This witty play shows that even the best of friends don’t always agree!
Yasmina Reza’s 1994 play Art shows just how good theatre can be when it’s sharp, sophisticated, and fully focused. It looks deceptively simple on the stage, and that is its inner strength. Originally written and performed in French, the English version premiered in the West End in 1996 and this new Australian staging shows why it has endured for three decades. At its heart, this is a witty and perceptive look at long-term friendships and the inevitable compromises that sustain them.
At the centre of the play is an argument between friends over a painting. Serge, a successful dermatologist (a very smooth Damon Herriman) has bought a new painting. It’s white, it’s minimalist, and it’s very expensive. His oldest friend, the aeronautical engineer Marc (a loud and rugged Richard Roxburgh) thinks he’s insane for spending 160,000 euros on a white canvas. They argue about its worth and its artistic merit, about Serge’s motivation for buying it, and about their understanding of modern art. Into the mix comes Yvan (Toby Schmitz), their other old friend, who is having professional and personal problems of his own.
Seeing Art this week felt unexpectedly apt as the art world watched in astonishment when Christie’s sold Jackson Pollock’s drip painting, Number 7A, in New York for $181.2 million USD. How can an artwork be worth so much money? This shows that the debates underlining the play are as relevant now as ever. There was huge controversy when the Whitlam Government bought Pollock’s, Blue Poles back in 1973 for $1.3 million; it’s now estimated to be worth close to $500 million.
Taste, status, money, value – all these things are debated in the play. And whilst the audience laughs out loud at these arguments on stage, we recognise that this is also real life. Go to an art fair anywhere in the world and people are happily buying art as interior design, a status symbol, and (hopefully) as an investment.
The play is brought to vibrant life by these three well-known Australian actors, Richard Roxburgh, Damon Herriman, and Toby Schmitz. Roxburgh strides the stage in increasing levels of bewilderment and frustration; Herriman is eminently believable as someone living a successful, but emotionally empty life; and Schmitz is tragically comic as his life falls apart around him. Together, they give a warm and convincing look at the rhythms and rituals of male friendship, from the banter and the teasing to the underlying care and affection that is there even if it’s not spoken. There’s also a fundamental acknowledgement that people inevitably change over time, and not always in the same ways. The dialogue is fast and furious and has moments of tenderness amidst the increasingly loud debates. And it is very funny, absolutely laugh out loud funny.
This is a polished, thoughtful and thoroughly engaging revival of a modern classic. Don’t miss it!
Rating: FIVE STARS!
Art is at Her Majesty’s Theatre to Sunday May 24 2026
For more information and bookings, visit: arttheplay.com.au
