Ivo van Hove engages British and Dutch actors to debate the urgent question of 2019 Are we really past all this? From Ivo van Hove's 2019 polyphony of opinions and reflections down the centu…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 04:54AMA host of Broadway stars varies the strain in classily done from-home gala Maybe you can't compare incomparables, but it was instructive to watch this Broadway lockdown gala feting nonagenar…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 06:42AMIs there a better climax to a musical first act than the terror-plus-wit in 'Sweeney Todd'? Two numbers, one hair-raising slice of music-theatre. When Sondheim's paying homage to the older, …
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 09:54PMMiddleton's decimation of an Italian court needs more satirical thrust Vendetta, morte: what a lark to find those tools of 19th century Italian opera taken back to their mother tongue in a M…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 08:54AMEmbarrassing period piece needs a lift from better comic timing than this Not the musical then, worst luck. How timely it would have been to mark Jerry Herman's passing with a celebration of…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 04:42AMOne woman barely speaks, the other can't be heard and two men interfere A work of genius isn't sacred, copyrighted territory. A great film may become a play, a novel a film; the adaptation s…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 05:24AMAn immortal lyricist and composer leaves us plenty to be joyful about How is it that, in the nearly 900 pages of Sondheim's collected lyrics with extensive comments Finishing the Hat and Loo…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 11:54AMFour complex novels squeezed into a big, bold show with strong performances It took no time for Elena Ferrante's two Neapolitan friends to join the ranks of great literary creations: Lenù a…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 06:03AMClose-knit company keeps the York and Lancaster clashes as clear and lively as it can No Joan of Arc means no Henry VI Part One. France, where we left the victorious Henry V - the superb Sar…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 08:06AMMultimedia haunting from Norwegian company De Utvalgte in Jon Fosse's theatre-poem In a flowering branch of London theatre, Norway comes to Notting Hill with what's becoming revelatory regul…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 06:06AMA young carer and her mother movingly portrayed in Sean Mathias's 1985 drama When Sean Mathias wrote A Prayer for Wings 35 years ago, the subject of young carers devoting their lives to pare…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 11:42AMA dramatic tour from the tomb of Italy's greatest poet and music among the mosaics Two years ago Ermanno Montanari and Marco Martinelli, the visionary partners who have powered Ravenna's rev…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 08:24AMJames McArdle's lead, strong ensemble and David Hare's Ibsen adaptation compel Like Hamlet and both parts of Goethe's Faust, with which it shares the highest peak of poetic drama, Ibsen's Pe…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 08:42AMIvo van Hove reinvents Visconti's fable about a 1930s German House of Atreus Is the terrifying past of Germany in 1933 also our future? Having had nightmares about the brilliant dystopian TV…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 08:54AM1930s setting for Falstaff's escapades wins out only in song and dance Need Shakespeare's Falstaff charm to be funny? Those warm, indulgent feelings won by Mrisho Mpoto in the amazing Globe…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 02:06PMDoubling, humour and an outstanding female Henry V Henry IV Part One (***)
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 05:48AMCompelling fantasia about black South Africans drowned in a World War 1 disaster While Bach's and Handel's Passions have been driving thousands to contemplate suffering, mortality and grace,…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 04:22AMSimon Stone's homage to Euripides is faultless, while Marieke Heebink tears at the soul Hallucinatory theatre has struck quite a few times in the Barbican's international seasons. On an epic…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 05:15AMMartin Sherman has the excellent Jonathan Hyde telling true talesRipeness is sometimes all. Martin Sherman's new play, receiving its UK premiere at canny Park Theatre, says more about gay hi…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 05:06AMMusically strong, if persistent, this production has a star protagonist"In our country the capable man needs luck," belts out Shen Te, the Good Person of Szechwan in the most powerful song o…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 08:32PMPoignant take on Captain Marlene in the Second World WarGetting the look right is half the battle: in that, Peter Groom's one-time-Captain Marlene Dietrich is a winner from the start. The lo…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 05:36AMA virtuoso ensemble justifies this youthful baggy monster's West End transferIts roots are in truth: 15-year-old Matthew Lopez saw the film, then read the book, of Howards End and 11 ye…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 08:42PMJust a tad short on Broadway charisma, but this sophisticated production glides alongFirst palpable hit of the evening: a full orchestra in the pit under hyper-alert Opera North stalwart Jam…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 06:18AMHarriet Walter and Jade Anouka are the superlative opposite poles in a perfect ensembleWho would have thought, when Phyllida Lloyd's Donmar Julius Caesar opened to justified fanfare, that tw…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 06:12AMStunning detail from Lev Dodin's company in desperate tragedy and human comedyTowards the end of the Maly Drama Theatre of St Petersburg's Life and Fate, a long scene in director Lev Do…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 04:18AMRoger Allam and Nancy Carroll serve David Hare's iron fist in velvet glove to perfection"What could be more serious than married life?" asked Richard Strauss, whose operas became a surp…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 02:51AM★★★ FANNY AND ALEXANDER, OLD VIC Agile but shallow Bergman adaptationThree strong performances weakened by miscasting elsewhere and restless soundtrackCould an epic cinematic masterpie…
SOURCE: theartsdesk.com at 05:05AMNobody said that a 70-minute audience with the undead was going to be easy. You can read Samuel Beckett's Texts for Nothing in your own time, pausing for thought, leaving off, coming back. W…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 04:14AMWhat's in a name? Imogen has a softer music to it than Cymbeline, the only one of Shakespeare's plays in which the title character is marginal - even if Hal and Falstaff just outshine Henry …
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 04:57AMShe gave us the most moving of King Lears years before the news broke that Glenda Jackson would be playing the role. Only Mark Rylance has recently matched the malicious wit of her Globe Ric…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 03:36AMSouthwark's golden triangle – the Menier, the Playhouse and the Union – has given us so many "lost" musicals which only a decade or so ago would have been lucky to get in-concert airings…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 05:15AM
