Hollywood loved William Haines—until it didn’t. When MGM’s brightest star chose his lover over a sham marriage, the newly enforced Hays Code made him a target, exposing the brutal hypocrisy of a town built on image. The Code, at Southwark Playhouse Elephant, shines a spotlight on Haines’ defiance, the cruelty faced by gay men, and the loyal, razor-tongued friendship of Tallulah Bankhead in a world desperate to keep its secrets.

From the moment the lights rise, The Code wraps you in both the dazzle and the darkness of Hollywood’s golden age. Ethan Cheek’s stylish set frames the action with the cracked, dismantled remnants of a tourist billboard advertising “Hollywoodland,” a striking metaphor for the industry’s glossy façade and the rot beneath it. This is a world where glamour is manufactured, reputations are bartered, and careers can be destroyed in an instant by gossip or decree.

At the heart of the play is Tracie Bennett’s sensational Tallulah Bankhead. Bennett crackles with wicked one-liners and champagne-soaked bravado, delivering a performance as deliciously outrageous as Tallulah herself. Yet beneath the sharp wit lies a desperate tenderness: an actress out of step with a Hollywood that has abandoned her, battling addiction and clawing at the fading edges of stardom. Bennett balances this duality beautifully, making Tallulah both larger-than-life and achingly human. It’s the sort of performance you can’t take your eyes off—ferocious, funny, and unflinchingly sad.

John Partridge is equally magnetic as William “Billy” Haines. Suave and assured, his Haines is every inch the Hollywood charmer turned interior-design darling, but Partridge brings a fiercely defiant energy whenever Haines is pushed to justify his choices. His blistering self-defence against the hypocrisy of the industry is riveting, delivered with charisma and conviction. Yet it is in the quieter, more vulnerable moments—particularly in the tender embraces he shares with Tallulah as the play closes—that Partridge’s performance breaks your heart. His Haines is a man both triumphant and wounded, living a love story denied to the screen but no less real.

Nick Blakeley’s Henry Willson, a Hollywood agent with ice in his veins, embodies the brutal machinery of the studio system. He is bleak, controlling, and vicious—a man who enforces the moral laws of the time while exploiting the actors he claims to represent. Against him stands the tragic figure of Chad Manford, played with aching vulnerability by Solomon Davy. Chad is not a villain but a victim: mistreated and abused, forced apart from his lover Lloyd by the so-called “decency laws” of Hollywood. His story becomes a microcosm of countless closeted men prevented from living authentically, broken by a system that demanded silence and sacrifice.

What makes The Code so powerful is its refusal to look away. It pulls no punches in its portrayal of homophobia and the abuse meted out to actors by the industry they helped to build. References to real-life scandals—including the speculation around Cary Grant—anchor the story in its time, reminding us how much was silenced or erased under the weight of the Production Code.

The result is theatre that feels both unflinchingly honest and heartbreakingly necessary. Under Christopher Renshaw’s assured direction, glamour and grit sit side by side: the champagne fizz of Tallulah’s quips one moment, the sting of Hollywood’s cruelty the next.

The Code is dazzling, devastating, and absolutely essential viewing.