Lucinda Everett

In fact, the whole play rails against sentimentality, an admirable tactic that forces us to face war like grown-ups but which has its downsides. The first act, grounded in the men’s experiences, might not let us weep, but it does let us feel. However, after the interval, as Baghdad fills with ghosts, the action becomes more abstract, the focus turns more intensely to existential and religious musings, and the philosophical overtakes the emotional.

Despite Robert Jones’s sumptuous set and costumes, free-flowing jokes, and the kind of consummate directing you’d expect from Trevor Nunn, it feels turgid at times. And especially so in the aftermath of Bach and Frederick’s main confrontation, when we move to Leipzig for more contemplation and a final, less electric, meeting between the pair. But this play has a trick up its sleeve: its Bach is Brian Cox (perhaps best known as Succession’s Logan Roy) and he is mesmerising. So much so that any aimless spots or protracted scenes just feel like extra opportunities to watch him at work.

Designer Rae Smith orchestrates a blistering run of costume changes, and a set that at times beggars belief. Buildings and train stations fly in, shops whizz slickly into place on a conveyor belt, which also allows the cast to walk for mile after imaginary mile, as New York’s buildings and skies move past them on a video backdrop. The world feels expansive. Not to mention expensive. An opulent restaurant with a sweeping staircase appears. A steam train rolls onto stage (really) as if the Palladium’s wings are one great Mary Poppins carpet bag. It’s the kind of set that could upstage a lesser cast.