Review: COPENHAGEN at Hampstead Theatre

Frayn is now 92, but I was delighted to see him in attendance for this revival of his award-winning 1998 play, which centres on the wartime decisions made by Jewish physicists who find themselves on opposing sides. Both Niels Bohr (Richard Schiff) and Werner Heisenberg (Damien Molony) see themselves as mathematicians and physicists first, and Jews second. One is considered the father of quantum theory and atomic structure, the other his friend and brilliant former pupil who has gone on to establish himself in academia. The first is Danish and lives in German occupied territory, the other is German and continues his research and lecturing but only at the behest of Hitler’s ruling Nazi party who are eager to develop and possess the ultimate weapon as a symbol of the Third Reich’s power.

Through an imagined post-death meeting, the play seeks to clarify what may or may not have transpired during a fraught but initially friendly meeting between the two men at Copenhagen during the war. Its' structure, requires phases of repetition to gradually introduced key elements of information and speculation. There is sufficient evidence in the 1992 declassified transcript documents of Heisenberg’s time spent at British Intelligence’s Farm Hall, to strongly suggest that he never seriously worked towards producing a nuclear bomb for the Nazis. In the play, much is made of the fact that the calculus required to determine the critical mass of uranium needed for a fission reaction, was something he specifically avoided engaging with, focusing instead on a nuclear reactor’s potential for producing energy. Bohr’s wife Margrethe (Alex Kingston) for the purposes of the play, acts as a foil between the two men, a mediator on occasions and a combatant at key moments, helping drive the narrative.

There is no doubting the intelligence applied in the material — it is estimated that Frayn read over 50 books on the subject while researching and writing the piece. In many ways this is both the play's strength and also its failing, for COPENHAGEN is a complex scientific word salad which loses much of its power when its flow is interrupted. Unfortunately on opening night — the renowned American cast member Richard Schiff (notable for playing Toby Ziegler in possibly the best American television series ever created, The West Wing) was as yet not fully conversant with the dialogue. Frayn’s writing is a minefield of technical and linguistic jargon which hardly trips off the tongue and so when the rhythm of conversational exchanges is lost, whole sections unravel. This results in a tense discomfort for the audience which finds itself collectively waiting for a performer to dry completely as they stumble and repeat phrases trying to get back on track. It’s an unfortunate reality of complicated scripts played in a live theatre setting and Mr Schiff simply was not ready. But to be fair, he was not the only actor to have momentary lapses in this notoriously tricksy and cerebral vehicle which requires absolute focus. Of the three, Damien Molony comes off best as Heisenberg although his “U” and “I” vowels frequently slipped into his strong native Irish accent which too became a source of momentary disconcertion. These gripes aside, it is a pleasure to have such weighty material re-examined and brought to life for a new audience and Hampstead Theatre are to be commended for mounting the revival under Michael Longhurst’s direction, performed on a spartan set of inky black hues and suspended lights by Joanna Scotcher which for me, evoked the imagined void of atoms and their spinning component parts.

That a play which discusses the unleashing of weapons of death and destruction, opened on the day coinciding with Trump’s appalling threats to reign (sic) down terror on a country and send it back to the Stone Age, was the subject of much discussion at both the interval and after the show. The simple fact is, that tyrants come in all hues and nationalities. It is the naive enablers and unquestioning acolytes who should perhaps be of greater concern. The play therefore serves as a salutary reminder of the worst excesses of human behaviour. Whilst many may feel that they are already exhausted at the daily bombardment of dispiriting news, it humoured me to remember that both the physicists at the centre of COPENHAGEN won the Nobel Prize - unlike a certain individual I could name!

The play continues at Hampstead Theatre until 2nd May and runs 2 hours 45 mins including an interval.

Copenhagen Tickets