Theatre Reviews
Proms 34 & 35 review: Oklahoma!, John Wilson Orchestra - music triumphs, words and drama sufferSaturday, 12 August 2017
Only one thing could equal the "wow!" factor of seeing and hearing a youngish Hugh Jackman launch into “Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin’“ at the start of the National Theatre’s 1998 staging of Oklahoma!: John Wilson and his orchestra trilling and swooning their perfectly-balanced way through the Overture at the Proms... Read more...
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Edinburgh Fringe 2017 reviews: Adam / Eve / NassimThursday, 10 August 2017
Eve ★★★★Transgender issues are high on the agenda at this year’s Fringe, with the energetic Testosterone at the Pleasance and the breezy You’ve Changed from Northern Stage at Summerhall among the stand-outs. Read more... |
Edinburgh Festival 2017 reviews: Rhinoceros / FlightWednesday, 09 August 2017
Rhinoceros ★★★★★ |
Apologia, Trafalgar Studios review – Stockard Channing shines bright as a 1960s radicalFriday, 04 August 2017
The 1960s were “hilarious”, says one young character in this revival, starring Broadway icon Stockard Channing, of Alexi Kaye Campbell’s 2009 family drama at the Trafalgar Studios. How so? Read more... |
Coming Clean, King's Head Theatre / Twilight Song, Park Theatre reviews - gay-themed first and last plays falterTuesday, 01 August 2017
Like his smash-hit My Night With Reg, Kevin Elyot's first and last plays have a role to play in the history of gay theatre, but do they work? Emphatically not in the case of Twilight Song (★★), completed – one is tempted to say, sketched – shortly before his death in 2014, though four out of five actors at the admirable Park Theatre give it their best shot. Read more... |
Road, Royal Court review - poetry amidst the painMonday, 31 July 2017
Who'd have guessed that the London theatre scene at present would be so devoted to the numinous? Hard on the heels of Girl from the North Country, which locates moments of transcendence in hard-scrabble Depression-era lives, along comes John Tiffany's deeply tender revival of Jim Cartwright's vaunted 1986 play Road, which tempers its landscape of pain with an abundance of poetry. Read more... |
The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 ¾, Menier Chocolate Factory review – more than feel-good summer funFriday, 28 July 2017
Back in Margaret Thatcher’s middle England, teenagers got by somehow. Without recourse to wands or Ballardian games of extinction, we survived adolescence with the help of a story full of people we knew. People (a bit) like us. Every year I re-read Sue Townsend’s chronicles of Adrian Mole, hopeless lovestruck bard of Leicester. And each year he grew up with me, as experience uncovered the texture of Mole’s life. Read more... |
Mosquitoes, National Theatre review - Olivias Colman and Williams dazzle amid dramatic excessThursday, 27 July 2017
There's enough plot for a dozen plays buzzing its way through Mosquitoes, Lucy Kirkwood's play that uses the backdrop of the Large Hadron Collidor (LHC) to chronicle the multiple collisions within a family. Read more... |
Girl from the North Country, Old Vic review – Dylan songs hit home, the rest is weirdnessThursday, 27 July 2017
Plays with songs in, or more precisely plays with famous songs in, can feel like the uncanny valley of theatre. They’re not quite musicals and not quite tribute shows. They deliver on familiar tunes and disconcert with fresh narrative. You’re constantly wrongfooted by the rush of recognition. Read more... |
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Apollo Theatre review - Sienna Miller lets ripTuesday, 25 July 2017
"Maggie the cat is alive: I am alive," or so remarks the feline, eternally frustrated heroine of Tennessee Williams's Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. 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*
with no booking fee.
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