The reviews have landed for The Story, the UK premiere of Tracey Scott Wilson’s newsroom drama in the Olivier, and the critics are markedly more divided than the billing suggested. Letitia Wright makes her National Theatre debut as Yvonne, an ambitious young reporter who chases the killing of a white teacher in a Black neighbourhood past the point where the facts will carry her, and Clint Dyer’s production surrounds her with overlapping scenes, video walls and a newsroom that never stops moving. Almost everyone found the first half gripping; almost everyone found the second half too much. The performance the notices agree on is not the one at the top of the poster but Lorraine Toussaint’s Pat, the Civil Rights veteran running the desk, whom several critics called the evening’s anchor.
The verdict: eight reviews so far — one four-star notice, six three-star, and one outlet that publishes no rating. Among those that score, the average is 3.1 out of 5, and the split is unusually consistent: a first half the critics enjoyed, a second half they thought overloaded.
What are critics saying about The Story?
The Standard
“Cracking melodrama about race and the media in America”
Reviewer: Nick Curtis
“Wilson is also good on the romance of newspapers – the thrill of the deadline and securing the front-page splash, the urge not to let facts get in the way of a good story. As someone who’s spent most of his life in print, I approve heartily of this, and of Wilson’s willingness to play fast and loose with the tedious reality of newsroom life to ramp up tension.”
The Independent
“Thorny journalism drama The Story makes the audience gasp like deflating balloons”
Reviewer: Alice Saville
“Wilson’s play is full of radical thinking, and the kind of piercing observations that make the audience gasp like deflating balloons. It goes to so many exciting, uncomfortable places, resisting the temptation to provide heroes, villains, or digestible messages. Still, its neatly crafted ambiguity ultimately feels frustrating. How deep does this mess go? Is grieving wife Jessica (Antonia Bernath) as suspicious as she seems? A powerful final scene explodes across the stage in a burst of fire and violence. It shows how high the stakes are, here, without fully letting them play out.”
Time Out
“Letitia Wright heads up the cast of this gripping but overwrought journalistic thriller”
Reviewer: Andrzej Lukowski
“Wilson’s play is unabashedly populist, bordering on trashy at times, and while there may be some real-life precedent for Pat separately commissioning both Yvonne and Neil to get to the bottom of the gang story – so they are overtly in competition – it does feel like a clunking plot device to up the excitement. And it works: Clint Dyer’s production is totally gripping, especially in the first half as the dialogue rapidly intercuts between the two rival journalists bitching about each other. Yes, it has the air of a well-made Channel 5 true-crime drama. But not all theatre need to be highbrow all the time, plus it makes a lot of incisive points about the fragility of the African-American community, especially as Pam’s hardassed facade melts (or at least, becomes more explicable).”
WhatsOnStage
Reviewer: Sarah Crompton
“But on the whole The Story sprawls when it should tighten; it feels like a series of point paragraphs rather than a narrative. Wright is energetic and wired as Yvonne but her motivations – with a melodramatic explanation – never quite convince, and the fractured nature of the telling makes it hard to care about her. In the end, it is Toussaint who holds it all together, fierce and unbending and heartbreakingly destroyed by sacrificing her principles in a world and in an industry that makes it very difficult to succeed.”
LondonTheatre.co.uk
“Letitia Wright leads a prescient play tackling race and fake news”
Reviewer: Aliya Al-Hassan
“Black Panther star Letitia Wright conveys huge drive and ambition as Yvonne, but never quite convinces in the role. As part of the emerging Black middle class, she is as far removed from the community she is supposed to understand as her white colleagues. Described derisively by her colleague Neil as an “uncertain sister”, Yvonne wants her success to belong to her, not used as a symbol of the achievements of her community. There is little chemistry with secret boyfriend Jeff, played with conviction by Wilf Scolding, but Wright does have enjoyable tension with Ashley Thomas’s sceptical Neil.”
The Reviews Hub
Reviewer: Maryam Philpott
“There are strong performances here from Letitia Wright as the determined, if never likeable Yvonne and especially from Lorraine Toussaint as Pat, Ashely Thomas as Neil and Aliyah Odoffin as source Latisha, But the scale of the Olivier drowns this series of intimate conversations; the momentum dissipates, and The Story ultimately forgets to answer its most important question – what has this all been about?”
BroadwayWorld
Reviewer: Clementine Scott
“This is a promising premise, but the play, despite updates to the script for this revival, falls strangely flat. The two ambitious female characters articulate two opposite responses to racism and misogyny in their profession, but in practice, they often fall into Devil Wears Prada-esque stereotypes of the mentor and protege, never dropping the facade they wear at work. In one of several odd pacing choices in this script, crucial elements of their personal histories are withheld until the eleventh hour, so that when we finally start to understand these characters, we have barely any time left with them.”
Production photographs by Feruza Afewerki.
Also reviewed by: The Stage (Dave Fargnoli, three stars, “Stinging indictment”), whose review sits behind a paywall.
The Olivier’s neighbour in the Lyttelton divided the critics much the same way this week: our roundup of Electra/Persona at the National Theatre collects those notices, and Jeeves Takes Charge at the Charing Cross Theatre gathers a warmer set.
The Story is booking at the Olivier Theatre at the National Theatre until 24 October 2026.
