SACRED MONSTERS IN THE UNDERWORLD Deep darkness within the U-shaped seating,: into it on wheels glides the dark gondola: Charon the ferryman, after millennia punting to and fro across t…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 04:32AMA HIGH-KICKING WOODEN WONDER Serious fun, this. Never liked the Disney Pinocchio, or even in childhood the over-preachy Carlo Collodi book about the defiant wooden puppet who …
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:57AMPRESENT MIRTH HATH PRESENT LAUGHTER. AND MELANCHOLY. AND FALSE NOSES In a play as familiar as this it is small touches that spring fresh life. Like the moment when the fool Feste def…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:48PMSPRINGTIME FOR…EVERYONE Joyful, headlong and full-hearted, here comes sacred outrage. If director Patrick Marber and the Menier had been minded to issue wet ‘trigger warning…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:23AMMAZELTOV! JEWISH PANTO STRIKES AGAIN Goldie Frocks, rightful heiress to an East End schmutter workshop, has been enslaved by the evil Calvin Brine, whose behemoth of too-small c…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 03:45AMFEARED IT MIGHT BE TUTU MUCH, BUT NO… I immediately fell for Frankie Bradshaw’s set: a two- storey house lined with fossil skeletons in cases, and a spirited opening in which th…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 09:05AMLOOK BEYOND THE LETTUCE It is a tribute to Greg Wilkinson’s monologue play that I had not previously seen the rise and fall of Liz Truss as having a gripping dramatic line. It h…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 08:31PMHIGH SPIRITS, HIGH COMEDY, EVEN HIGHER HEELS Elton John, who jumped at the idea of writing the music, calls the 2006 film a favourite; many of us nod in blissful agreement. B…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:55PMC’EST MAGNIFIQUE ! Napoleon, defeated at Trafalgar, vows revenge on Britain and its “bootlicking monoglot monarchists”. Stalking around in breeches and bicorn hat, Ma…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:26AMTA-RAN-TA-RA ! Mike Leigh, a veteran better known for films, Abigail’s Party and theatrical experiments with scriptless rehearsal, is also a dedicated devotee of the utterly scripte…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 03:55AMTHE COOLEST CAT IN LONDON. AND SOME RATS. Here’s your traditional Christmas outing, proper panto. No rackety popstar hype or tedious suggestive jokes from worn-out comicS…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 01:27PMGALSWORTHY ? WELL WORTH SEEING With late Victorians, there’s plenty to bite on: a rising bourgeoisie aflame with parvenu ambition, piety , pannier skirts ,patriarchs, an empi…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 01:05PMWISDOM IN A LIFE BACKWARDS Forget the awful fim made from Scott Fitzgerald’s story about a life lived backwards – a man born in old age, working towards youth and infancy in reve…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 09:44AMA JOURNEY OF JOURNEYS A map is a lovely thing, but sometimes practically speaking a diagram is better. And can also be lovely: especially when its useful elegance has become a fam…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 01:04PMTHE BIG RATHER UNFRIENDLY GIANT Tom Maschler, legendary publisher and once a Kindertransport child, summed up the appeal of Roald Dahl: his stories offer “A glorious p…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 08:55AM1648, Agra: marble and murder, a terrible beauty One of the worst photo-ops of Princess Diana’s collapsing marriage was that shot at the Taj Mahal, billed by romantics as “eternal …
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 08:24AMLOOK BACK IN COMPASSION The Rattigan renaissance of the last few years is more than welcome: ever since Flare Path hit the West End fourteen years ago there seems to have bee…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 04:45PMTHE GRANDEST OF GRIEFS Not Renaissance Mantua but New York a century past: smart bars and low dives, gangsters in fedoras. Why not ? In any world might be a lonely jokester, missing his …
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:11AMA short catch-up on one of the season’s greats (was away..) Mark Strong is made to play great tragedy: a long powerful body, controlled bleak intelligent features.A figure from any age…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 01:37PM“…HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE BOMB” That was the subtitle, when exactly sixty years ago a shower of Oscars fell on Stanley Kubrick’s brilliantly tasteless,…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:26PMA HARD AND ICY WORLD A 1970’s Hull folksong chorus: “Next time you see a trawlerman on Hessle Road half tight – remember, o remember, the perils of that night”. It was a trib…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:27AMBROTHER, CHRISTIAN, WITCHFINDER I reviewed this play about the Witchfinder General Matthew Hopkins last year, in Ipswich: I write only to add thoughts, now that it has deservedly…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:54PMLEHMANS REVISITED The first time I saw Sam Mendes’ production at the NT, I exclaimed that the evening had no right to be so much fun: three hours, three chaps in black frock coats, no so…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:10AMCHOSEN PEOPLE, CHOSEN LIVES The saying goes “two Jews, three opinions”, though some say that’s an underestimate. Here are five people and innumerable opinions: two couples, …
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 01:58PMSent from my iPad ZELDIN AGAIN I sometimes feel real sympathy (possibly unwanted) for actors who, trained and motivated to channel and express extreme and painful emotions, do their absolute…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 04:00AMPOETRY AND PITY Tremendous swagged, fringed, and roped retro curtains , the Gielgud looking much as it would 100 years ago when Sean O’Casey’s most famous play reached Londo…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 01:46AMSHARP SCRATCH? Crossing the Edgware Rd yesterday a shouting vaccine denier with a loudspeaker informed us all, stomping past in some sort of hurry, that vaccines were lies, inoculat…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:02AMSTONED STONES IN WEST WITTERING, 1967 At the end the 1200-strong crowd explodes to join a final roar of “Satisfaction” with the cast – lawyers, police, fans, three generatons …
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:33PMVICTORIAN MISCHIEF WELL IN TUNE FOR TODAY . Do you want to see a senior Government minister entangled with a socially climbing financier and a fashion-greedy wife, playing the flute t…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 04:51AMLAURIE LEE, REMEMBERED AND REMEMBERING A nine-part orchestra, gilded harp and flute at its apex; behind, monochrome photos of a century past show rural Gloucestershire, then the…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 03:21AMPOLITICAL ECHOES, CLASS ARROGANCE, THRILLS The award for ExIt of the Year goes to the magnificent David Oyelowo, tearing up the central aisle of the Olivier in a fury as the f…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:57AM
