Review: MY MASTER BUILDER, Wyndham’s Theatre
Photo credit: Johan Persson
Lila Raicek’s My Master Builder, directed by Michael Grandage, is an ambitious reimagining of Henrik Ibsen’s 1892 play of the same name. Set, not in a quiet Norwegian town, but amid the glitz and ego of the Hamptons, this updated version attempts to explore memory, gender politics, artistic legacy, and love through a contemporary lens.
It’s the eve of July 4th in the Hamptons, and Elena Solness, a composed and calculating publishing powerhouse, is preparing to host a party in honour of her husband Henry (Ewan McGregor), a celebrated architect unveiling his latest project. The building in question is the restored 19th-century Whaler’s Church, once the site of deep personal grief for the couple, now transformed into a gleaming showpiece. The evening’s mood shifts sharply with the arrival of Mathilde (Elizabeth Debicki), a quietly disarming arts journalist who shares a complicated past with Henry. Her presence begins to pull at the loose threads of a decade-old emotional entanglement.
Richard Kent’s set design is sleek, minimalist, and full of quiet intention, perfectly at home in the world of the art elite. It captures the light and calm of the Hamptons coast while maintaining an undercurrent of isolation and tension. The visual aesthetic is clean but never cold. Kent’s costumes are equally sharp, each outfit helping define the characters’ status and psychology. These are people who choose the expensive options, and it shows. The attention to detail gives the production a visual richness that subtly supports the story’s emotional undercurrents.
Raicek mirrors Ibsen’s original themes in a modern context, drawing clear parallels between the old and new worlds while incorporating her own lived perspective into this partial retelling. The shift from a small Nordic town to the elite, performative circles of the Hamptons casts the characters in sharper, more satirical light, particularly Henry and his celebrity status as an architect. Ewan McGregor, returning to the stage after 17 years, steps into this role with ease, striking a careful balance between charm and cluelessness. His Henry is naïve and misguided, sincere in his intentions yet blind to the impact of his actions. It’s a performance that will satisfy those who’ve come to see McGregor, though the character himself is far less redeemable than he imagines.
The real shift in this adaptation lies in perspective. While Ibsen’s original play centres on Halvard Solness and his existential dread, Raicek tilts the focus toward the women around him, particularly Elena and Mathilde. Kate Fleetwood plays Elena with a sharp edge and emotional gravity. She doesn’t ask the audience to like her, and that’s the point. Her portrayal allows Elena to come apart on her own terms, grappling with betrayal and grief while embodying the kind of midlife crisis usually reserved for male characters. Her clash with the much younger Mathilde is also her undoing, as Raicek pits the women against each other in increasingly uncomfortable ways.
Debicki is well-cast as Mathilde, offering a poised and vulnerable performance. This version of the character is less ethereal than Ibsen’s Hilda, more grounded, but still searching. There’s a quiet resilience in how she tries to decipher what she truly wants, caught between the murky tides of feminist responsibility and the emotional wreckage of having been manipulated by an older man in her formative years. The character opens a space for important questions about autonomy, desire, and how young women navigate power structures disguised as mentorship.
Supporting performances round out the world neatly. David Ajala’s Ragnar, a former protégé turned rival to Henry, brings intensity as he navigates the tension between lingering admiration and growing resentment. Mirren Mack adds a youthful spark as Kaia, Elena’s assistant, offering a striking contrast to her older, more jaded counterparts. Caught between complicity and insight, Kaia becomes a subtle bridge between Elena’s unraveling and Mathilde’s reckoning with the past. The play gestures toward a complex triangle of female experience, compassion, rivalry, and the tangled pursuit of love but, at times, it feels like a chorus of entitled frustrations railing against the collapse of clear-cut gender roles. There’s potential for deeper humanity to emerge from each character’s motivations, but the emotional groundwork isn’t always fully realised.
Themes of memory resonate strongly. Buildings carry memory in a way people often can’t be trusted to, wood and stone become more reliable witnesses than the characters, whose recollections are warped by betrayal, guilt, and self-interest. This interplay between personal and architectural memory adds depth, even when the plot’s momentum begins to falter.
And falter it unfortunately does, particularly in the second half, when the pace lags and the play edges toward high-budget soap opera. The emotional stakes, though well-acted, don’t always feel urgent. There’s also the lingering question of relevance. Stories about wealthy people in crisis have less pull in today’s theatre landscape. While the themes are timeless, the setting and tone sometimes feel out of step with the questions modern audiences are asking. The production risks appearing self-involved, even as it tries to interrogate that very dynamic.
Still, My Master Builder is engaging and often thought-provoking. It’s visually stylish and well-performed. There’s entertainment to be had, especially in the first act, but by the end, you may find yourself asking: why this play, why now, and why should we still care about the problems of people so wrapped up in their own reflections?
*** Three stars
Reviewed by: Stephanie Osztreicher
My Master Builder plays at London’s Wyndham’s Theatre until 12 July, with tickets available here.
