Theatre Reviews
Pressure Drop, Wellcome CollectionMonday, 26 April 2010
Four podia occupy the Wellcome Collection’s temporary gallery space. Three are stage sets: a living room, a pub and a funeral parlour, all recognisable as “typical” working class - in fact, the living room might have been based on Pauline Fowler’s dog-eared front room. The fourth, placed further back, is where Billy Bragg will intercut the dramatic action with a new set of songs with his three-piece band, plus engage in a bit of ad-lib banter that will direct the audience back and forth across... Read more... |
Pictures from an Exhibition, Sadler's WellsSunday, 25 April 2010
I’ve seen raping Popes, I’ve seen more naked guys dancing with waggling penises than I can count, I’ve seen naked breasts on dancing girls for what feels like all my adult life. But a man with a blood-stained prosthetic cock that looks like a baby’s bottle? A teacher munching a testicle off his pupil? Well, lor' love a duck. Read more... |
Ruined, Almeida TheatreThursday, 22 April 2010
Telling the truth about women in a war zone usually hits hardest through one of two means: clear reportage that presents the facts, or the devastating narrative of a survivor. Making a drama out of atrocity gets harder, though it's an age-old tradition, which is maybe why directors usually prefer to draw parallels through updating Euripides or Shakespeare. Lynn Nottage's Pulitzer Prize-winning play, fired by interviews with women in the Democratic Republic of Congo and premiered last year in... Read more... |
The Real Thing, Old VicThursday, 22 April 2010
By general consent, The Real Thing expresses an almost perfect balance between the brilliance of its dialogue and the ideas examined on one hand, and the depth and range of human feelings on the other. Anna Mackmin’s brisk and dynamic take on the play, first performed nearly 30 years ago, to a large extent succeeds in recontextualising what is surely a classic, for a subsequent generation of viewers. Read more... |
Little Gem, Bush TheatreMonday, 19 April 2010
Monologue is a boring word, but in the hands of an Irish pensmith it can create some pretty exciting theatre. From a writer such as Conor McPherson or Mark O’Rowe the monologue can set the night alight with its storytelling brio. Word-drunk on these great draughts of bubbling verbal nectar, you soon feel you know the speakers as well as your own family. Yes, a good monologue is that beguiling. Which is exactly the case with Elaine Murphy’s first play, now visiting west London, a lovely and... Read more... |
Behud (Beyond Belief), Soho TheatreThursday, 15 April 2010
In December 2004, Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti’s play Behzti (Dishonour) caused riots when it was staged at Birmingham Rep. It concerned the (fictional) story of a child rape in a gurdwara (a Sikh temple) and the theatre, in a well-intentioned but misguided act, invited local Sikh leaders to a preview. They asked for changes to be made (relocating the play to a community centre), Bhatti refused, the play went ahead as she wrote it, riots ensued and violent threats were made. She went into... Read more... |
Posh, Royal Court TheatreThursday, 15 April 2010
When artistic director Dominic Cooke took up his new post at this venue in 2007, he said that he wanted “to look at what it means to be middle class, what it means to have power, what it means to have wealth”. Although this comment caused a lot of fuss, with die-hard Royal Court fans imagining that he was about to betray the theatre’s tradition of staging plays about low-lifes, Cooke’s programming has managed to balance gritty underclass dramas with plays about the rich and privileged. Read more... |
Hair, Gielgud TheatreWednesday, 14 April 2010
Who would have thought that the self-described "American Tribal Love-Rock Musical" better known as Hair would have proven over the years to be such a tricky customer? A defining template of the 1960s (the original cast album was one of the soundtracks of my youth), this counter-culture mother lode has spawned more cheesy revivals than some people have, well, hair. Read more... |
Beyond the Horizon & Spring Storm, National TheatreThursday, 08 April 2010
No stars, minimal hype, a long afternoon into the South Bank night: the National Theatre is staging back to back two little-known plays by two 20th-century American masters, and the result is a bit like opening an old trunk in the attic to find pristinely laundered shirts and suits, and perhaps a pair of perfect spats. Beyond the Horizon by Eugene O'Neill and Spring Storm by Tennessee Williams are early works by each playwright, from 1920 and 1937 respectively, and while... Read more... |
Polar Bears, Donmar WarehouseWednesday, 07 April 2010
Mark Haddon is rather making a habit of writing about mental-health issues. His novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time was about a boy with Asperger’s and his TV drama Coming Down the Mountain had a character with Down’s syndrome. He charts similar territory with Polar Bears, which also features a character with a mental-health disorder. 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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