Nixon in Agony review – Berkoff gets inside disgraced president's head
about 5 years in The guardian
Available onlineRichard Nixon’s downfall may be resonant with our age, but in Adam Donen’s experimental sound dramatisation the psychological noise drowns out the story
Hottest front-room seats: the best theatre and dance online
Ever since Richard Nixon delivered his resignation speech in August 1974, a steady slew of fictional Nixons have attempted to unpick the slippery contradictions in his US presidential term, and his character. In this audio play, Steven Berkoff’s defeated, angry and anguished president-in-disgrace is closer to Anthony Hopkins’s neurotic Nixon in Oliver Stone’s film than Frank Langella’s smooth, hard survivor in Ron Howard’s Frost/Nixon.
Nixon’s story seems particularly resonant for our age, with its political paranoias, memory lapses, claims of misleading news and impeachment hearings, so this dramatisation feels timely. Set inside Nixon’s mind on the evening before his resignation, it is written and directed by the composer Adam Donen, who remotely created it with audio producer Robert Harder. Continue reading...
Who is popular today?
