Theatre review: The Exorcist, Theatre Royal, Glasgow

The possessed Regan is played with terrific commitment and skill by Susannah Edgley in The Exorcist

WHAT a load of enjoyable old nonsense is this Bill Kenwright stage version of The Exorcist, playing to packed houses at the Theatre Royal this week as part of a UK tour. Adapted by John Pielmeier from William Peter Blatty’s original novel, the show trades relentlessly on the global fame of William Friedkin’s 1973 film, which made Blatty’s tale of a young teenage girl possessed by a demon one of the most successful horror movies of all time; it even makes a brave effort to reproduce the notorious scene where the film heroine’s head twirls round on her shoulders.

The Exorcist, Theatre Royal, Glasgow ***

The young girl at the heart of the drama, Regan, is played with terrific commitment and skill by Susannah Edgley. The lovely Sophie Ward acts up a storm as her distraught film-actress mother, Tristram Wymark, Paul Nicholas and Ben Caplan work tirelessly as suave film director, exorcist and priest respectively, and Ian McKellen delivers a truly astonishing recorded performance as the voice of the ghastly demon that possesses Regan.

Add a relentlessly creaky and shape-shifting American-gothic set by Anna Fleischle, and spectacular lighting by Philip Gladwell, and you have a thoroughly enjoyable two hours of hokum. In 2019, of course, the kids are marching to save the planet, not masturbating with crucifixes; and we hardly need imaginary horrors like these to tickle our bored imaginations. Yet the early teens are still a time of huge and disturbing change; and in exploring that phenomenon to the horror-movie max, The Exorcist clearly strikes a chord that has not stopped resonating yet.

JOYCE MCMILLAN

King’s Theatre, Edinburgh, 5-9 Nov, Eden Court Theatre, Inverness, 12-16 Nov, His Majesty’s Theatre, Aberdeen, 19-23 Nov