Orlando Bloom in In Celebration

David Storey's drama In Celebration originally played at the Royal Court in 1969 and is currently enjoying a revival at the Duke of York's Theatre. It recounts the story of a family reunion, as three adult brothers return to their parental home, ostensibly to celebrate the 40th wedding anniversary of their mother and their miner father. Much attention has been drawn to the casting of Hollywood pin-up Orlando Bloom in the play. Did critics enjoy the star in the show?

Here's a sampling of what they had to say: 

Mark Shenton in his Theatre.com Review: “There’s nowt, as someone might say in David Storey’s In Celebration, to celebrate amongst the tense, uneasy, fractured web of family relationships that the play lays bare, but its return to the West End is paradoxically a cause for rejoicing.The play itself reveals the frequent absence of affection, let alone love, in the home of a Northern miner, Mr. Shaw...when he and his wife are visited by their three adult sons, returning home to celebrate their parents’ 40th wedding anniversary…Even if much of the attention that this production has received inevitably surrounds the celebrity casting of British movie actor Orlando Bloom…there’s also an integrity and intensity throughout the casting here that places him merely as a part of a finely-calibrated ensemble, not as a stand-out over it…In Anna Mackmin’s beautifully felt production…Bloom is joined by the wonderful Paul Hilton as his eldest brother Andrew (the former solicitor) and Gareth Farr as Colin, the negotiator whose professional skills can’t negotiate around the personal landmines that keep threatening to detonate in the family, particularly over an unspoken grief that forever haunts them all. As the mother, Dearbhla Molloy’s howl of anguish is ripped from the heart, in a play that ultimately rips your own apart.”

Benedict Nightingale in The London Times: "Storey's work isn't just alive but has a kick capable of separating today's audiences from their emotional teeth. Bloom is Steven Shaw, one of three sons returning from the comfy, middle-class South to celebrate his parents' ruby wedding in the Yorkshire village where his father works as a coalminer. Superficially it's an unrewarding part…but an important one. He's a teacher who hasn't only abandoned the novel he was writing but has lost his old fire and ire. In his aloof, broken way he's the most troubling proof of Storey's thesis: that education and social mobility can damage the heart as well as open the mind. Does this idea, which comes from Storey's own experience as a miner's son made good, date the play? A bit…But we still read Lawrence's Sons and Lovers and in many ways In Celebration is wiser and more balanced than that."

Tim Healy and Orlando Bloom in In Celebration

Michael Billington in The Guardian: “What makes it a fine play is Storey's use of the specifics of family life to explore a cultural malaise. Andrew's anger springs from the deification of a mother who, in Lawrentian terms, feels she married beneath her…But Storey is also addressing the alienation of sons educated out of their class and suffering a peculiar English mix of guilt and insecurity. Andrew's explanation for his sense of hurt may be a bit glib. But through Steven, Storey nails the traumatised rootlessness that comes from feeling one's life has no significance. Bloom lends Steven exactly the right sense of haunted taciturnity and withdrawn moodiness…Paul Hilton as the vengeful Andrew, however, really has to motor the action, and does so with a quivering, attenuated figure suggestive of a Wakefield Hamlet. Even his few gestures of affection, such as dancing with his mother, are replete with irony...The result is a richly satisfying evening that reminds you of Storey's ability to confront unpalatable domestic truths and to portray an England in which class is still a governing determinant.”

Charles Spencer in The Daily Telegraph: “Director Anna Mackmin, with the help of suitably dreary designs by Lez Brotherston, certainly doesn’t short-change the audience when it comes to wretchedness, while a brilliantined and moustached Orlando Bloom spends the entire evening looking pale and interesting. It’s not a challenging role but he remembers his lines and doesn’t bump into the furniture. Tim Healy and Dearbhla Molloy are genuinely moving as the parents who have done their best in vain and Paul Hilton brings an edge of danger to the stage as vengeful brother Andrew…But frankly you’d only recommend this play to your worst enemy.”

Rhonda Koenig in The Independent: “’It's like a museum, this is!’ says Andrew (Paul Hilton), back in his parents' Yorkshire home. ‘It hasn't changed in 500 years.’ The faded floral wallpaper, the unframed mirror, the protective covers on furniture any sane person would abandon to the elements—all these do look like exhibits in the Museum of Dull, but the play that inhabits this setting is something of a museum piece as well…David Storey's drama of 1969 may be younger than most of the first-night audience, but already it seems a relic of a time when men were no good at expressing their feelings, and women weren't much better…The play also lacks the sympathy for women that would be expected of plays written a short time later. Mother is fingered as the family villain, a chilly expert in ‘domestic science’ and ‘human hygiene’. But the now-clichéd silent scream is Storey's only acknowledgment of her own pain.”

Nicholas de Jongh in The Evening Standard: “The test will be to see whether new-generation theatre audiences will be tempted both by Orlando Bloom, whose first shot at stage acting is a bit of a miss, and the chance of learning some invaluable social history, theatrically conveyed…In Celebration by neglected Royal Court favourite David Storey, harks back to the social-realist school of novelists, dramatists and film directors who brought grimy, industrial England into national view…Bloom's troubled, taciturn Steven is sometimes obliged to squat: Anna Mackmin's production needs more chairs and far greater charges of passion and engagement, particularly in the first torpid half…Bloom's sexual charisma and androgynous prettiness before the camera vanishes clean away on the stage's more distant perspective...Fortunately Dearbhla Molloy's astonishing Mrs Shaw does capture the play's complex essence. She exudes a strange, sad reserve, a sense of shuttered emotion.”

[AD]Paul Callan in The Daily Express: "Dark family secrets are exposed and from the pent-up anger comes a doomed vision of the boys' childhood. There are some impressive performances—in particular Paul Hilton as Andrew, the tortured failure who tears back all the pretence of family unity…Gareth Farr as the solid, worried Colin, with his cars, salary and secrets is powerful and telling in what is a difficult role. But sadly Orlando Bloom, in his London stage debut, is disappointing. This is not entirely his fault. The part of the frustrated and crushed Steven is too small and lacks the opportunity for spreading any dramatic wings. But the evening really went to the ever-splendid Tim Healy as the father, a man full of miner's bluff bonhomie. He portrayed, with great sensitivity, a man who was hiding the truth about his family from himself... Dearbhla Molloy gave a finely drawn portrait of the mother–a matrimonial power, wielding influence in a pinny."

Quentin Letts in The Daily Mail: "Don't be misled by the title into thinking that In Celebration is light-hearted. It is a gloomy, northern coalmines affair with a pulverisingly slow first half. I say that with a certain trepidation, for playwright David Storey has been known to punch critics. Yet this 1969 play is worth persevering with. Use the first half, as I did last night, to catch up on a few zeds. Things improve markedly after the interval and by the end all the unhappiness of Mr. Storey's characters has a cleansing effect on the soul. Their misery reminds you to be glad—if you have one—for the blessings of your own family."