Review by Simon Jenner, March 22nd 2025
James Graham’s Dear England really has proved a game of two halves. Nearly two years after its premiere with a mostly rewritten second act to take in the events of 2023-24, he draws Gareth Southgate’s career to a close. In 2023 the play seemed numinous with possibility. Now we know how it ends, its feel shifts. Originally directed by Rupert Goold, now with revival director Elin Schofield, it plays at the National’s Oliver till 24th May. Moving on to the Lowry, Salford from 29th May to 29th June, it then embarks on a nationwide tour from September 15th.
Ensemble. Photo Credit: Marc Brenner
There’s still a sacramental thrill as you enter the NT’s Olivier: Es Devlin’s design echoes the clean sweep of the revolve in gun-mental grey, with a gleaming hoop above it, both sci-fi and ancient Greek. And with each player emerging from a cubicle. Dear England is like that: tackling something seen as transcendent for many; but so impacted by nationalist hubris it’s become sclerotic.
Gareth Southgate (Gwilym Lee replacing Joseph Fiennes) edges from manager of the under-21s, as caretaker after Sam Allardyce is forced to quit after winning one game. No-one wants the job. “So, that was why you asked me!” says Southgate Lee like Southgate has shoes to fill. His agonised Southgate is uncanny: without Fiennes’ humorous glint though even more solitary: downturned mouth, upraised eyebrows, laconic Watford tang, holding himself exquisitely as if hung out to dry the wrong way. “It’s just be kind to people, care about them,” he says. “That’s radical in sport,” he’s told.
Graham explores historical antagonists at maximum tension, to prove how they might reconcile. It’s there in This House, it’s given a posthumous twist in Best of Enemies. Rewriting, Graham emphasised Southgate’s end with an Act Two prologue, dropped in performance (so keeping chronology linear), though explaining why the end’s brief. Dear England now takes two-hours-fifty; Act Two still feels like open-ended variations on Act One’s theme. It’s not surprising pace is relentless, but there’s a few magical eddies.
Here the antagonist is uniquely numinous. In a word, us: though the sheer toxicity is shrunk to red lighting and a bit of choreography. Southgate addresses his historic open letter’s ‘Dear England’ tackling abuse and racism – raging betrayal projected onto England players; which he feels paralyses them with fear.
Channelling a nation’s aspirations shows just how its poisons burn through its temporary gods. Southgate uniquely took on a national culture: what he achieved for his players had him called a better leader of the opposition than Keir Starmer. Graham elides wider commentary. But he’s attuned to the arena of such leadership.
Thronged with multi-roling interviewers – Graham etches a peripheral crowd – the scale of expectation is sketched: from failed penalty-takers three prime ministers (not Sunak) through a wedding couple betting with their priest on England’s chances, to a gallimaufry of lawyers through to roadworkers. Shout out for Evie Gurney’s dazzling array of costume designs, yielding their apotheosis in quick-change suits flicked off by England players, revealing strips.
Despite Southgate’s avowed focus on the players, Lee has to be central. Inhabiting a nervy fidgety figure often on the periphery of the stage, sometimes downstage centre as if giving up his theatrical power, Lee backs into the limelight.
He inhabits the stillness around which co-movement directors Ellen Kane, Hannes Langolf weave a mesmerising ballet of players – a word Southgate uses – and an ever-active video design by Ash J Woodward, using that loop as (ultimately ritualistic) score-board, aide-memoire and back-projections of everything from historic footage to emerging skylines.
Graham’s brilliance lies in how he makes his protagonist glimpse, then grasp the truth of his revolution, and Lee manages this consummately, in edging his voice, veiling it, swallowing it even. It’s a mesmerising portrait of conditional self-belief, carrying the wound of 1996, Southgate’s own missed penalty, something Graham keeps as a recurring toxin in telling moments, including the very first.
Martin Marquez is just one of the multi-roling cast who portray a lineal descent of challenges: After Allardyce, Marquez’s another two managers (Capello, then Panama’s) then morphs into benign Physio Phil, quietly sympathetic oppo of old-style coach Mike Webster (Matt Bardock) who at crucial stages fails to undermine Southgate’s approach. With Marquez’ Phil Lee enjoys an exquisite understated scene on ageing.
Those who inhabit the nearest to antagonism are sceptical older white men in power Southgate tries winning over. There’s memorable contributions from avuncular, old-school sceptic Greg Clarke (John Hodgkinson, reprising his role) morphing to Infantino in Qtar attacking Southgate’s ethos and Matt LeTissier as well as that priest. An overly dumbed-down Greg Dyke (Tony Turner, also returning) also briefly Steve Holland and Graham Taylor play sceptical good cops.
