Copenhagen review – atomic secrets and moral fog in a terrifyingly timely revival

Hampstead theatre, London
Michael Frayn’s cerebral drama of science and conscience returns with urgency – although this production struggles to ignite its emotional core

Paapa Essiedu recently spoke of reviving only those plays that speak to the present moment. Michael Frayn’s 1998 drama could not better fit that bill. A dangerous hard-right politician who threatens to wipe out an entire civilisation sits at the heart of this three-hander about pioneering atomic physics caught in the warp of political violence and warfare.

It is based on a real life meeting in 1941 between the Danish Niels Bohr (Richard Schiff) and the German Werner Heisenberg (Damien Molony), both brilliant quantum scientists on opposite sides during the second world war. The raging leader here is Hitler but echoes of Donald Trump could not be more resounding, given his recently expressed fantasy of genocide in his war with Iran.