Theatre review: Tru brings a strong performance to a modest script about Truman Capote

A new theatre review assesses Tru, a play about the life of author Truman Capote currently running at the Menier Chocolate Factory in London, describing the production's performance as considerably stronger than its script.

The production features Jesse Tyler Ferguson in an 85-minute solo monologue, staged within an immersive set designed by Paul Farnsworth intended to evoke Capote's world. According to the review, the performance itself is highly accomplished, though the underlying text is assessed as more limited, described as a modest piece unable to fully capture the depth of Capote's life and career.

The review situates Capote's most significant creative period as relatively brief, spanning from the publication of his novella Breakfast at Tiffany's in 1958 to his genre-influential "nonfiction novel" In Cold Blood in 1965. It notes that Capote's later years were marked by struggles with drugs and alcohol, during which he spent roughly two decades failing to complete a planned masterwork, Answered Prayers. Early chapters of that unfinished project, once published in magazine form, reportedly led to Capote's ostracization by the socialite circles he had once moved within, after they found the material insufficiently fictionalized for their comfort.

The review characterizes the overall production as falling short of a fully realized theatrical exploration of Capote's life, likening it to a "Broadway museum piece" text, despite praising the central performance and staging. Tru is running at the Menier Chocolate Factory until November 14.