“Absurd comedy and total tragedy, like being alive.” That’s how director Finn Den Hertog described The Fifth Step, David Ireland’s beautifully poised two-hander, starring Jack Lowden and Martin Freeman. It ran for just over two months at Soho Place, and is now finding a new audience through NT Live, in cinemas from 27th November.
At first glance, The Fifth Step appears simple: ninety minutes, two actors, simple staging. But beneath the surface lies a deep meditation on guilt, shame, religion, addiction, and how people support each other through the fluctuations of life.
Playwright David Ireland began writing the piece in 2021, drawing from his own experiences in Alcoholics Anonymous and the interplay between his newfound faith and recovery. The play feels deeply personal, with Ireland commenting in a post-screening Q&A that “writing the play brought [him] a lot of peace.” Jack Lowden was attached from the inset, and the play was briefly staged in Scotland in 2024, but underwent some changes in the interim, including bringing Martin Freeman into the project.
Martin Freeman and Jack Lowden play two sides of the same coin; one, younger, newly sober and desperate for connection; the other, older, wiser, and eager to dispense advice. Their rapport is evident throughout, with a shifting dynamic between them; a slow, careful descent as the balance of power alters. The play expertly balances humour and levity with raw confession, a hallmark of Ireland’s writing and his blend of the sacred and the profane.
Den Hertog, who had directed a previous production of the play, reinvented it when Freeman joined. Staging it in the round provided an opportunity to amplify the intimacy of the encounter between the characters and the audience. The space evokes both the shape of an AA meeting and the sense of a sparring match, with the audience (both in the room, and those viewing on screen) acting as active witnesses to the men’s confessions and contradictions.
The production design is understated yet striking- subtle music, minimal props, and simple lighting, used to effect at key moments of change or chaos. For NT Live audiences, Den Hertog has carefully chosen camera angles to heighten and mimic the intimacy experienced by live viewers, preserving the immediacy of the stage while expanding its emotional reach. The result is a cinematic translation that feels organic and engaging.
Viewers can anticipate a production that doesn’t rely on spectacle but instead on honesty and rhythm: the ebb and flow of two men searching for meaning. What might sound static- a series of conversations in a room- becomes a portrait of fragility and forgiveness, lifted by the authenticity of its performances and the precision of the writing and direction.
The Fifth Step offers no easy solutions, only the uneasy grace of human connection. Ireland’s words remind us that redemption rarely arrives as a moment of divine inspiration but as conversation- halting, awkward and contradictory. On stage or on screen, this is storytelling both unadorned and profound.