Stage review: Blood And Gifts, National Theatre

Afghanistan. That insoluble conundrum that makes the whole Maria problem look like an open and shut case.

You would think that BBC News 24 would be enough and a night at the theatre would be the other thing. But the powerful and compelling Blood And Gifts is not trite or gratuitous. It feels necessary.

This is a history lesson that avoids glib neon fingerposts highlighting the ironies of Western involvement in the expulsion of the Soviets and the rise of monied and armed warlords in the 1980s.

Director Howard Davies begins the journey as a John Le Carre shadow play where the softly-spoken lie, the empty gesture, a bag of cash and shifting allegiances create illusions of loyalty.

The slick setting (designed by Ultz) reflects the whisper quiet machinations of the plot. Airless corridors, barren outposts and heat-suffused offices slip back and forth giving an impression of unsteady tectonic plates.

At first, all is clear cut. America is the cocksure moneybags. Britain is yesterday's man. The Afghans are fratricidal. The Pakistanis corrupt. Russians ruthless.

But as JT Rogers' multi-stranded play unfurls, the archetypes reveal their flaws, the complexity of their motivations and their muted honour. A big war becomes a personal battlefield.

This is the story of three relationships made and maintained by CIA man James Warnock over a decade. With the dry, white Russian Dmitri Gromov (Matthew Marsh), he is cagey. With tub-thumping Brit Simon Craig (Adam James) he is dismissive. With warlord Abdullah Khan (Demosthenes Chrysan) he is impatient.

But time, attrition, and a bond built on shared experiences softens James's outlook until, when all is done, he has achieved something obviously smaller, yet discernibly grander, than the Pyrrhic victory against the scolded Red Army.

Lloyd Owen as James is a compelling presence in a performance that rarely sees him off stage. Strong, single-minded but conflicted in his loyalties to family and country, he subverts the cliche of the imperialist Yank abroad, softening to the plight of his fellow-travellers and hardening to the politicians and pen-pushers back home.

Marsh and James bring charm, wit and dexterity to their roles. Chrysan brings presence. The large cast is uniformly flawless (and flawlessly uniformed).

Atoning for his desertion from Tehran, James vows not to let Khan become an expendable pawn and it is this cross-cultural, decade-long fractured-yet-unbroken loyalty that is the soul of a piece and a counterweight to the brutal manoeuvrings of the power players.

Cinematic in scope and ambition, the story is necessarily circular, for the departure of the Americans heralds the rise of the Islamic fundamentalists and a new round of fighting. They will all be back (is the obvious subtext) doing this all again and without a trace of irony.

"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely," Simon tells James, and then points out how George Santayana's famous phrase continues: "Great men are almost always bad men."

This is a touching portrayal of four men, neither great nor bad but good to the limit of their capacity in a world where such a quality is a inconvenient affectation.

See this. Really. It packs an unanticipated punch to the gut. And there is much to enjoy - and not just the Afghans, enamored with Western pop culture, cradling their bolt-action Enfields singing in broken English: "On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair, warm smell of colitis rising up through the air..."

– From September 2010