Soho theatre, London"Can a story save a life?" That is the question posed at the start of this multi-authored show in which six writers adapt narratives from The 1001 Nights, in response to …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:57PMOrange Tree, RichmondWatching David Antrobus's rare and exhilarating revival of this early Ibsen play, written in 1862 when he was 34, I was reminded of another youthful work: Shakespeare's …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:31AMOlivier, LondonIt was originally to have been The Count of Monte Cristo in the Olivier this Yule but instead we get a revival of Pinero's 1885 farce. I have no complaints about that since I …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:26PMTrafalgar Studios, LondonAleksei Arbuzov's play, with its suggestion that the wartime siege of Leningrad emotionally devastated a whole generation, must have seemed daring in the Soviet Unio…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:12PMApollo, London★★★★/★★★For those of us who favour good sightlines and acoustics, the transfer of these two productions from Shakespeare's Globe to the West End is welcome news. …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:00AMAlmeida, LondonPlays about poets are notoriously problematic. But Nick Dear overcomes the difficulties in this probing, intelligent piece about Edward Thomas, who produced a formidable body …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:57AMCottesloe Theatre, LondonHow do you follow a big hit? Just as Jez Butterworth succeeded Jerusalem with the more modest The River, so Lucy Prebble follows her spectacular Enron with an intima…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:20PMGate, LondonEuripides's great anti-war play has been constantly updated. But much as I relished the linguistic vigour and pugnacious wit of Caroline Bird's new version, descri…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:00PMSalisbury PlayhouseThis version of William Golding's 1964 novel confronts a subject from which the British theatre normally shies away in terror: the nature of religious faith. Although…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:23AM'Forget the single play – give me an entire oeuvre'Over the years, I've been to seasons of plays by Harold Pinter at the Gate theatre in Dublin, by Sarah Kane at Berlin's Schaubühne and, …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:30PMThe Swan, Stratford-upon-AvonThis production of a Chinese classic has already caused controversy because only three actors out of a cast of 17 are of east Asian origin. But, although there a…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:02PMLyttelton Theatre, LondonIn 1980 Alan Bennett wrote Enjoy, which showed a Leeds working-class house and its occupants being preserved as a museum exhibit.Now, in his mordantly funny new play…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:07PMSt James, LondonJean Webster's 1912 novel about an orphan girl and her mysterious benefactor has cast a long shadow. It spawned a Broadway play and several movies, including one in which, ra…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:00PMNoel Coward, LondonYou could hardly have a greater contrast than between the stolid Uncle Vanya that has just opened at the Vaudeville and this mercurially brilliant import from Moscow's Vak…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:51PMVaudeville, LondonHow do you play Anton Chekhov today? After the liberating unorthodoxy of the Young Vic's Three Sisters, we are back to normal with Lindsay Posner's production of Uncle Vany…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:25PMRoyal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-AvonShakespeare's great revenge comedy gains immeasurably from being staged in modern dress. But, while other directors have opted for the materiali…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:52AMRoyal Court, LondonLucy Kirkwood's new play is bright, sharp, funny and 80 minutes long. And, while one can never legislate for length, I found myself craving more: I wanted to see Kirkwood,…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:51AMFrom the Woman in Black to killers in thrillers, theatre has plenty of characters that shock – but it takes Judi Dench as Lady Macbeth to well and truly terrify • Spoiler alert: this blo…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:16PMCrucible, SheffieldShelagh Delaney's play, the work of an unknown working-class 18-year-old from Salford, was a big hit in 1958 and became a source of inspiration to a new generati…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:48AMRoyal Court, LondonI spy a danger for the theatre in a new form of chic exclusivity. Because everyone wants to see Jez Butterworth's first new play since Jerusalem and because space is limit…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:27PMTheatre Royal Stratford East, LondonAlthough this is the third of Martina Cole's bestselling crime thrillers to be presented at this theatre, it is my first acquaintance with her work. While…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:25PMHampstead, LondonAfter plays about Anne Boleyn and Abelard and Héloïse, Howard Brenton is turning into the history man. But I have no complaint about that, since he has chosen the best mod…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:00PMBelgrade, CoventryAll great dramatists stake out their own particular territory; the problem with William Inge, who had four Broadway hits in the 1950s of which this was the last, is that he…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:18PMThe National Theatre of Scotland has scored a coup by appointing the hugely talented Laurie Sansom as its new boss. Now, how about putting a Scot in charge of the Edinburgh festival?It's soo…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:46AMOdéon, ParisLuc Bondy's production of Harold Pinter's Le Retour (The Homecoming) offers a radically fresh perspective on the play, without destroying its essential fabric. It helps that Bon…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:12AMTricycle, LondonIndhu Rubasingham makes a strong start to her tenure at the Tricycle with this new play about the pride and prejudice that greeted the pioneering African-American actor Ira A…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:09AMA critic once described Alan Bennett as 'England's cultural teddy bear'. As his new play, People, prepares to open in London, Michael Billington argues that he is a more complicated –…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:38AMJermyn Street theatre, London'It is a text written to come out of the dark," said Samuel Beckett of this radio play first broadcast by the BBC in 1957. But, although not conceived for the st…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:00PMRose, KingstonArthur Wing Pinero's 1893 play was a late-Victorian theatrical landmark, so it's good to see it given one of its increasingly rare outings. In the end, this piece of Anglicised…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:11PM
