By: Darryl Reilly
“Hi, I’m Daniel” says Daniel Radcliffe numerous times to beaming audience members as he races around the Hudson Theatre during the rollicking pre-show sequence of the emotionally draining and uplifting solo show Every Brilliant Thing.
Mr. Radcliffe is not being gimmicky; he is being purposeful. He selects several patrons to later appear onstage as pivotal characters and to recite dialogue from the auditorium. A band is playing exuberant jazz melodies throughout. For 70 minutes Radcliffe is arguably delivering the greatest male stage performance of the current New York theater season.
Every Brilliant Thing debuted at the 2014 Edinburgh Fringe Festival. It went on to have international productions including an acclaimed Off-Broadway run, and a television adaptation broadcast on HBO. This is its Broadway debut.
Playwright Duncan Macmillan with original performer Jonny Donahoe have crafted an engaging and shattering interactive monologue. In 1996 an unnamed seven-year-old English boy copes with his depressed mother’s suicide attempt; there will be two more such tries over the years. He looks back on the past from his perspective in the present.
To cheer his mother up, he begins compiling a list of brilliant things in life. These items range from the whimsical to the banal and to the profound. “Super Mario,” “Chocolate,” “Christopher Walken’s voice,” “Christopher Walken’s hair,” “When the windshield wiper wipes in time to the car radio’s music,” and “Waking up late with someone you love” are among hundreds of thousands of such observational nuggets. Mr. Macmillan and Donahoe’s humane scenario is smartly-conceived and immaculately structured.
Wearing a gray pullover and jeans, the lean, athletic, and bearded Radcliffe employs his animated physicality, expressive voice, and star quality for his supreme characterization. He personifies a resolute young man who appears to triumph over adversity only to fall prey to his own demons. “When I was young, I was better at being happy.”
Singing snippets from “That’s Life,” “My Way,” and Daniel Johnston’s “Some Things Last a Long Time,” demonstrate Radcliffe’s glorious vocal abilities. Reenacting the veterinarian performed euthanasia of his childhood old dog Indiana Bones (represented as a folded-up coat), an anguished car ride with his father, and falling in love with a man in a library are among the dramatic highlights of his hilarious, heartbreaking and truly spontaneous performance. The vet, the father, and the boyfriend, are played by audience members.
Director Jeremy Herrin with Macmillan have staged Every Brilliant Thing with energy, momentum, fast pacing, and with a minimal though jolting presentation. Scenic designer Vicki Mortimer has the stage aesthetically configured as a three-sided playing area where spectators sit around a medium-sized rectangle for the actions. The bulk of the audience is in the theater. Ms. Mortimer’s basic costume design is of everyday authenticity.
Overhead industrial bulbs with amber hues are a hallmark of Jack Knowles’ active lighting design which complement the events with verve. Sound designer Tom Gibbons realizes the many musical selections and effects with pleasing force.
Every Brilliant Thing is an exhilarating and wrenching showcase for Daniel Radcliffe’s tremendous talent.
Every Brilliant Thing (through May 24, 2026)
Hudson Theatre, 141 West 44th Street, in Manhattan
For tickets visit, www.everybrilliantthing.com
Running time: 70 minutes with no intermission