Following the resounding success of Prima Facie, Suzie Miller has returned with Inter Alia, a thematically linked and equally ambitious follow-up that once again peers into the murky moral waters of the British legal system. Where Prima Facie was an intense, one-woman monologue exploring systemic injustice from the standpoint of a female barrister, Inter Alia builds on that legacy, deepening Miller’s inquiry with a broader canvas and a more complex emotional palette. Directed with inventive finesse by Justin Martin, and featuring a blistering turn from Rosamund Pike, Inter Alia is a bold, sophisticated production that lingers in the mind long after the final curtain.
Pike plays Jessica, a crown court judge whose world is a high-octane blur of courtrooms, committee meetings, family dinners and karaoke nights. Her life is a masterclass in over-functioning: she’s a legal powerhouse by day, and a dutiful mother and wife by night – albeit to a lazy husband and a clueless teenage son, Harry, whose idea of self-reliance is ringing his mother at work to ask why his shirt isn’t in the fridge. At home, Jessica is treated more as domestic staff than maternal anchor, but rather than protest, she dances on tabletops and sings Shania Twain with abandon – a woman performing the fantasy of ‘having it all’ while quietly unravelling inside.
Pike is nothing short of electric. It’s a physically and emotionally demanding performance, surging between brittle confidence and barely-suppressed anxiety. Her Jessica is posh yet earthy, commanding yet vulnerable, her charisma radiating through every frenetic moment. At times, Miller’s script veers into caricature – Jessica courts favour from a former lover in court, fakes orgasms to end marital duty, and imagines herself as a legal pop diva – but Pike navigates these eccentricities with a deftness that keeps the character grounded and oddly sympathetic.
Where the first third of Inter Alia flirts with satire, the tone darkens dramatically once the real story emerges. When Jessica’s teenage son is accused of sexual assault, the play pivots from domestic farce to forensic moral drama. Miller is astute in how she handles the subject matter. This is not a tale of open-and-shut justice, but a probing exploration of ambiguity – both legal and emotional. Jessica, a champion of women’s rights and an expert in sexual assault jurisprudence, is plunged into an agonising conflict: between professional principle and maternal instinct, between the letter of the law and the messiness of love.
Martin’s production is richly textured, weaving in puppetry, illusions and dreamlike vignettes from Harry’s childhood that bleed into the present like half-remembered fragments. It’s a more layered and visually poetic staging than Prima Facie, reinforcing the notion that we are seeing the world not just as it is, but as Jessica processes it – fraught, fluid, and clouded by memory, guilt, and fear.
Jamie Glover offers a fine counterbalance as Michael, Jessica’s emotionally unavailable husband, whose complacency becomes increasingly galling as the play progresses. A scene in which Jessica eviscerates him for failing to teach their son about sexual consent lands with chilling power – cruel, yes, but incisive and raw in its accusation.
It’s a testament to Miller’s skill that the play resists the urge to moralise. Harry is not cast as a villain, nor is his accuser presented as beyond reproach. Instead, Inter Alia presents the kind of murky, painful uncertainty that typifies so many real-life cases – the difficulty in distinguishing between miscommunication and misconduct, between a legal truth and an emotional one.
The final act is tightly plotted, with revelations that shift our sympathies and perceptions. It builds to a conclusion that is both emotionally harrowing and intellectually satisfying, with an image so stark and resonant that it sends shivers down the spine. The play’s second half elevates the whole – transforming it from a somewhat indulgent character study into a compelling courtroom drama that never loses its grip.
Yes, Inter Alia is, at times, a theatrical contrivance – the central conceit of a high-flying female judge navigating personal and professional crises feels slightly engineered to serve the playwright’s message. But when that message is as urgent and intelligently rendered as it is here, such contrivance is forgivable.
More than just a companion to Prima Facie, Inter Alia is a formidable work in its own right – an emotionally charged, intellectually rigorous piece of theatre that unflinchingly interrogates the fault lines between justice, privilege and parenthood. And at its centre, Rosamund Pike delivers a career-defining performance that confirms her as one of Britain’s most arresting stage presences.
Inter Alia, Lyttelton Theatre, National Theatre, South Bank, London SE1 9PX until 13 September 2025
