"LANNY" REVIEW: Bristol Old Vic. Stunning To Look At, But Too Timid To Truly Cast A Spell

Bristol Old Vic has thrown everything at "Lanny" and, on a technical level, much of it is extraordinary. Rebecca Jane Wood's magnificent set peels back layer after layer of village life, while the shadow play, projections and superb sound design create an atmosphere that is by turns unsettling, beautiful and immersive.

Yet for all its ambition, this adaptation of Max Porter's acclaimed novel never quite captures the full power of the source material. A beautiful, haunting production that looks and sounds magnificent, but is ultimately too timid to reach its full potential.

The central problem is that it feels too cautious. A story steeped in folklore, myth and menace cries out for boldness, but Nancy Medina's production spends much of its running time playing it safe. The first half drifts through familiar family drama and village intrigue when it should be embracing the eerie strangeness lurking beneath the surface. Too often, just as the play threatens to become genuinely weird or frightening, it pulls back.

After his parents move to a remote village outside of Bristol. imaginative and adventurous 10-year-old Lanny (played by young performer Lucian Thomas) takes solace in the surrounding forest and stories of Dead Papa Toothwort - the local name for the Green Man.

While his mother Jolie (a terrific Hanora Kamen) encourages his fascinations and suggests he take informal drawing lessons with reclusive artist Pete (a beautifully sensitive Richard Cant), his father Robert (Raj Bajaj) is suspicious of Pete and increasingly wary of the way his son is allowed to run wild across the countryside. The village’s quiet talk of folklore and the Dead Papa Toothwort slowly infiltrates the minds of Jolie and Robert and leads them to assume the worst about their new community.

In the original book, Dead Papa Toothworth’s purpose is hazy. He watches and listens, absorbing all the speech and thoughts of the inhabitants: “he swims in it, he gobbles it up and wraps himself in it, he rubs it all over himself, he pushes it into his holes…” This allows Porter to experiment with form, as words and phrases swirl over the page, the random fragments building up into a coherent picture of 21st century village life.

Porter’s book is also about the increased limits we set on children’s freedoms, and our fear of child abuse.

"Lanny" is a novel that thrives on messiness, contradiction, and ambiguity. Medina’s production often feels determined to organise those impulses into something clearer and more coherent.

The cast, meanwhile, are uniformly strong and engaging even when the adaptation begins to lose momentum. Hanora Kamen delivers a beautifully observed performance as Lanny’s mother Jolie. There is a quiet uncertainty to her work, a sense of somebody trying desperately to make sense of a world that increasingly refuses to behave according to familiar rules.

Warm, vulnerable and utterly believable, she delivers a performance of remarkable emotional depth, grounding the play even as reality begins to fracture around her.

Richard Cant is equally impressive as Pete, the reclusive artist who becomes Lanny's mentor and friend. His performance is tender, funny and deeply humane, providing the show's emotional heart. The scenes between Pete and Lanny are among the production's most affecting and beautifully realised moments.

When Medina finally lets the creative team off the leash, Lanny bursts into life. The final half-hour embraces folklore, nightmare, and spectacle with real confidence. The imagery is striking; the atmosphere gripping and the production suddenly becomes the show it has spent two hours promising to be.

That is what makes "Lanny " so frustrating. Almost every ingredient works. The performances are excellent, the design work is outstanding, and the sound engineering is first-class. But despite all that talent and technical brilliance, the production too often feels reluctant to surrender to its own weirdness.

What remains is a handsome, haunting, and frequently engrossing evening that fascinates more than it truly enchants. A visually stunning folk-horror drama lifted by outstanding performances and brilliant design, but ultimately too timid to cast the spell it should.

Lanny is at Bristol Old Vic from October 16-November 7 at 7.30pm with additional 2.30pm matinee shows on Thursday and Saturday.