Claire Foy and Matt Smith Give Outstanding Performances in Duncan Macmillan's Climate Play

It's the two-hander the theatre industry has been waiting for all year. The iconic on-screen couple who so successfully helped hit TV series The Crown become a staple box-set must-see are back, this time cast as a couple significantly younger though no less fraught with their own burdens. The mere mention of Claire Foy and Matt Smith gracing a London stage ensured that tickets to Lungs sold out for almost every performance. One of those productions that was a hit long before the first previews had even run.

But what exactly IS Lungs about, and does the play itself even matter when the casting is so good? If Al Pacino's ill-fated turn in Broadway's 2015 China Doll is anything to go by, then yes. A glittering cast might be one of the box office's favourite tricks but, when it comes to the art of Broadway, it does not guarantee that something memorable will be created. Well, memorable for the right reasons. It is a wonderful thing then when art and eminence collide. And that, I am very pleased to say, is exactly what is happening at the Old Vic's Lungs.

Smith and Foy play a young couple debating whether or not to have a child in a world unfit to house many more humans. Written in 2011, Duncan Macmillan's play is perfectly timed against today's backdrop of rebellions against Extinction, Brexit, and other man-made disasters. Unfortunately for Smith, his character once again exists largely to serve Foy, or rather to fuel the majestic, electric performance she delivers. It really is the stuff awards are made of, and is carried for nearly the entire 90 minutes by Foy's exceptional talents and unrelenting energy.

It's a shame then that it is the play itself, and certainly not the actors, which cause the production to falter two-thirds of the way through. The pace slows, the couple splits thanks to an annoyingly cliche, and sentimentality gets in the way of substance. The play was so much more than a relationship drama up until that point, that Lungs would still be exceptional if those slower scenes were scrapped entirely. Instead, let the play continue plunging onwards towards its conclusion, as humanity plunges towards our own uncertain end. And if Foy's fire does eventually start to die down without those moments of respite, it will still be one of the most significant performances the West End has seen for some time.

View our show pages for more information about Lungs, Old Vic Theatre.