Nye at the National Theatre – Reviews round-up

"Michael Sheen is perfect in this surefire hit"

"Nimble study of Aneurin 'Nye' Bevan, firebrand Welsh health minister who founded the NHS, is a taut and fluid triumph"

"Price wears his copious research commendably lightly, leaving us with the pleasant sensation of feeling steeped in but not overwhelmed by the subject matter."

"Rufus Norris, the National’s outgoing artistic director, deserves a big hit and this is it. His production is taut and fluid, making fine use of an ensemble company to add depth and texture. Sheen is the perfect choice to portray Bevan’s stubbornness and idealism, charisma and conviction. Nye ends with the same rueful ruminations on the future prospects of the NHS as The Human Body but compels with its detailed depiction of the fearlessness that forged it."

"A valiant and valuable affirmation of the NHS"

"Michael Sheen is in his element as NHS founder Aneurin Bevan, in Tim Price’s rousing new drama

"Price (like his hero, from the South Wales Valleys) slyly implies that Bevan hit on the health revolution after being brought into Clement Attlee’s cabinet, overlooking the spade-work done by his Tory predecessor Henry Willink. In his defence, the playwright distils a mass of useful information and, significantly, he doesn’t duck the monied intransigence of the medical establishment. He also astutely yokes what Neil Kinnock calls Bevan’s “guile and slogging determination” to his formative years in communal-minded Tredegar as the son of a miner felled by work-related lung disease."

"Rufus Norris and his creative team attain a pulse-quickening theatricality, the ensemble as tightly drilled as an A&E team: hospital beds take on hallucinogenic properties, repurposed as doors or surreally upended, while yards of green hospital curtain achieve swishing transitions. Comic liberties are smartly taken, memorably when an irate Herbert Morrison attempts to smother Bevan with a pillow, but the death-bed climax is rousingly poignant."

"Michael Sheen is electrifying in NHS origin story Nye"

"A mighty, moving and sometimes messy piece of theatre, it’s really, at heart, a state-of-the-nation play. And like Dear England and Standing at the Sky’s Edge before it, Nye (a co-production with the Wales Millennium Centre) seizes this venue’s great potential as a national public forum to frame critical questions about who we are and who we want to be."

"But this is, unashamedly, a play about principle, passion and compassion, driven by a fantastic ensemble and an electrifying performance from Sheen. Even in his pink pyjamas, his Bevan has a stature that throws down a gauntlet to today’s politicians across the river Thames."

"Michael Sheen burns with passion"

"Price’s script rattles through so many episodes that, after the end of more than two and a half hours, you are left wondering how much you really learn about Bevan’s personality and beliefs."

"It’s startling, too, to see his soulmate and fellow MP, Jennie Lee, given so little attention. Sharon Small is terrific in the role; it’s a shame we don’t see more of her."

"Tony Jayawardena gives us a memorably silky Churchill"

"The masked faces of physicians, who try to block the creation of the NHS, loom overhead on Jon Driscoll’s projections. Throughout it all, Sheen burns with genuine passion. His charisma fills the gaps in the script."

"Micheal Sheen brings zest to this lumpy story of the founder of the NHS"

"Michael Sheen’s performance as the creator of the NHS Aneurin Bevan here is, fittingly, a triumph against the odds."

"Bevan’s exceptionalism shines through, but with so much history to cover the show feels skimpy at times. "

"Tim Price may not have written the most subtle version of Nye, but Sheen fills him with zest."

"Michael Sheen is a terrifically engaging Bevan"

"Michael Sheen is a terrifically engaging Bevan, his busy brain and steely tenacity swathed in twinkling charm."

"Part surreal morphine dream, part episodic bio-drama and part sociopolitical cartoon strip, [Tim] Price’s piece loops back into the early life of the father of the NHS as a book-mad miner’s son, before charting his career and transformative achievements. It’s crammed with information but remains surface-skimming."

"The human drama sometimes feels squeezed by the spectacle and the roll call of events"

Imperfect, but stirringly impassioned.

" Nye is a too full, yet too simplified"

Sheen (grey helmet hair, chequered pyjamas) is well cast for his natural charm. He brings a curious fey playfulness and vulnerability but does not plumb the depths of his commanding character – or perhaps the busy script simply does not allow it.

"There is some inspired stagecraft as the hospital curtains of Vicki Mortimer’s ingenious set swish to reveal debating chambers and libraries. But the narrative is too long-reaching and schematic, its extensively researched material not fully absorbed dramatically."

"At over two and a half hours, Nye is a too full, yet too simplified, survey of the personal and political elements in Bevan’s world, with some high-pitched moments accompanied by syrupy music."

"Norris’s production is infected with a dreadful larkiness"

"Nye is a fevered dream. The form is fractured, giddy: Vicki Mortimer’s design does a good job of hallucinatory blending, effortlessly swishing the institutional green of hospital curtains into the ranks of the House of Commons. Yet the dialogue is dogged, grab-you-by-the-collar instructional. Interesting nuggets become mechanical explanation"

"Rufus Norris’s production is infected with a dreadful larkiness, which goes beyond conveying the weirdness of fever."

"Now Tim Price’s new play, co-produced with the Wales Millennium Centre, looks at the inspiring achievements of Aneurin “Nye” Bevan, the Welsh Labour firebrand who founded the NHS. It is a wasted opportunity."