'Teeth 'n' Smiles' review — Rebecca Lucy Taylor (aka Self Esteem) is electrifying as a fading rock star

Read our review of David Hare's play Teeth 'n' Smiles, now in performances at the Duke of York's Theatre to 6 June.

Summary

• David Hare's play Teeth 'n' Smiles gets a major West End revival at the Duke of York's Theatre
• The 1969-set story follows fading rock star Maggie Frisby
• Rebecca Lucy Taylor aka Self Esteem puts in a remarkable performance as Maggie

It’s no wonder, really, why David Hare’s 1969-set play about a fading rock star drinking through the diminuendo of her demise is produced so infrequently. Beyond the fact it strives to capture a moment long passed in music history, where the hippyish counterculture of the 60s was fizzling but yet to be replaced by punk, the equilibrium needed on stage to make it land is seriously hard to get right. Maggie Frisby, the has-been star in question, is a brilliantly complex character who requires all sorts of nuances as well as bursts of believably gargantuan energy. Everyone else, meanwhile, has the subtler task of providing a razor sharp and sometimes too specific satirical commentary on elitist university culture, the entitlement of rock stars, the woes of being British, and other stray ideas that never quite come together as a cohesive, state-of-the-nation argument.

But if this period piece is not exactly hard-hitting in 2026, it’s still a well-paced play running on a whip-smart script that’s very entertaining in all its salty sarcasm. The most contemporary component of Daniel Raggett’s production is the casting of Rebecca Lucy Taylor – better known by her pop star alias, Self Esteem – as Maggie. While Helen Mirren, who originated the role in 1975, is said to have modelled her performance on Janis Joplin, Taylor’s interpretation is fuelled by her own frustrations with a music industry that saw her slog away for years as one half of indie outfit Slow Club before breaking free in her thirties and finding her voice, and fame, as a solo artist.

Taylor is markedly soft-spoken in the role, but she quietly pulls off Maggie’s whirligig of shrewdness, sultry mystery, and an unpredictability that manifests in acid putdowns of those in her orbit. Indeed, her uncanny ability to send the conversation pivoting in wild directions manages to wrongfoot everyone, from Roman Asde’s dorky student journalist Anson, who gets more than he bargained for from their interview, to Phil Daniels’ crooked, festering manager Saraffan, who couldn’t give a toss about his band’s welfare.

“The singing is easy, it’s the bits in between I can’t do,” she says. And certainly, Taylor’s Maggie grows more self-assured each time she gets behind the microphone. Her vocals are familiarly powerful and raw – and those booking for the sheer chance of seeing Self Esteem up close on stage won’t be disappointed on this front. Chloe Lamford’s set design sends the band’s own stage sliding right to the front each time they perform, which increases the intimacy.

Most of the songs aren’t hers, mind. But there’s a diverse enough feel to Nick and Tony Bicât’s original numbers that Taylor’s addition of the soulful "Maggie’s Song", which she sings alone with her guitar, slots in seamlessly.

But this isn’t just Maggie’s story. Everyone in her male-dominated band, the Skins, is also struggling to reconcile themselves with unfulfilled potential, now that their time is almost up. Here they are playing for posh swots at Jesus College, Cambridge, instead of in sunny San Francisco. Disillusioned and disenfranchised, Peyote (a goggle-eyed JoJo Macari) is shooting up, Wilson (a bristling Michael Abubakar) is searching for the most boring facts he can find, and Arthur (a strained Michael Fox) is torn between his unresolved feelings for Maggie and settling into a dull but stable partnership with Laura (a demure Aysha Kala).

Indeed, this lot makes the trials of the band in David Adjmi’s Stereophonic, which played this same theatre a few short months before, seem trivial. They’re a directionless group going through a collective existential crisis, terrified of the mundanity hurtling their way with encroaching middle age. Behind their teeth and smiles is the agony of escaped dreams, and the ennui of living out of the spotlight.

Teeth 'n' Smiles is at the Duke of York's Theatre to 6 June. Book Teeth 'n' Smiles tickets on LondonTheatre.co.uk

Photo credit: Teeth 'n' Smiles (Photos by Helen Murray)