Theatre Reviews
Kiss Me Kate, Old Vic TheatreWednesday, 28 November 2012
Cole Porter’s musical spin on Shakespeare demands the fluidity, fizz and acidity of champagne. In Trevor Nunn’s revival, which transfers to London after a successful run in Chichester, it’s more like gelato. It has sweetness, and a rich abundance of detail, but it’s also thick, cloying, and somewhat bland. There’s plenty of stagey pizzazz on display, but it too often feels strained and soulless. Read more...
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Goodnight Mister Tom, Phoenix TheatreWednesday, 28 November 2012
Love and loneliness, broken homes and broken hearts, child abuse and communities clinging on through war... This adaptation of Michelle Magorian's children's book treats the darkest and most difficult of themes with a firm but tender touch, breathing life into the friendship at the heart of her World War Two story. Oliver Ford Davies leads the cast as Tom Oakley, the elderly recluse looking after an evacuee, with a calm confidence. He exudes an almost palpable warmth. Read more... |
Arab Nights, Soho TheatreSunday, 25 November 2012
Given the present Middle East uproar, perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that contemporary versions of The 1001 Arabian Nights are sprouting everywhere. With their variety of stories and roots in countries undergoing such political upheaval, they offer rich and important pickings. Read more... |
The Magistrate, National TheatreThursday, 22 November 2012
You don't see much of Arthur Wing Pinero's considerable output these days. Although he was largely contemporaneous with Oscar Wilde, George Bernard Shaw and Gilbert and Sullivan, whose works have stayed the course, his plays have not, with just a few exceptions. Read more... |
The Promise, Trafalgar StudiosTuesday, 20 November 2012
An expert cast delivers on their promise in Aleksei Arbuzov's triangular Russian drama from 1965 of the same name, which offers up war and peace and the shifting tides of love. There's so much of the last, in fact, that Alex Sims's production at times plays out like Design For Living set against a soundscape of shelling and the occasional nod to Hitler and Stalin. Read more... |
Epstein: The Man Who Made The Beatles, Epstein Theatre, LiverpoolTuesday, 20 November 2012
Those of us growing up in the heady days of 1960s Liverpool knew that four local lads were taking the world by storm. Some really grown-up people might even have been to The Cavern and seen the phenomenon in their early days. And yet there was always an enigma in the background: the figure who made it happen but about whom we knew almost nothing. Read more... |
Twelfth Night/Richard III, Apollo TheatreMonday, 19 November 2012
Something new is happening in the West End. Just up the road from Thriller and down a bit from Les Misérables a billboard the colour of weak tea (positively consumptive compared to the full-colour, neon assaults on either side) proclaims the arrival of Richard III and Twelfth Night. Shakespeare is back on Shaftesbury Avenue, and this time he means business – big, commercial business. How has this sleight of hand been achieved? Read more... |
Love's Comedy, Orange Tree TheatreSunday, 18 November 2012
1866 was a crucial watershed in Henrik Ibsen’s writing career. As a man he may have come of age some 20 years earlier, but it was only at almost 40 that his writing attained brooding, bearded maturity in Brand, the first in the sequence of plays that we now accept as the Ibsen canon. Read more... |
Constellations, Duke of York's TheatreSaturday, 17 November 2012
Nick Payne has already made quite a mark. In 2009 he won the George Devine award for Most Promising Playwright with the intriguingly entitled If There Is I Haven’t Found it Yet at the Bush. Wanderlust followed at the Royal Court and now with his second Court commission, transferred to the Duke of York's from Upstairs at the Royal Court, he’s come up with bees and multi-universe theories, love and death. Read more... |
The Dark Earth and the Light Sky, Almeida TheatreFriday, 16 November 2012
There’s no attempt to romanticise the hero of Nick Dear’s new play about the Anglo-Welsh poet Edward Thomas. Thomas, who died in action in the Battle of Arras in 1917 after enlisting at the age of 39 – far too old to have had to fight – is played by Pip Carter as prickly, petulant and with an alarmingly misogynistic streak. 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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