Some plays have "mandatory" written all over them, and this was one of them mostly thanks to the name Simon Stephens though the name Andrew Scott helped too. I have a Google Alert set up for Simon Stephens and that has led me to several of his plays across London in recent years.
There was quite a buzz about this play because of the recent high-profile performances by Andrew Scott but despite waiting a couple of hours to negotiate The Old Vic's online queueing system it was fairly easy to get the seat that I wanted, Lilian Baylis Circle A-13 for £20. I was almost tempted to go for a better seat but, to be honest, charging £80 for a forty minute performance seemed something like robbery.
Sea Wall was first performed at Bush Theatre and I am sure was fantastic in that space but it got somewhat lost in the relative vastness of Old Vic, neither the play nor the performance were enough to fill the space. It was interesting enough and for £20 I could not complain about the cost but it did not live up to the hype and that made it something of a disappointment.
