Theatre Reviews
Antony and Cleopatra, RSC, Barbican review - rising grandeurWednesday, 13 December 2017
Is there a key to “infinite variety”? The challenge of Cleopatra is to convey the sheer fullness of the role, the sense that it defines, and is defined by only itself: there’s no saying that the glorious tragedy of the closing plays itself out, of course, but its impact surely soars only when the ludic engagements of the first half have drawn us in equally. Read more... |
Cell Mates, Hampstead Theatre review - intriguing yet opaqueMonday, 11 December 2017
The play that famously got away when one of its stars (quite literally) jumped ship is back. In 1995, Stephen Fry abandoned the West End premiere of Simon Gray's espionage drama Cell Mates, leaving co-star Rik Mayall in the lurch and prompting Gray to write a particularly dyspeptic account of the bizarre goings-on called Fat Chance. Read more... |
Jack and the Beanstalk, Lyric Hammersmith review - great fun for all agesMonday, 11 December 2017
Pantomime may be a very old art form, but the Lyric Hammersmith has been injecting some freshness into it each year since 2009, and this year's production, written by Joel Horwood and directed by Jude Christian and Sean Holmes, is no exception. Read more... |
The Box of Delights, Wilton's Music Hall review - children's classic novel transferred to stageSaturday, 09 December 2017
Theatreland is currently awash with pantomimes and rehashes of A Christmas Carol, so all credit to this ambitious new production, an adaptation of the 1935 children’s book, The Box of Delights. Long before Narnia, poet laureate John Masefield was concocting tales of children dispatched to mys Read more... |
La Soirée, Aldwych Theatre review - flickers of brilliance in a patchy eveningThursday, 07 December 2017
La Soirée is on the up-and-up. Beginning life as an after-hours show at the fringes of the Fringe in 2004, it won an Olivier in 2015 and has landed its first West End residency, a two-month run at the Aldwych Theatre over Christmas. |
The Melting Pot, Finborough Theatre review - entertaining moralsThursday, 07 December 2017
Israel Zangwill’s 1908 play The Melting Pot characterises Europe as an old and worn-out continent racked by violence and injustice and in thrall to its own bloody past. America, on the other hand, represents a visionary project that will “melt up all race-difference and vendettas” to “purge and recreate” a new world. Read more... |
Barnum, Menier Chocolate Factory review - a big, blowsy spectacleWednesday, 06 December 2017
You have to hand it to Menier Chocolate Factory, a venue that doesn't let size matter as it stages an all-singing, all-dancing new production of Barnum, a musical about Phineas Taylor (PT) Barnum – the 19th-century showman famed for staging “The Greatest Show on Earth”. Read more... |
Parliament Square, Bush Theatre, review – uncomfortable blaze of angerWednesday, 06 December 2017
The political story of our time is the upsurge in support for Jeremy Corbyn, leftwing leader of the Labour Party, mainly by young activists who are both idealistic and energetic. But what would happen if one of them decided to go freelance, and pushed their protest beyond the bounds of reason? James Fritz’s resonant and beautifully structured play explores this kind of question. Read more... |
Dear Brutus, Southwark Playhouse review - a judicious mix of comedy and sadnessTuesday, 05 December 2017
Confused people, some of whom may have made the wrong choices in life and love, find themselves in an enchanted wood at Midsummer. Dear Brutus has long been seen to echo Shakespeare’s comedy of metamorphosis, A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Read more... |
The Passing of the Third Floor Back, Finborough Theatre review - the better nature of Jerome K JeromeMonday, 04 December 2017
Even by the standards of theatrical archaeology that the Finborough has made its own, The Passing of the Third Floor Back is a curiosity. Jerome K Jerome’s 1908 play was a long-running hit in the West End – with Johnston Forbes-Robertson, one of the leading English classical actors of his day, in the lead – before transferring to Broadway for a year. Read more... |
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★★★★★
‘A compulsive, involving, emotionally stirring evening – theatre’s answer to a page-turner.’
The Observer, Kate Kellaway
Direct from a sold-out season at Kiln Theatre the five star, hit play, The Son, is now playing at the Duke of York’s Theatre for a strictly limited season.
★★★★★
‘This final part of Florian Zeller’s trilogy is the most powerful of all.’
The Times, Ann Treneman
Written by the internationally acclaimed Florian Zeller (The Father, The Mother), lauded by The Guardian as ‘the most exciting playwright of our time’, The Son is directed by the award-winning Michael Longhurst.
Book by 30 September and get tickets from £15*
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