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@sohoplace, London
Writers: Joe Murphy and Joe Robertson
Producer: Royal Shakespeare Theatre and Good Chance
Directors: Stephen Daldry and Justin Martin
Dates of run: until May 3
Running time: Two hours, 35 minutes, including interval
Cast: Kristin Atherton, Jenna Augen, Karen Barredo, Olivia Barrowclough, Jorge Bosch, Jeffrey Chekai, Nancy Crane, Alvaro Flores, Andrea Gatchalian, Mark Hammersley, Moe Idris, Togo Igawa, Aïcha Kossoko, Stephen Kunken, Kwong Loke, Sibylla Meienberg, Dale Rapley, Raad Rawi, Ferdy Roberts, Duncan Wisbey
Oil – the fuel of Western capitalism – was the issue in 1997 when the Kyoto Protocol delivered the first set of targets to limit its use. Nearly three decades later, far too little has changed.
A collaboration between Good Chance and the Royal Shakespeare Company, the first performances of “Kyoto” in Stratford last year earned rave reviews.
At the West End’s newest theatre @sohoplace, the audience was, if anything, even more enthusiastic for this thrilling account of an epic negotiation that could not feel more urgent now a climate-denying oil-lover has been returned to the White House.
Writers – and alchemists – Joe Murphy and Joe Robertson, whose credentials were established by their play “The Jungle” about migrants stranded in Calais, have transformed volumes of research. Anything from facts that will send us Googling for verification – such as the oil companies understood the science as early as 1959 – to the hours of tedious argument over the commas and full stops that eventually became part of the Kyoto Protocol are made gripping matters of life and death. They are also frequently hilarious.
The action hinges, above all, on Washington lawyer Don Pearlman, brought back to vivid, restless life by Stephen Kunken, and former lawyer and leading climate diplomat Raul Estrada-Oyuela, played by a loveable Jorge Bosch.
The tension between them is emotional as well as intellectual, as Pearlman denies his motive is money. He too, he says, is driven by conviction. As the son of an émigré Lithuanian Jew, he says, his ideal is the American way of life; the belief America will always “figure it out” without having to give anything up.
Though dominant, the leading roles leave much tor the rest of cast to relish.
Ferdy Roberts as “Britain” reminds us of the gritty talent of John Prescott, who learnt how to negotiate in the docks of northern England, while Andrea Gatchalian, as the representative of the sinking small island Kiribati, is far fiercer than the delicate flower in her neat hair would suggest.
The joy of it all is that “Kyoto” represents a triumph of hope that, in the safe space of a beautiful, sustainably-built West End theatre, unites an audience. The anguish, as we pour out into the streets outside, is how to keep that hope alive.
Kyoto
@sohoplace, London
Writers: Joe Murphy and Joe Robertson
Producer: Royal Shakespeare Theatre and Good Chance
Directors: Stephen Daldry and Justin Martin
Dates of run: until May 3
Running time: Two hours, 35 minutes, including interval
Cast: Kristin Atherton, Jenna Augen, Karen Barredo, Olivia Barrowclough, Jorge Bosch, Jeffrey Chekai, Nancy Crane, Alvaro Flores, Andrea Gatchalian, Mark Hammersley, Moe Idris, Togo Igawa, Aïcha Kossoko, Stephen Kunken, Kwong Loke, Sibylla Meienberg, Dale Rapley, Raad Rawi, Ferdy Roberts, Duncan Wisbey
Oil – the fuel of Western capitalism – was the issue in 1997 when the Kyoto Protocol delivered the first set of targets to limit its use. Nearly three decades later, far too little has changed.
A collaboration between Good Chance and the Royal Shakespeare Company, the first performances of “Kyoto” in Stratford last year earned rave reviews.
At the West End’s newest theatre @sohoplace, the audience was, if anything, even more enthusiastic for this thrilling account of an epic negotiation that could not feel more urgent now a climate-denying oil-lover has been returned to the White House.
Writers – and alchemists – Joe Murphy and Joe Robertson, whose credentials were established by their play “The Jungle” about migrants stranded in Calais, have transformed volumes of research. Anything from facts that will send us Googling for verification – such as the oil companies understood the science as early as 1959 – to the hours of tedious argument over the commas and full stops that eventually became part of the Kyoto Protocol are made gripping matters of life and death. They are also frequently hilarious.
The action hinges, above all, on Washington lawyer Don Pearlman, brought back to vivid, restless life by Stephen Kunken, and former lawyer and leading climate diplomat Raul Estrada-Oyuela, played by a loveable Jorge Bosch.
The tension between them is emotional as well as intellectual, as Pearlman denies his motive is money. He too, he says, is driven by conviction. As the son of an émigré Lithuanian Jew, he says, his ideal is the American way of life; the belief America will always “figure it out” without having to give anything up.
Though dominant, the leading roles leave much tor the rest of cast to relish.
Ferdy Roberts as “Britain” reminds us of the gritty talent of John Prescott, who learnt how to negotiate in the docks of northern England, while Andrea Gatchalian, as the representative of the sinking small island Kiribati, is far fiercer than the delicate flower in her neat hair would suggest.
The joy of it all is that “Kyoto” represents a triumph of hope that, in the safe space of a beautiful, sustainably-built West End theatre, unites an audience. The anguish, as we pour out into the streets outside, is how to keep that hope alive.
Barbara Lewis © 2025.
By Barbara Lewis • added recently on London Grip, plays, theatre • Tags: Barbara Lewis, plays, theatre