Skip to main content
Terrible triumph of ‘man who became death’
Gordon Parsons recommends a new play on the rise and fall of J Robert Oppenheimer, the so-called father of the atomic bomb

Oppenheimer at The Swan Theatre, Stratford-Upon-Avon

5/5

J Robert Oppenheimer, the “father of the atomic bomb,” is reputed to have reacted to a 1960s play on his life by complaining that the writer had made a tragedy out of a “damned farce.”

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
Similar stories
NO LAUGHING MATTER: (L to R) LJ Parkinson as Givola, Mark Gatiss as Arturo Ui and Mawaan Rizwan as Giri in The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui
Theatre review / 23 April 2026
23 April 2026

GORDON PARSONS salutes the apt return of Brecht’s vaudevillian cartoon drama that retains the vitality of the boxing or the circus ring

cyrano
Theatre review / 8 October 2025
8 October 2025

GORDON PARSONS is blown away by a superb production of Rostand’s comedy of verbal panache and swordmanship

4.48
Theatre review / 18 July 2025
18 July 2025

GORDON PARSONS acknowledges the authority with which Sarah Kane’s theatrical justification for suicide has resonance today

constant
Theatre review / 4 July 2025
4 July 2025

GORDON PARSONS is disappointed by an unsubtle production of this comedy of upper middle class infidelity