Grace Pervades – Theatre Royal Haymarket – Saturday 30th May 2026

(Rated 4/5) For this theatre day out, my companion and I agreed to meet at an old haunt – “Dug Out Corner” as there used to be an eatery called ‘The Dug Out’ there many moons ago. It is now ‘Steak and Company’ - you choose your meat and are given it alongside a choice of salt, butter and sauce and a hot stone tablet to cook it on yourself. (So delicious as is their sticky toffee pudding!) I arrived pretty early and looked for somewhere to wait for my friend. I could see a bench behind a large statue of someone. I thought I better check who they are so I could message where I’d be sitting. It turned out to be Sir Henry Irving and ‘Steak and Company’ are on Irving Street!

David Hare’s ‘Grace Pervades’ is a highly ambitious play in the main about the contributions of Sir Henry Irving and Ellen Terry to theatre. Ralph Fiennes plays Irving and Miranda Raison is the Grace Pervading of the title within and emanating from Ellen Terry. I am fascinated by any history of the theatre and this felt so important – that and such a moving interview with Ralph Fiennes on ‘Lorraine’ in which he shone with enthusiasm about Victorian Theatre, the protagonists and intelligently extoled on Shakespeare and all we can learn from him about human nature. He won me over completely, so of course, I was going to give it a go if I could. Unfortunately, the tickets seemed very pricey indeed so I chose Royal Circle rather than stalls, and because I am struggling with my right knee, second row which gives more room, and I sat on an aisle seat so I could stick my leg out to the side. Rather amusingly there was a man in the front row who was doing the same with his left leg! Also, connected to that my companion noted Ralph has very skinny legs so a leg theme going on 😉 My companion also noted he would look good in Kinky Boots, and I also need to confess that part way through the performance I was wishing I was watching Kinky Boots again. Sadly, I didn’t feel the enthusiasm for it I had felt watching Ralph’s interview. My friend agreed something was missing emotionally for or failing to land with us.

In the play, David Hare has Ellen Terry’s children – Edward Gordon Craig (Jordan Metcalfe) and Edith Craig (Ruby Ashbourne Serkis) – narrate the events over the lifetimes of Henry and Ellen from their meeting up to her death (after his) – and within that jumping back and forth in time Ellen’s children’s contributions to theatre also. I felt it started beautifully with a montage of Ellen performing a wealth of Shakespearian roles alongside Henry and the ensemble, and I really felt her psychologically and highly expressively embodying each part. Yet it seemed to dip from there as soon as they were both themselves – or rather Miranda as Ellen and Raph as Henry. I felt I couldn’t connect with or really feel emotional expression from either of them. Having heard it has really impressive reviews, I felt we were missing/not getting something and had got it wrong! Thinking back, I now believe part of the problem to be that Hare was trying to include way too much to fit in all the history from all his sources. Not only that, it felt jam-packed with exposition – not just in the narration from the adult children – but also even between Henry and Ellen. Show not tell is the key, David! There was a large cast of characters too, feeling more like name-checking key people of the time including Isadora Duncan, Stanislavski and Vita Sackville-West, which again for me took away from the intimate creation of moving interaction, which I would assume Henry and Ellen achieved together in reality. It left me wanting to know more on their contributions to theatre as I felt I got too little! Hm. A real shame. Or could it also be that being so far from the stage you don’t feel absorbed into the world – you’re too detached?

I do think everyone performed well and the production was visually stunning with wonderful sets and glorious costumes of the time. I think I’ve seen David Hare’s work before and felt the same – or rather felt that I didn’t feel enough. So possibly he is just not to my taste. I’m in no doubt he worked very hard on the piece and paid a lot of attention to detail, so, in spite of all the above, a very admirable effort, and he certainly shouldn’t worry about this restricted reviewer when he has rave reviews from elsewhere! Grace Pervades – Review by TheRestrictedReviewer © 2026