Monday, July 13, 2015
There’s theatrical gold all over the country this week, including Manchester’s Flare festival and the latest from Francesca Millican-Slater, Alice Birch, Jess Thom and Tom BasdenThe Flar…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:39AMSunday, July 12, 2015
Theatre Royal, BathSo much more is needed from this production – a light comic touch, generosity of spirit and more polish on performances“To be sure, aunts of all kinds are damned bad t…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:29AMSaturday, July 11, 2015
Home, ManchesterCharlotte Rampling does her best in visual artist Douglas Gordon’s humourless and sedate Red Riding Hood retellingIf you go down to the woods today ... the only surprise ab…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:30AMTuesday, July 7, 2015
The fuss over Damiano Michieletto’s Guillaume Tell at the Royal Opera House must not lead to caution in all live performanceContext can be all in live performance. Where and when a show is…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:08AMPolka, LondonRoyal Opera House and Polka’s opera and dance show for the under-fours has a smidgeon of magic and a dreamy staging but fails to engage its young audienceThis collaboration be…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:01AMThe Oscar-winning co-writer of Ida is determined to shout loudly about cuts to legal aid. The result is her new drama, The Invisible. ‘A play may be a very small ripple,’ she says, ‘bu…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:46AMMonday, July 6, 2015
There’s new writing to discover in Newcastle under Lyme and Cambridge, creepy offerings in Bristol and Battersea, people power in Corby, and fringe surprises as well as blockbuster shows i…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:23AMSunday, July 5, 2015
Bristol Old VicInspired by interviews with British soldiers, poet Owen Sheers’ tale of three Bristol men deployed to Afghanistan confronts the mental scars that never fade“Who wants to p…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:04PMFriday, July 3, 2015
Tobacco Factory, BristolJules Verne’s novel is reimagined as a family-friendly summer pantomime that pokes fun at Victorian colonial attitudesAnyone can now circumnavigate the globe in wel…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:51AMThursday, July 2, 2015
Elizabeth Day reckons most plays are average, staged in uncomfortable venues for pretentious audiences. Yes, too many shows get standing ovations, but British theatre is currently on a roll.…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:07AMRoyal Artillery Barracks, Woolwich, LondonThe Mexican artist is celebrated with dance, fireworks and aerial skills in a colourful show created for the Greenwich and Docklands International f…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:07AMHammersmith Apollo, LondonTo enter the world of Disney's High School Musical Live on Stage is to enter a parallel universe. It is a world where mothers and six-year-old daughters arrive in m…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:51AMWednesday, July 1, 2015
Sheffield Crucible studioPrebble’s funny and heartbreaking play about a clinical trial for a new antidepressant – which might be ‘a Viagra for the heart’ – is cannily revivedUnder …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:22AMTuesday, June 30, 2015
Greenwich and Docklands international festival, LondonFrom Artizani’s colony of bizarre bees to Gandini Juggling’s rock’n’roll show, this is a great showcase of al fresco performance…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:44AMIvo van Hove’s Kings of War and Forced Entertainment’s Complete Works prove that a performance is about far more than the textOver the last couple of weeks I’ve seen three very differe…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:40AMA new show combining live action and film, to be broadcast on S4C, explores the colony formed in Argentina by settlers from Wales. Artist Marc Rees explains how he was seduced by their story…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:40AMMonday, June 29, 2015
Assembly Rooms, EdinburghYou often kill the thing you love, and in the toilets of a Hollywood nightclub where the hotel heiress is due to arrive at any minute the smell of Paris envy mingles…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:58PMGreenwich and Docklands festival, LondonFull of pyrotechnics, Periplum’s large-scale production reworks Fahrenheit 451 for the modern worldWe may be a long way from burning books, but we a…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:04AMThere’s a new play from Mark Ravenhill in London, Maxine Peake stars in Caryl Churchill’s The Skriker in Manchester, and the experiences of returning veterans are explored in both Bristo…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:40AMSunday, June 28, 2015
National Theatre temporary space, LondonTim Crouch’s two-hander about bereavement – in which half the cast haven’t seen the play – circles elegantly around ideas of reality, certaint…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:09AMThursday, June 25, 2015
Some of today’s most interesting theatre is being made with audiences, not just for them. That’s key to keeping the arts aliveLast week’s Devoted and Disgruntled (D&D)/In Battalion…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:57AMWednesday, June 24, 2015
At this time of year, you'll find plenty of actors breaking down in laughter. Irritating and unprofessional – or can it bring a production alive?On the press night of Cinderella at the Lyr…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:06PMThe star’s stumble and subsequent recovery at the opening night of Educating Rita will win him more bouquets than brickbats“I’ve completely gone,” declared Lenny Henry during the pre…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:39PMWatford Palace theatreThis ambitious attempt to examine the health service is at its best when it deals in striking imagesThe NHS takes care of us, but are we taking enough care of the NHS? …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:37AMMonday, June 22, 2015
A busy season of new works inspired by the discovery of Anglo-Saxon treasure is being staged at the New Vic theatre in Newcastle-under-LymeAt 11.45am on 5 July 2009, Terry Herbert, a keen me…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:33PMWe no longer accept white actors blacking up – yet the able-bodied Daniel Radcliffe is playing a physically disabled character in the West End. How come?As I've written here recently, it's…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:43AMForced Entertainment tackle all of Shakespeare’s plays on a table top, Lucy Prebble’s The Effect gets its regional premiere in Sheffield, Maxine Peake’s Beryl is back in Leeds and Punc…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:42AMSunday, June 21, 2015
Stadsschouwburg, AmsterdamThis epic reimagining of Henry V, Henry VI and Richard III makes for an explosive examination of political leadership and present-day powerThere is a moment during …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:28AMFriday, June 19, 2015
We all know that theatregoing is a habit – the more you see, the more you want to see. But how do you encourage audiences to try new venues?Recent British Theatre Consortium research found…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:52PMWednesday, June 17, 2015
Park theatre, LondonNick Darke’s 1986 play about a couple who have lost their sparkle offers a few laughs, but its sexual politics look hackneyedNick Darke, who died 10 years ago, wrote fo…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:00AMTuesday, June 16, 2015
Helen Mirren thinks that you need to be a teenager to enjoy Shakespeare, but the sooner children encounter the plays in performance the less likely they will dismiss them as difficult and du…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:16PM 
