National Theatre: Mrs Warren’s Profession

*From the organisers (correct at the time of publishing), please see the organiser’s website for the latest details.

Cast: Imelda Staunton, Bessie Carter, Kevin Doyle, Robert Glenister

Written By: Bernard Shaw

Directed by: Dominic Cooke

George Bernard Shaw’s 1893 Mrs Warren’s Profession still feels startlingly modern in Dominic Cooke’s trenchant production. Cooke pairs traditional Victorian costumes and a pastoral revolve with a ghostly chorus of white-clad women, hinting at darker social realities beneath the polite surface. Imelda Staunton makes a quietly magnetic Mrs Warren—complex, unshamed and emotionally resonant—while Bessie Carter’s Vivie is a clear-headed, Cambridge-educated foil whose confrontations with her mother drive the drama. The cast’s comic male foils and the stripped-back staging intensify the play’s moral questions about sex work, capitalism and respectability; despite running close to two hours without an interval, the pace rarely flags. Staunton’s powerhouse performance, Cooke’s sharply contrasted staging and the play’s urgent, still-relevant themes make this both entertaining and thought-provoking theatre.