Two London plays bring updated classic characters to big screens in Canada

Everyman

Adapted by Carol Ann Duffy
Directed by Rufus Norris
Starring Chiwetel EjioforTwo and a half stars

Man and Superman

Written by Bernard Shaw
Directed by Simon Godwin
Starring Ralph FiennesThree and a half stars

Both at the National Theatre in London

Everyman – in the dashing form of Oscar-nominated actor Chiwetel Ejiofor in a blue, bespoke suit – snorts the world's longest line of cocaine off a table the length of a fashion runway, as an attractive and diverse cohort of chums cheer him on while striking a Last Supper pose.

"Happy Birthday!" chant his pals Passion, Vanity, Sensuality, Taste et al., although they throw in an expletive between "happy" and "birthday." The chant continues as Everyman drinks and drugs and dances to a techno beat – oblivious to the fact that Death is on his way for a reckoning.

Everyman, an anonymously penned Christian morality play from the 15th century, is the opening gambit from Rufus Norris as new artistic director of the National Theatre of Great Britain. The medieval text has been updated and secularized by Britain's poet laureate, Carol Ann Duffy, while Norris's production, which begins with extended choreographed debauchery, is flashy and trashy and as unapologetically entertaining as an allegorical drama about how everyone and everything abandons you when you die can be.

The current change of leadership at the National, as it is known around these parts, is of much greater interest to theatregoers around the world than the last one was in 2003.

That's because, during his 12 years as artistic director, just departed Nicholas Hytner (and executive director Nick Starr) transformed the Brutalist building on the South Bank of the Thames into an international institution, leading the resurgent domination of British writers and directors and designers in the English-language theatre world.

Hytner oversaw the well-subsidized development of a steady stream of shows that were then exported to Broadway and transformed into commercial hits – from The History Boys to War Horse, from One Man, Two Guv'nors to the current Tony-nominated stage adaptation of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.

These titles have all trickled up to Canada (or will shortly). In its Toronto incarnation, the puppet epic War Horse – co-produced with Mirvish Productions – set a record as the longest-running drama in Canadian stage history. (Mirvish hopes to present Curious Incident next, when it goes out on tour in 2016.)

Just as significant in spreading the National's influence worldwide has been the NT Live cinema series. An appetite for these premium screenings in Canada has been growing: From April, 2014, to March, 2015, NT Live programming reached an audience of 45,000 Canadians.

Everyman screens in Canada on July 16 with an encore on Sept. 19; it is worth catching for the central performance of Ejiofor, who manages to remain sympathetic even as he tries to whine and buy his way back, shedding tears and spraying credit cards across the stage.

The real stand-out performance comes from the earthy Kate Duchêne as a janitor-God, however, and not close behind is Dermot Crowley as Death in a hazmat suit. "I'll find an Everyman most typical of the one who's squandered his God-given time on pleasure, treasure, leisure, et cetera," he says, and with his Irish accent, all four of those last words rhyme.

That isn't to say that Norris and Duffy's attempts to turn a Christian show about how to save your soul into a secular one about saving the planet really works. There's a contradiction between the mammoth video screens, the falling dummies and sexy excess of this 1-per-center Everyman's party scenes and the moralizing anti-materialist message. It looks like a commercial for anti-commercialism.

Because the National sails year round, with shows run in repertory, there hasn't been a clear line drawn between the Hytner era and the Norris era in terms of programming. (In a bit of backstage drama, Tessa Ross, a film and television producer who was to be chief executive to Norris's artistic director, resigned in April after only six months in the job.)

While Everyman is on the Olivier stage, Man and Superman – one of Hytner's final shows – continues on stage at the Lyttelton. This 1903 play by Bernard Shaw, which comes to cinemas in Canada on Thursday and again on June 13, stars another British stage/screen superstar. Ralph Fiennes plays the well-to-do revolutionary John Tanner, a contrarian who spends most of the play on the run from the Life Force and marriage as represented by his winsome ward Ann Whitefield (a crafty Indira Varma).

Director Simon Godwin has sliced and diced Shaw's play down to a mean and, if not lean, then at least medium-fat 3 1/2 hours with a 20-minute intermission. Crucially, he's done this without excising what is really the only truly fascinating part of the play – an extended dream sequence known as "Don Juan in Hell." (In Neil Munro's celebrated, uncut Man and Superman at the Shaw Festival in 2004, the whole shebang ran for six hours, including two intermissions and a dinner break.)

As the wordy-even-by-Shaw-standards Tanner, Fiennes keeps the energy flowing by bouncing back and forth, like he's playing tennis with himself; with slightly hunched posture, he shepherds a whole flock of sheepish grins, making Tanner out to be more mensch than Ubermensch. But his steady stream of words is certainly impressive – and I'm in absolute admiration of the way big stars work in London versus New York, tackling tough classics instead of easy, old chestnuts.

There are plenty of show-me-the-money goodies in this modern-dress production seemingly staged on a Star Trek holodeck, including a vintage car that Fiennes drives off the stage, but the best aspect is the endlessly funny character actor Tim McMullan as a poetry-writing bandit named Mendoza who, in Tanner's dream, transforms into a lushly louche Lucifer.

So: That's Man and Superman with a scene-stealing Devil ending Hytner's tenure, and Everyman with a scene-stealing God beginning Norris's. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose? The world will wait and see.

Man and Superman runs until May 17; Everyman until Aug. 30; (nationaltheatre.org.uk). To find NT Live screening details for either play in Canada, visit cineplex.com.