Thursday, October 22, 2015
Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, London Nicola Wilson’s debut drama gives affecting snapshots of one woman at different points in her mental decline, but too many facts stifle the emotional i…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:40AMSunday, October 18, 2015
The dream of a national theatre has happily come to pass, not only in England but in Wales and Scotland, too. But is regional theatre under threat as a result?I was very struck by something …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:26PMChichester Festival theatreSeeing Platonov, Ivanov and The Seagull in a single day unforgettably charts Chekhov’s progress from farce to melodrama to a new symphonic realism Sir David Hare…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:22AMOrange Tree, RichmondPaul Miller’s impressively cast production throws more light on nervous British masculinity than even the playwright may have intendedTerence Rattigan’s 1936 hit has…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:16AMThursday, October 15, 2015
Tricycle, London Tartuffe transplanted to the deep south is full of jet-fuelled prose and raucous hilarity but the original play’s target – blind faith – emerges unscathedHaving reloca…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:26AMWednesday, October 14, 2015
Birmingham Rep theatreTanika Gupta’s lively adaptation, with music by Ben and Max Ringham, retains the novel’s resonance and zestMeera Syal is, in some ways, the victim of her own succes…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:08AMMonday, October 12, 2015
Jermyn Street theatre, LondonThe American playwright’s 1922 drama, given its UK premiere, suffers from its sentimentality and characters driven by rage and rancourI’ve often quoted a dic…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:54AMFriday, October 9, 2015
Young Vic, LondonStrong performances power Joe Hill-Gibbins’ inventive production as it brilliantly captures the eternal conflict between flesh and spiritThere are no half measures in Joe …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:20AMThursday, October 8, 2015
Donmar Warehouse, LondonDirected with flair by Dominic Cooke, Christopher Shinn’s polemical play demolishes the myth that we live in a cosy world of sexual toleranceChristopher Shinn’s f…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:22AMHe has always been compared to Laurence Olivier. But, as his star-laden season opens at the Garrick, can he now outdo him as actor-manager – and save the West End? One thing I know about K…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:04AMTuesday, October 6, 2015
Wyndham’s theatre, LondonKenneth Cranham and Claire Skinner are superb in Florian Zeller’s moving play that takes you inside the mind of a man with dementiaFlorian Zeller’s play has en…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:57AMSunday, October 4, 2015
Rose theatre, KingstonMemories of Peter Hall and John Barton’s original 1963 conflation are banished in refashioned plays for our own divided ageI am old and lucky enough to have seen the …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:17AMFriday, October 2, 2015
Almeida, London Rachel Cusk’s updated version of Euripides’s tragedy is wild and witty but dilutes the tragedy by eschewing the violenceReimagining the classics is fine. There is, howeve…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:25AMFriel, whose death has been announced, was never a writer to be pigeonholed. He leaves a vast variety of personal and political plays, as well as beautiful translationsBrian Friel, who has d…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:19AMThursday, October 1, 2015
Everyman, LiverpoolThis timely adaptation has a Europhobic prime minister, Odysseus as a politician turned migrant – and a dead pig jokeLast year, Simon Armitage boldly gave us a version o…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:07AMWednesday, September 30, 2015
Finborough, LondonFrom a soldier grappling with shellshock to a study of miners’ wives, this selection of northern dramas brings the early 20th century aliveBetween 1908 and 1917, Annie Ho…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:16AMTuesday, September 29, 2015
Lyric Hammersmith, LondonPerformed by a fine ensemble, this adaptation of the picaresque novel is a good night out and a rousing tribute to feminist principlesLaura Wade’s adaptation of Sa…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:14AMMonday, September 28, 2015
Arcola, LondonBarney Norris’s poetic, character-driven portrait of a changing Hampshire seizes your interest and never lets goAll good dramatists carve out their own territory. After an aw…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:21AMFriday, September 25, 2015
The Swan, Stratford-upon-AvonMarina Carr showcases her fascination with outsiders in this emotional and intelligent take on a classic – with contradictory consequencesMarina Carr, in plays…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:38AMThursday, September 24, 2015
Print Room at the Coronet, LondonEliot’s baroque drawing-room drama presents a couple’s faltering relationship as a spiritual trial, echoing his own troubled marriageOnce a popular West …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:53AMWednesday, September 23, 2015
Royal Shakespeare theatre, Stratford-upon-AvonGregory Doran’s imaginative production, in which the action is played out on a largely bare stage, allows the words to weave their spellShakes…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:03AMTuesday, September 22, 2015
Menier Chocolate Factory, LondonSteven Berkoff plays the Iraqi dictator with virtuosic menace in Anthony Horowitz’s admirable yet troubling comedyCan you have a comedy about tyranny? Chapl…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:13PMHampstead theatre, LondonRussell Beale is as coyly flirtatious as ever in a merry, if overstuffed, tale of a trailblazing Georgian comedianIan Kelly’s play, based on his biography of the s…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:58AMMonday, September 21, 2015
Royal Court, LondonDavid Morrissey and Reece Shearsmith give pitch-perfect performances in the theatrical maverick’s first London premiere in 12 years Related: Martin McDonagh interview: �…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:09AMFriday, September 18, 2015
Lyttelton, LondonA shortened version of the acclaimed Bristol Old Vic production has much to admire, but inevitably loses the fine detail of the great novelAcclaimed last year at the Bristol…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:10AMThursday, September 17, 2015
Harold Pinter Theatre, LondonKristin Scott Thomas and Lia Williams are currently alternating the two female roles in Harold Pinter's 1971 play with Rufus Sewell as the man in the middle. The…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:38PMBush, LondonTanya Ronder’s play probes the clash between corporate career and private conscience via one conflicted familyYou can’t accuse the British theatre of ignoring climate change:…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:10AMTuesday, September 15, 2015
Adelphi, LondonFrom Cyndi Lauper’s score to impressive lead performances, this winsome men-in-frocks show puts its best foot forwardThis theatre seems to be specialising in factory-set mus…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:15PMWatching dramatisations of Chekhov’s early short stories, Michael Billington finds the writer sketching out his caustic portrait of the Russian character – complete with drunken fisherme…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:45AMMonday, September 14, 2015
Noël Coward theatre, London Anna Ziegler’s new play asserts the contribution of 1950s chemist Rosalind Franklin to the discovery of DNA and asks: is science still sexist?You could hardly …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:44PMOld Vic, LondonEverything that art can do to boost this revival of Tennessee Williams's 1959 play has been done. Marianne Elliott's production is first-rate. The cast, led by Kim Cattrall, i…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:12PM 
