Review: INTER ALIA at Wyndhams Theatre

Stuart King 14 April, 2026, 16:31

She dazzled patrons on the National Theatre’s Lyttelton stage last year and will surely dazzle New York audiences when she opens on Broadway, but before then, London audiences have another chance to experience Rosamund Pike’s bravura central performance as Judge Jessica Parks, in Suzie Miller’s legal family drama INTER ALIA, where she delivers a multi-faceted central performance with vigour and élan which has already won for her the coveted Best Actress gongs at both the prestigious Critics’ Circle Awards and the Oliviers. Who is to say she won’t add the Tony to that growing collection?

Rosamund Pike in INTER ALIA. Image provided by production.

When not presiding over sensitive rape cases at court, Jesse is wife to barrister Michael (Jamie Glover) and a fretting mother to son Harry (Cormac McAlinden). Through a sequence of flashbacks which ebb and flow seamlessly with the present, we see Harry as a very young boy and experience his mother’s anxiety and determination to raise a young man who demonstrates and understands the need to respect girls and women.

In the early part of the play, we learn of Jesse’s drive to suppress the inevitable patriarchal smugness of male barristers in her court. Breathing into her microphone whilst accompanied by guitar and drums, she unpicks the staid remnants of historical courtroom hierarchy, revelling in the control she can wield as a woman with the power to ensure victims are treated with dignity, compassion and respect. This is particularly relevant during the overzealous cross-examination of plaintiffs by defence teams who invariably deploy discrediting tactics. She intercedes using her status and well-honed soft skills to stymie their efforts with (as she puts it) a tone which cuts through tendons and bone. It is one of several feminist highlights that audibly strike a chord with female audience members. Another, almost gets lost in the freneticism of her excitable preparations for a large dinner party, where she dashes back and forth only to have Michael swagger into the scene with his single notable contribution to proceedings, the cheese, which she notes wryly, has been delivered!

We chuckle as she dives in and tackles head-on those awkward and embarrassing conversations between parent and youth. The dialogue deployed in these scenes is frequently laced with stilted and mortifying subject matter for her son, which alludes to bullying, grooming, physical development, sex and consent. It is evident that her work and home life overlap and impact each other in situations which, for men, have traditionally been far easier to compartmentalise and separate. The watching of porn and the events at a frat party during which Harry may have had sex with a girl he has known since childhood, create the most uncomfortable of all conflicts. The situation becomes the crux of the play, testing Jesse’s inclination to save her son’s future, which is seemingly threatened by a single, uncharacteristic, hormone-led act. Tempered by her long held inclination to protect innocent girls whose lives can be forever tainted by the stigma and trauma of rape, she is forced to walk a tightrope which no parent ever wants to be faced with.

The parallels with Miller’s other legal hit Prima Facie (which was also directed by Justin Martin) are obvious, as Jesse assesses the fitness for purpose of the current justice system when applying onus of proof protections to defendants. Exploring this vein, one of the most powerful and harrowing moments in an otherwise often funny and enlightening production, occurs when Michael breaks down. Convulsed in tears, he has realised his personal limitations in offering useful advice to his son, given that his generation had always promoted the idea that pursuing a girl until she relented to sexual congress, was simply considered part of the mating game and as such, widely condoned by society as acceptable and even understandable behaviour. By its very nature, this moment underpins how much societal attitudes have changed, and just how much the law still needs to catch-up and be a true reflection of current mores.

With set and costume design by Miriam Buether and lighting, sound and video design contributions from Natasha Chivers, Ben and Max Ringham and Willie Williams, INTER ALIA continues at Wyndham’s Theatre until 20th June and plays 1 hour and 40mins straight through without interval.

Inter Alia Tickets