England’s National Theatre film productions of their live theatre  performances make you feel you really are in the theatre. The Lehman Trilogy is one of its best.  The original play, by Italian Stefano Massini, was a Homeric ten hours long.  The English translation was reduced by Ben Power to a 210-minute spell-binder, with three actors telling the story of the three brothers from Bavaria who created the world’s largest finance conglomerate out of nothing.  The 150-year saga follows the family on the rise from nothing to become the cotton merchant kings, creators of the Panama Canal, financiers of the rail system across America, and more as they survive the Civil War, the First World War, the Depression, the Second World War, only to become bankrupt in 2008.  At the beginning of the Global Financial Crisis there was not one Lehman family member left in the octopus financial institution.                         

The story has been told many times over in books, films, media and other plays but Ben Power’s and the National Theatre’s production is about, aging, youth, power, progress and collapse.  It is not merely the migrant-makes-good and boom-to-bust story. The three actors seamlessly play all the characters — the wives, business partners, a Governor, children and more. Their acting skills are magnificent as they weave the saga.  It is a poetic rendering of American capitalism on a minimalist stage with an excellent film backdrop and subtle live piano music that casts a spell. The play has received rave reviews, as has the film of the play. National Theatre Live rocks!