Under Milk Wood is on the National Theatre stage since June 16, but the press night took place last Wednesday (24), which has brought some good reviews to the production and Michael Sheen’s performance. You will find some reviews below, but before them, check out some photos from both the rehearsals and the play:
Now to the reviews:
Nor could you wish for a more loquacious, richer narrator than hirsute, woody-voiced Sheen, who looks like he’s been training outside an off-licence.
Evening Standard (4/5 stars)
Ler maisA charismatic Michael Sheen is part showman, part shaman in this staging of Dylan Thomas’s 1954 radio play, conjuring a Welsh town into lyrical, beguiling life with mostly older actors on a bare stage.
Faith Healer short run at the Old Vic as part of the In Camera project was concluded last Saturday, 19, to positive reviews. Read below what the critics are saying about the play and Michael Sheen’s performance as Francis Hardy:
In the role of Frank, Michael Sheen captures the bonhomie and charm of a born performer, who only seems to exist when he’s in front of an audience. In his second monologue, which concludes the play, Sheen reveals the pain and deep insecurity underneath Frank’s acts of self-dramatisation and the terrible consequences of Frank’s loss of faith in himself and his abilities.
Sheen (Good Omens), an actor capable of volcanic zeal and rich musical vocalism, plays the “Fantastic” Frank Hardy, itinerant layer-on of hands, who we learn is often drunk and in self-exile from his native Ireland. Frank travels to backwater villages in Wales and Scotland with his miserable wife Grace (Indira Varma) and unctuous, Cockney manger Teddy (David Threlfall).
The Guardian (4/5 stars)
Ler maisModestly billed as a “scratch” production, with sparing use of music and some occasionally jarring extreme closeups, the evening has three superb performances. As the ironically named Frank, Sheen gives as rich a delivery as you could wish of the mesmeric incantation of Welsh village names remembered from the trio’s travels. His three-piece black suit is not as shabby as Friel’s stage directions advise, but he looks dressed for a funeral, which brings its own resonance.
Quiz is coming to AMC on Sunday, May 31 and is already Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, with a score 96% at its Tomatometer and a critic consensus that reads: “With clever writing, a slick production, and a pitch perfect Michael Sheen, Quiz crafts a captivating snapshot of a wild scandal that will keep viewers on their toes.”
Read what critics are saying about the three-part drama and Michael’s performance:
However, the most eye-catching and ear-grabbing performance was Michael Sheen’s razzle-dazzle turn as Chris Tarrant, the quiz show’s host. Sheen combined a note-perfect impersonation with a spiky character study, underscoring a defining trait of all TV personalities: the gnashing teeth beneath the smarmy smile. Nobody emerged unscathed from Quiz, but the skewering of broadcaster-kind and their delusional vanities was its top prize.
The Times II (4/5 stars)
If Michael Sheen’s splendid impression of Chris Tarrant did not impress then, please, watch it again. Apparently Tarrant approached Sheen at an event just after he had been cast to play him and said: “You look nothing like me,” which is true, but with a blond wig and fake tan, Sheen was transformed. Close your eyes and his voice, the intonation, his little high-pitched laughs and the way he called the phone-a-friend helpers at home to say “John? Hi, THIS is CHRIS Tarrant,” were Rory Bremner good. It was almost as slick as Sheen’s Tony Blair and his Brian Clough; he didn’t have the lead role, but he kind of stole the show.
The Guardian (3/5 stars)
Ler maisBut grab the public imagination it did, so much so that nearly 20 years on it has been made into Quiz (ITV), a three-part drama starring Matthew Macfadyen as the major and Sian Clifford as his wife, Diana (both so far following their media portrayals at least, as hapless and Lady Macbethesque respectively), and – most eye-catchingly – Michael Sheen as a pitch perfect Chris Tarrant. If you close your eyes, it’s him. The physical resemblance is uncanny, too, but in a more complicated way – you have to go back to the original to remind yourself that the presenter really does have that plasticky a rictus grin and adjust your credulity accordingly.
Dolittle was released on Friday and unfortunately is getting panned by critics, currently rotten at 18% on Rotten Tomatoes’ Tomatometer (79% at the audience score). There are some lovely words for Michael’s performance as Dr. Blair Müdfly, which you can read below:
Our reluctant hero [Dolittle] will have to voyage to both of the other locations that weren’t cut out during reshoots, and he’ll have to get there before the chinless doctor Müdfly (a delicious Michael Sheen, making a glorious meal out of table scraps) is able to find the magic whatsit for himself.
Ler mais(…) the only wholly successful element of Dolittle is its villain. Michael Sheen plays Dr. Blair Müdfly, personal doctor to the queen of England and rival to the legendary Dolittle. Where Downey is fumbling with a clumsy Welsh accent and mawkish melancholy, Sheen is on fire, incensed by Müdfly’s jealousy and embracing this property’s camp past. With a severe goatee, bulging eyes, and a voice ever on the verge of breaking into a squeal of rage, Sheen gifts this fumbling film a surge of energy and hilarious pettiness. Perhaps the joke that proved the most silly yet satisfying is when Dolittle mutters that the man is a “chinless wonder,” then the cut leaps across leagues of open ocean to Müdfly’s warship where he’s looking through a spyglass and yelps, “I think he said something about my chin!” Sheen is the only one who seems to truly embrace what over-the-top fun this could have been. Bless him.
Prodigal Son season one premiered last Monday night on FOX and is getting mixed reviews, currently ranking at 59% (rotten) on Rotten Tomatoes’ Tomatometer, even though Michael’s performance is being praised by most critics. Read below some selected excerpts of reviews published so far and click on the links to read them. Warning: some of them have spoilers, so do not read them if you haven’t seen episode one “Pilot” yet!
At the show’s center, Sheen cleverly carries off a character with all the urbane wit of Hannibal Lecter, but evil buried further under the surface. He doesn’t kill because, as in Lecter’s case, it’s an amusing game that proves his superiority. He kills because he is governed by forces he cannot understand or control. The show, though, is completely in control, deploying Sheen carefully, well, and never too much.
TV Guide (Rating: 4/5)
Dr. Whitly’s crimes are unspeakable, sure, but he presents himself as a peach. And somehow funny? Michael Sheen is dancing with light feet in this role, clearly having a blast playing a serial killer who is at once a duplicitous menace and a charming conversationalist. And he really does give Martin the air of caring deeply about his son in his own wild, and often controlling, way.
Sheen outshines anyone else he shares screen space with, gripping the audience with his masterful portrayal of a serial killer who also wishes to be a doting father to his son – to reconnect with him despite his past and to reconnect because of his past and Malcolm’s present.
Den of Geek (Rating: 3/5)
Ler maisMichael Sheen puts on a mannered comic performance reminiscent of his Wesley Snipes character in NBC’s sitcom 30 Rock. Every day references mean little to his Martin Whitly as he was raised a little differently. He gives off an air of studious indifference, but will still break his inner bad guy code for a hug from his son, who manages to always stay one step beyond the shackles which bind the surgeon to his work space.