Review of The Other Place at the National Theatre: Hauntingly Ambiguous or Frustratingly Elusive?

Rated 🍯🍯

Alexander Zeldin’s The Other Place at the National Theatre is a rivetingly complex piece, a play so steeped in ambiguity that each viewer is left to wander through its thickets of unresolved emotions, unanswered questions, and elusive backstories. Loosely inspired by Antigone, this production examines familial trauma, grief, and guilt through characters who seem perpetually at odds with themselves and each other.

Interpretation as a Form of Obsession

The Other Place teases its audience into an interpretive frenzy, giving just enough hints to allow a multitude of readings while withholding any conclusive revelations. The playwright seems almost to challenge us: can we sit with the discomfort of not fully understanding? Chris, played with subdued intensity by Tobias Menzies, is an uncle caught in the cognitive dissonance of a grief-laden past that he recalls incorrectly or incompletely. This selective memory forces the audience into a position of trying to make sense of what we’re told—and what’s left unsaid.

Emma D’Arcy’s Annie, explosive and mercurial, and Alison Oliver’s Issy, restrained and almost placid, are sisters haunted by their father’s death—a death whose circumstances remain shrouded. Is the play’s reluctance to clarify the trauma a critique of our need to “know” and categorize every tragedy, or simply a comment on the ways trauma itself resists clean narratives? If Zeldin intended to create an environment where we are meant to grapple with characters without understanding them fully, he’s succeeded.

Frustration with Character Motivations

For all its philosophical allure, the play leaves Theatre Bee feeling somewhat alienated. Issy’s blandness and unfulfilled ambition are clear, yet without insight into her internal world, her life trajectory appears as much a cipher as a character. Chris, driven yet timid, seems caught between detachment and an unacknowledged desperation for family connection. Annie’s abrupt emotional shifts and intense defensiveness hint at underlying mental illness, but the production offers neither the background nor the forward arc to help the audience understand or sympathize fully. We’re left grasping at shadows, haunted by characters whose motivations remain at arm’s length.

Multiple Interpretations: What Do They Suggest?

For viewers willing to engage with these gaps, the play invites endless interpretations. Could Annie’s protest about the ashes be less about reverence and more about her only remaining way to assert control in a fractured world? Is Chris’s attempt to “bury the past” a covert attempt to reconcile with Annie, suggesting an unhealthy attachment? The lack of clarity surrounding Issy and Annie’s relationship gives room for questions about familial loyalty: Is their bond one of mutual affection, or merely obligation born of shared trauma? This interpretive richness may be a strength for some and a source of irritation for others.

Final Thoughts: An Unresolved Narrative, a Successful Provocation?

Ultimately, The Other Place does more than present a family drama; it exposes our obsessive need to make meaning where there may be none. For those who enjoy the intellectual exercise of piecing together fragmented lives, Zeldin’s play may feel like a triumph of ambiguity. Yet, as Theatre Bee left the theatre, the lingering questions and lack of emotional resolution left a mark—not of disappointment but of frustration. This may, in fact, be the play’s success: leaving us with no clear answers, only the unsettling reminder that family histories are as complex and unfathomable as the relationships they create.

One of the most jarring elements of The Other Place’s set design is the glaring panel that hovers as both the “ceiling” of the living room and a source of harsh, unfiltered light. It looms so aggressively above the action that it becomes almost invasive—a bright, boxy eyesore that doesn’t blend seamlessly into the background but rather dominates the space in an almost confrontational way. This might be intentional, symbolizing the oppressive nature of the unresolved family history, but the result for the audience is disorienting. Instead of drawing us deeper into the domestic sphere, this panel keeps us on edge, acting as a visual reminder of the play’s discomforting themes. Yet, it could also be argued that its in-your-face nature just plainly annoys the viewer and precludes a full engagement with the show — that was the bee’s experience, at least.

So while the bee personally cannot award more than two stars, it will acknowledge the standing ovation that the show received from the audience; clearly, the show was very well received and enjoyed by most.

Watched October 2024 at the National Theatre, London. The Other Place runs through 9 November 2024.

Theatre Bee