Arthur Miller’s The Price at Marylebone Theatre is theatre at its finest

John Martin

May 11, 2026
6 min read

Arthur Miller’s The Price at Marylebone Theatre is theatre at its finest

The Price | Marylebone Theatre until 7th June, 2026

Arthur Miller’s The Price is back and it’s one worth paying

A wonderful cast and an intimate venue. Jonathan Munby’s production of Miller’s neglected classic is thought-provoking theatre at its finest.

“I don’t have to tell you, the average family, they love each other like crazy. But the minute the parents die, it’s all of a sudden the question: who is going to get what? And then you’re covered with cats and dogs.”

That’s Gregory Solomon, the wily octogenarian furniture dealer at the heart of Arthur Miller’s 1967 masterwork.

Henry Goodman as Gregory Solomon in Jonathan Munby’s revival of Arthur Miller’s The Price at the Marylebone Theatre. [Image Credit Marc Brenner]

And it’s Henry Goodman, one of our finest stage actors, delivering those lines with the impeccable comic timing that has made him a theatre legend.

He is one of my favourite actors, able to move with ease between the worlds of musical theatre and drama. I have seen him as a brilliant Charles Guiteau in Sondheim’s Assassins and as Billy Flynn in Chicago, to name but two. He has also been one of the best Shylocks I have seen in Trevor Nunn’s landmark production of The Merchant of Venice at the National Theatre.

If you have seen him on stage, you’ll know exactly what I mean. If you haven’t, go and see The Price and you’ll understand immediately.

We’re in a cluttered Manhattan attic in 1968.

Victor Franz, a policeman, has spent his life sacrificing his ambitions to care for his father in the aftermath of the Depression. His brother Walter, a successful surgeon, took a very different path. He left and never looked back.

Now their father is dead, the furniture must go, and Solomon has arrived to make an offer.

Then Walter arrives.

What follows is the kind of drama that reminds you why theatre matters.

Miller wrote The Price partly as a reaction to the avant-garde theatre of his era, plays in which characters seemed to exist without a past. His intention was the opposite: to place his people in a present entirely shaped by a conflicted history.

John Hopkins as Walter Franz and Henry Goodman as Gregory Solomon in Arthur Miller’s The Price at the Marylebone Theatre. [Image Credit Marc Brenner]

The play premiered on Broadway in February 1968, ran for 429 performances, and has been revived four times since, most recently in 2017 with Mark Ruffalo and Danny DeVito. In the UK, a landmark 2018 production starring David Suchet earned an Olivier nomination for Best Revival. Now, Olivier Award-nominated director Jonathan Munby brings it back to London, to the intimate Marylebone Theatre, for its first London production since then.

Act One is essentially the set-up: the sale, Solomon’s negotiations, and the slow drip of backstory.

It’s very funny, and while very little happens, the skill of the actors makes it engrossing.

The pace picks up with the arrival of the other brother at the end of Act One, though Solomon is, regrettably, relegated to an offstage room for much of the subsequent discussions.

It is in Act Two that Miller’s themes and ideas come into sharper focus.

I sometimes refer to him as the Oliver Stone of the theatre world. Once he gets hold of a theme, he will bludgeon you over the head with it!

The Price is about the American dream, or rather the price of it.

It explores the sacrifice, loss and cost of the choices one makes. Themes he also explored in Death of a Salesman (currently having yet another Broadway revival with Nathan Lane) and in All My Sons, which we saw here in London with Bryan Cranston not long ago.

But what saves The Price from feeling like a lecture are the four superb performances.

Henry Goodman as Solomon is simply extraordinary.

His comic timing is superb, and he brings a richness and almost vaudevillian approach to the role that is very funny but never sacrifices the reality of the character or the situation.

Elliot Cowan, as Victor, the brother who stayed behind, is quite superb. He charts decades of quiet resentment with subtlety and skill without ever tipping into self-pity.

Henry Goodman as Gregory Solomon and Elliot Cowan as Victor Franz in Arthur Miller’s The Price at the Marylebone Theatre. [Image Credit Marc Brenner]

John Hopkins as Walter, the wealthier, more successful brother, is also very good, although there were moments when I felt he was skirting on the edge of caricature.

Faye Castelow as Esther brings warmth and grounding to what could easily become a peripheral role.

The set, too, deserves a mention.

That cluttered attic, crammed with the detritus of a life, is wonderfully realised courtesy of Jon Bausor.

The Marylebone Theatre itself is a recently refurbished fringe venue with excellent sightlines and a genuinely good view from every seat, the kind of intimate space that suits this play perfectly.

Anyone who enjoyed the sheer theatrical assurance of Kinky Boots at the London Coliseum will appreciate the confidence with which this production lets the writing and performances do the work.

We live in an age of Jamie Lloyd video cameras and highly stylised theatre, and there’s much to admire in that.

The Marylebone Theatre may be smaller in scale, but, like Avenue Q, it proves that an intimate production can draw you so completely into its characters that you care deeply about what happens to them.

But sometimes what you want is a well-made play.

Two acts, strong writing, great thought-provoking drama, and some outstanding performances.

The Price is absolutely that.

Arthur Miller’s The Price gets a superb London revival at the Marylebone Theatre, anchored by an extraordinary performance from Henry Goodman. Four outstanding actors make this thought-provoking drama crackle with life.

A well-made play at its very best.

For more thoughtful theatre criticism and arts coverage from across the capital, explore EyeOnLondon’s latest reviews.