It’s no mystery why this gleefully silly spy parody remains an audience favourite. The show is a rollicking breeding ground for 100 minutes of non-stop mayhem as our four fearless actors play 130 roles in a dazzling display of quick changes, inventive stagecraft and high-energy hilarity..
Under the direction of Damien Ryan, four accomplished actors, Lisa McCune, Ian Stenlake and the Umbilical Brothers, David Collins and Shane Dundas, strut their brilliance. We have all loved Alfred Hitchcock’s classic spy thriller but throw in a dash of Monty Python-style lunacy and out pops The 39 Steps adapted by Patrick Barlow from the novel by John Buchan.
On stage, suave but unsuspecting Richard Hannay finds himself framed for murder and becomes tangled in a web of spies, secrets and seductive strangers. To clear his name, he must outrun the law, outwit international agents and survive a string of increasingly absurd adventures. Our upper-lipped hero gets drawn into a deadly game of espionage after a chance encounter with a femme fatale while attending a West End show. Soon he is racing across Scotland, wrongly accused of murder, trying to evade a gang of Germans and the constabulary.
This action packed thriller is being told in a deliberately lo-fi theatrical way, with extraordinary hard-working actors doing costume quick changes, while dragging various props to evoke everything from a train to a bridge. It’s sheer music hall performance, as out of whack as Hannay’s various love interests: one minute a pining Highlands housewife, then a haughty blonde Pamela.
The play retains the pace, passion and varied twists that Hannay faces along the way while the rest of the characters are superbly played with admirable clowning, quick changes and cheeky to cheezy aplomb. The staging is deceptively clever in presenting the thriller-like tension of espionage, derring-do and murder. It takes a lot of skill to make something look this hilariously ropey. Overacting is the name of the game and the cast throw themselves into this with gusto. The chase across the moors is performed in silhouette with human shadows, miniature 2D cut outs and 3D models of biplanes. The lighting and sound complemented the stagecraft.
It’s good old-school silly comedy.
THE 39 STEPS is playing the Drama Theatre at the Sydney Opera House until the 30th August 2025 and then goes on tour, next to the Civic Theatre, Newcastle between the 2nd and 6th September 2025.