Gwilym Lee. Photo Credit: Marc Brenner
But it’s Southgate’s bringing psychologist Dr Pippa Grange (Liz White, accenting Grange’s Australian upbringing, as predecessor Gina McKee emphasised Grange’s northern roots) that allows Graham to prompt questions. Despite existing in the trailer, Grange’s exuberant line “a different England, fearless, having fun out there” is cut; and though the biggest role after Lee, it’s slightly muted verbally and White scores with a radiant attentiveness. White’s interrogative ally is also radical: and probes Southgate too. A crisis develops between them as the story of three parts Southgate wants to tell of an England taking six years to win, gets upended by the 2021 Euros.
Schofield and Graham ensure characters are individualised with key words. It’s a patient build, deliberate dialogue at dramatic odds with the velocity of action. Though Gunnar Cauthery is mainly Gary Lineker commenting from the sidelines, he’s now Southgate’s successor Thomas Tuchel complete with valediction.
It’s a subtle prelude to the way Southgate feels he has to drop some new talent like Dele Alli (Tristan Waterson). After the 2018 Russia World Cup, where Grange has helped everyone – including Southgate – confront the penalty-shoot-out curse, that hits hard.
The melt of players from wounded masculinity to men openly talking of fear is poignant – sometimes uproarious. Marcus Rashford (Jude Carmichael) inevitably leads this charge, in a believably radiant performance. There’s initial resistance from straight-talking Jordan Pickford (a returning Josh Barrow), Jordan Henderson (Joshua Hill) and larky Bukayo Saka (Tane Siah), and each player’s winning-over is traced with touching, occasionally funny results. Harry Maguire (Ryan Donaldson), the self-possessed Newcastle player surprises by how quickly he adapts.
Harry Kane (Ryan Whittle, previously playing Eric Dier) is a watchful study of a tongue-tied player who gets it more than most, using a 1966 dance to show how gesture, letting go is key, becoming a true captain in the process. Eric Dier (Tom Lane) child of two FIFA members, relates how his early privilege sets him apart; his own crushed feelings on missing a penalty are memorable. Raheem Sterling (Gamba Cole) is opposite, and like Siah’s Saka, relates the ugly racism that makes three lions and imperialist crusades distasteful. As does Jadan Sancho (Kadell Herida).
Graham lets players create their own ‘Dear England’ moments. But the racism occasioning the letter should count as pivotal, faced down. Graham refuses such furies. He instinctively seeks to connect, not divide: but we need the division too.
Alex Scott (Felixe Forde) is a refreshing contrast, a joyous meteor both as victorious footballer (another play there, though the Lionesses are now given more elbow-room here) and commentator, tripping up male colleagues, muppeting a tearful Theresa May. Stakes are higher than what passes for politics. With strong ensemble work from Joss Beki, Jordan Ford Silver, Courtney George, Will Harrison-Wallace, Miles Henderson, Philip Lobey, Ellouise Shakespeare-Hart, this swirling 23-strong cast never lets energy, let alone balls drop.
Photo Credit: Marc Brenner
Photo Credit: Marc Brenner
That’s mimicked with excellent sound-synching from co-sound designers Dan Balfour, Tom Gibbons, (two fine solo songs from composer Hannah Peel are dropped), with Max Perryment supplying orchestral elements marrying the finale of Saint-Saens Violin Concerto No 3 with drums; and less esoterically a snatch of Elgar’s In the South at a glutinous patriotic moment.
Luckily those are guyed by a player singing ‘God save the Queen’ instead of King, and the communal dissolve to ‘Sweet Caroline’. Southgate’s legacy might seem provisional; Graham confirms it isn’t. Not Graham’s masterpiece, it’s more than a state-of-the-nation play. Dear England celebrates a man whose humility doesn’t shroud a streak of greatness, who spoke for the country with more authority than any political leader. Even now with its nimbus of sad inevitability as national storytelling, it’s still groundbreaking.
Directed by Rupert Goold, Revival Director Elin Schofield, Set Es Devlin, Costume Design Evie Gurney, Lighting Designer John Clark, Co-Movement Directors Ellen Kane, Hannes Langolf, Co-Sound Designers Dan Balfour, Tom Gibbons, Additional Music Max Perryment, Video Designer Ash J Woodward
Casting Bryony Jarvis-Taylor and Lily Mackie, Dialect Coach Richard Ryder, Associate Director Elin Schofield, Associate Set Designer Alice Hallifax, Associate Lighting Designer Ben Jacobs, Associate Video Designer Hayley Egan.
Photo Credit: Marc Brenner
