In plays like “This House” and “Labour of Love,” Mr. Graham has focused on parliamentary politics. “Ink” widens the lens, scrutinizing the media landscape that holds so much sway.
Yet The Sun is still deemed, by some, a stain on British life, and Mr. Murdoch looms large in the public imagination. “He’s a sort of pantomime villain,” Mr. Carvel explained.
It takes a certain kind of actor to embody that onstage, and it’s telling that Mr. Carvel, a shape-shifter with a showman’s instincts, is the only member of the original British cast crossing the Atlantic with Rupert Goold’s production, which Manhattan Theater Club is presenting at the Samuel J. Friedman Theater.
It brings the 41-year-old Londoner back to New York six years after his Tony Award nomination for his turn as Miss Trunchbull, the imposing headmistress (and ex-Olympian hammer thrower) who towered over “Matilda the Musical.”
The “Matilda” director Matthew Warchus has described him as an old-school “nose putty actor,” referring to his relish for physical transformation. Mr. Carvel was, indeed, unrecognizable in the role. Buckled into a brown dress, hair wrenched into a bun, his “Trunch” was shrill-voiced, broad-shouldered and twinkle-toed.
Though he had led National Theater and Royal Court productions in London, “Matilda” cemented Mr. Carvel’s reputation as a singular, chameleonic performer. He has since been selective in choosing roles, ensuring each presented a fresh challenge. He was banshee-like in the Almeida’s “Bakkhai,” then a shaven-headed hulk in “The Hairy Ape” for the Old Vic. Onscreen, he’s played eccentric wizards and suburban adulterers. Every part is idiosyncratic, completely original.
Serious, symmetrical and athletic under his black turtleneck, Mr. Carvel is a character actor with leading-man looks. As a teenager growing up in Hampstead, North London, he was a keen cosplayer, creating Dungeons and Dragons-style personas.
