Letters from Max at Hampstead Theatre

Letters from Max is based on the deep and profound friendship between award-winning American playwright and Yale University Professor of Drama, Sarah Ruhl, and her student, the incredibly gifted poet, Max Ritvo.

When Max (a moving performance by Eric Sirakian) was in high school, he was diagnosed with pediatric cancer, Ewing’s sarcoma, which tragically returns in 2012 while he is an undergraduate in Ruhl’s playwriting class. As his health declines, his friendship with tutor Ruhl (played with acute compassion by Sirine Saba) blossoms and deepens.

Immediately, Sirakian has this intense golden retriever energy when he is accepted at Yale. The play flows in a naturalistic style, both actors’ synergy shining on stage, with witty, quick-fire responses. Both Ritvo and Ruhl are avid about poetry, and their ardent desire for literature shines in humorous and relatable monologues, all of which are based on Letters from Max, a heartwarming book of correspondence between the two. The young student is continuously writing and investing all his efforts into poetry, all the while firmly fighting cancer, as he proudly states, “All I want to do is write.”

Set design by Dick Bird is intimate and sparse, which brings forth focus to Ritvo and Ruhl’s blooming friendship, while Laura Moody’s beautiful cello music augments the play with complementary soundscapes.  The floor hosts a glass wall, which acts as the barrier between life and death; sometimes we see Ruhl on one side and Ritvo on the other. In one very affecting scene, their reflections hold hands, without the actors actually touching.

Ritvo is a resplendent, gifted writer, and poetry comes naturally to him. He turns from student to teacher and back again with ease, and Sirakian portrays the sparkling personality nonchalantly; it is serendipitous that both the actor and Ritvo were in the same class under the tutelage of Ruhl, which adds extra significance to the piece.

Letters from Max captures the brief but wondrous life of a young poet at his peak, the joy he brought to many, and the lasting impression his friendship had on Ruhl and those closest to him. It is a distilled, poignant piece that explores life, death, and the existence of God while honouring a young man gone too soon, but whose exquisite poetry lives on, like his spirit.

Selina Begum
Photos: Helen Murray

Letters from Max is at Hampstead Theatre from 23^rd May until 28^th June 2025. For further information or to book, visit the theatre’s website here.