Theatre
The Tiger Lillies' Christmas Carol: A Victorian Gutter, Southbank Centre review - cult band get inside Scrooge's headSaturday, 18 December 2021
Charles Dickens and Martyn Jacques is a marriage made in heaven (well, hell I suppose): the Victorian novelist touring the rookeries of Clerkenwell the better to fire his imagination and, 150 years or so later, the post-punk maestro mining London's... Read more... |
Habeas Corpus, Menier Chocolate Factory review - grappling with Alan Bennett's anti-farceWednesday, 15 December 2021
In his 1973 play Habeas Corpus, now revived at the Menier Chocolate Factory under the direction of Patrick Marber, Alan Bennett had his way with the venerable Whitehall farce. Today’s younger playgoer would probably marvel at the popularity of these... Read more... |
Pantomime 2021 round-up 1: a great Dame and two debutsTuesday, 14 December 2021
Jack and the Beanstalk, Hackney Empire ★★★ It's always good news when Clive Rowe decides to don the frocks to play the Dame, and this year he has also taken over directing duties (with Tony Whittle), with a script written by Will Brenton. It's a... Read more... |
Best of Enemies, Young Vic review – fast-paced portrait of a clash between two titanic egosMonday, 13 December 2021
No playwright has a scalpel as sharp as James Graham’s when it comes to dissecting politics; he has a brilliance and edge that strips away all unnecessary material till the beating heart of the matter is revealed. His latest tour de force takes the... Read more... |
Cabaret, The Kit Kat Club at the Playhouse Theatre review – polymorphous, prodigiousMonday, 13 December 2021
Has there ever been a Cabaret as dangerous as this one? Rebecca Frecknall’s disorienting take on the Kander and Ebb classic pulls you in and spits you out in a reinvention that pushes or dissolves boundaries at every twist and turn.Transforming a... Read more... |
Trouble in Mind, National Theatre review - race, rage and relevanceSaturday, 11 December 2021
The National Theatre has a good record in staging classic American drama by black playwrights. James Baldwin's The Amen Corner, August Wilson's Ma Rainey's Black Bottom and Lorraine Hansberry’s Les Blancs have all had terrific new stagings. Now it’s... Read more... |
The Strange Undoing of Prudencia Hart, Royal Exchange, Manchester review - a spooky study in balladryFriday, 10 December 2021
This is a story of an innocent who finds herself unexpectedly in a strange, unknown world. The same could be true for those in its audience.Scottish academia sets great store by the significance of folk tradition, and many are the books and papers... Read more... |
The Book of Dust, Bridge Theatre review – as much intelligence and provocation as fleet-footed funThursday, 09 December 2021
It’s been seventeen years since Nicholas Hytner first directed Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials at the National Theatre, ambitiously whirling audiences into Pullman’s universe of daemons, damnable clerics and parallel worlds. Now he has... Read more... |
Measure for Measure, Sam Wanamaker Theatre review - this problem play is a delightMonday, 06 December 2021
Measure for Measure may be the quintessential Shakespeare “problem” play, but just what has earned it that epithet remains a puzzle. Each generation approaches the matter from its own perspective. The developments of recent years, #MeToo most of all... Read more... |
Antony Sher: 'I discovered I could be other people'Monday, 06 December 2021
The energy of Antony Sher, who has died at the age of 72, was prodigious. He not only acted like a fizzing firecracker. He wrote books about his most celebrated roles, and several novels set in his native South Africa. He also wrote plays, and he... Read more... |
Life of Pi, Wyndham's Theatre review - visually ravishing show uplifted by astonishing puppetryFriday, 03 December 2021
When the Canadian Yann Martel went to India as a young adult backpacker he fell in love – not with one person but with the rich imaginative landscape opened up by its religions and its animals. A struggling writer at the time, he channelled this new... Read more... |
Stephen Sondheim in memoriam - he gave us more to seeTuesday, 30 November 2021
It seemed impossible and yet, the other evening, while idly flicking through emails, I learned the unimaginable: Stephen Sondheim, age 91, had passed away. And very quickly by all accounts, given that he was reported to have enjoyed a Thanksgiving... Read more... |
