INTER ALIA

By Diana Simmonds

September 26 2025

NTER ALIA, National Theatre Live at participating cinemas from 25 September 2025. (Seen at Randwick Ritz.) Photography by Manuel Harlan for NT London

As so often happens, playwright Suzie Miller became an overnight international success in 2023 after putting in the hard yards for more than 20 years. The play that made her name globally was, of course, Prima Facie, and after its premiere season in Sydney in 2019, at the Stables under Lee Lewis, with brilliant Sheridan Harbridge, it gave Killing Eve star Jodie Comer the vehicle to prove herself on stage. And three years on from her West End and Broadway success, she returns to the play in 2026 for a tour of the UK.

Meanwhile, Miller has been enjoying the extraordinary effect of the play around the globe with productions – so far – in New Zealand, Turkiye, Spain, Germany, Iceland, the Netherlands, France, Serbia, Brazil, China, Sweden, Hong Kong, and Mexico. During this time, in between sipping cocktails and hobnobbing with celebs, the playwright was working.

The result is Inter Alia, and it premiered at the UK’s National Theatre earlier this year. While not exactly another one-woman legal drama, it does offer a monster role for a female of the species and it’s TV, movie, and Saltburn star Rosamund Pike – on stage for the first time in 15 years. And she is phenomenal.

In Miller’s second play on the theme of the abyss between the law and everyday morality, Pike plays Jessica Parks, a judge, wife, and mother. In the opening scenes, we are swept up in a highly theatrical, often funny, always satirical telling of her day-to-day existence. She’s decent and caring to witnesses, gives arrogant male KCs the rough end of her gavel, then dashes home to not-quite-as-successful KC husband Michael (Jamie Glover), and 18-year-old son Jamie (Jasper Talbot), both of whom are being as useful as a wet tea towel in prepping for a dinner party.

In many ways, Inter Alia is an inverted Prima Facie. The latter took a female barrister, Tessa, on an excoriating journey from defending rapists to being sexually assaulted and finding out the hard way what it’s like to be treated by a profession full of operators such as herself. The effects are still rumbling around the courts and legal chambers of the world, with amazing and wonderful outcomes.

Inter Alia is unlikely to have such world-shaking consequences, but it’s another eye-opening insight into the often unjust world of the law. This time it’s more personal as Jessica, of course, worries the worries of all women: she’s not as good a mother as she should be; her husband’s tender sensibilities need nurturing; even though she’s at the top of her profession, she still isn’t treated in the way a man in her position would be treated.

Life is good, nevertheless. She has female (KC) friends who commiserate and join her in karaoke and bitching sessions. She makes her mark daily in righting the wrongs and imbalances in the courts, and, although juggling her horsehair wig and household chores is exhausting when not exasperating, she’s flourishing.

Throughout the two hours non-stop running time, Rosamund Pike rarely sits – except briefly on her court bench – and barely draws breath. It’s a powerhouse performance of formidable charm. The script gives her a solid foundation of credibility, and she takes off from it and never stumbles. When tragedy finally arrives, it’s to the credit of both play and actor that we’re put in the position of not knowing which way to turn, who to believe.

Jamie goes to a party, gets drunk, and, next day, is accused of rape. The police come knocking. What happens next is riveting and turns the mirror back on the audience. Directed by Justin Martin, who felt the need to add minutes of cascading water to Prima Facie, the production is fast, furious, incisive, and dry. It works well in the cinema and should be seen. I wonder which Sydney theatre company has the rights: it’s a fabulous way to spend two hours.