Thursday, July 24, 2014
RUFF TRADE…. Young Shakespeare, a struggling player and playwright, falls for the upper-class Viola de Lesseps, not knowing that she has dressed as a boy to join his cast. She i…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 02:18AMTuesday, July 22, 2014
DIVINITY AND DEADLY HATRED One day someone will put Milton’s Paradise Lost on stage and cast Rupert Everett as Satan, the bitter archangel. For now he is Peter Shaffer’s Salieri: c…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 08:24AMMonday, July 21, 2014
IN WHICH GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI FINDS MUCH TO ENJOY, AND ONLY A LITTLE TO MOAN ABOUT It is always exciting to have a new Medea, possibly the most controversial of all Euripides’ t…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:35PMThursday, July 10, 2014
LOCK, STOCK, AND NO BARRELS OF MALMSEY A credit in the programme for “fish care and health” answers one distracting question about Jamie Lloyd’s rackety p…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 03:56AMMonday, July 7, 2014
FOLLOW THE HERRING, SALUTE THE PAST That early morning cry that woke the herring lassies: women who, through the great days of the Victorian herring fisheries, met the flee…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:13PMFriday, July 4, 2014
BLOOD, POLITICS, RUFFS, AND TOGAS: MUCH TO DELIGHT GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI The Globe audience are still filing in as the Roman rabble break into a raucous, drunken football chant …
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 08:21PMThursday, July 3, 2014
THE GATES OF HELL CREAK OPEN… It will haunt the memory for months, this profound, dark-lit, smoke-scented deep-booming production of Arthur Miller’s play. In the round arena it cr…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 09:27PMWednesday, July 2, 2014
CAN YOU FEEL THE PAIN TONIGHT? NOT A BIT. Miss Saigon rhymes with One Big Yawn, a tiny helicopter wobbles over the stage and the “Viet-numb” cast. A huge-breasted “Matthew Warch…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 08:10PMAN AMBULANCE RIDE: A CITY’S HEARTBEAT Some theatre enterprises are quixotic, site-specific, small-scale immersive and probably economically ruinous. Gotta love them: e…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 12:53PMTHIRTY YEARS ON: A TRIBUTE TO THE MEN OF THE MINES Down the dark pit, Bible-bred men quote the Book of Job. “He putteth forth his hand upon the rock; he overturneth the mount…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 01:59AMMonday, June 30, 2014
ONE PLAY MANY TARGETS – CAN BEAN & HYTNER HACK IT….? The headlines flash up, perfect front pages on the glass walls which morph from newsroom to police sta…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:02PMThursday, June 26, 2014
GUEST REVIEWER LUKE JONES ENDURES GLOSSY EMPTINESS AT THE HANDS OF NEW YORK SOCIALITES Ever wondered what happens to Disney princesses when they grow up boring? Adam Bock has. His new play, …
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:39AMTuesday, June 24, 2014
GUEST REVIEWER LUKE JONES GOES ROUND AND ROUND THIS RICKETY BUT FUN CAROUSEL If you have never been to the Arcola, imagine the Donmar’s hip cousin; a small and intimate theatre, but wi…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 04:24AMMonday, June 23, 2014
GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI SEES THE SECOND TWO PLAYS IN THE RSC’S “MIDSUMMER MISCHIEF” SERIES: PROGRAMME B Continuing the exploration of the challenge phrase “Well-behaved wome…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 12:21PMSunday, June 22, 2014
GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI SEES THE FIRST TWO PLAYS IN THE RSC’S “MIDSUMMER MISCHIEF” SERIES: PROGRAMME A THE ANT AND THE CICADA – Timberlake Wertenbaker Zoe is an artist, l…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 11:30AMFriday, June 20, 2014
IN WHICH OUR GUEST REVIEWER JOHN PETER DOES NOT HAVE A HAPPY NIGHT OUT Tim Crouch has given us a play which is not a play. It has no narrative: it does not give you a story; it do…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 09:49AMWednesday, June 18, 2014
BILL NIGHY BACK ONSTAGE: MORE THAN WELCOME Few actors are more instantly recognizable than Bill Nighy, yet his gift is to deploy in faithful service of each distinct part his i…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:12PMTuesday, June 17, 2014
BY ‘ECK, IT’S BRIGHOUSE ROCKING INTO THE ‘SIXTIES… Never underestimate a young woman in a neat blue dress from anywhere North of Watford. Especially one called…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:55PMSunday, June 15, 2014
BRAVO BRAVISSIMO! OPERA-ROM-COM FROM THE HEART I knew I was going to like this operatico-jukebox backstage rom-com (a whole new genre) when Jenny Stafford – as trembling, …
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:40PMFriday, June 13, 2014
BEAUTIFUL BODIES, JOY IN ACTION In circus tradition feats of acrobatic daring and balance are hyped up by a ringmaster – drumrolls, pleas to keep totally quiet lest you distract…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:21PMThursday, June 12, 2014
BART SIMPSON’S LEGEND SURVIVES THE APOCALYPSE: DO WE CARE? A child of the Cold War, I have read post-apocalyptic fiction all my life: from John Wyndham and Kuttner to Nevil S…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:51PMWednesday, June 11, 2014
A KNIGHTSBRIDGE REDEMPTION…. Quotes from critics are always helpful. This one has “Drop dead funny and informative” on its flyer: not from a Spencer or Billington but signed…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 04:28PMTuesday, June 10, 2014
NUMRICH AS A NIHILIST HOUSEGUEST… It is a universally recognizable moment: an idealistic student home for summer with revolutionary theories and an adored, even more revolutionary, fla…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:59PMMonday, June 9, 2014
THE PIG TAKES ON THE PROVINCES, AND WINS I reviewed the West End premiere of this new Stiles-and-Drew musical, directed by Richard Eyre and passionately backed by Cameron Mac…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 03:55PMSaturday, June 7, 2014
POKER AND PATERNITY: A WOMAN QUIETLY DESPAIRS… Poker, like good drama, requires an ability to transmit or conceal “tells”: moments of facial or body language revealing or hi…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 08:38AMGuest reviewer LUKE JONES appreciates our Dawnie… At the very beginning, with a large clock face ticking behind her, Dawn French describes what we are about to see as a slice of …
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:38AMFriday, June 6, 2014
A HIGH PRESSURE TRIUMPH , AND A TRIBUTE It happened seventy years ago so we know the outcome. D-Day was the biggest amphibious invasion in history – 156,000 men, 6939 vessels, 11590 pl…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:51AMThursday, June 5, 2014
GORDON CONTRA MUNDUM…A BLEAK IMAGINING The focus groups, mourns this briefest of Prime Ministers, always come up with the same words about him. “Strong” and “Solid” are …
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 10:11AMWednesday, June 4, 2014
ONE GREAT PERFORMER’S TRIBUTE TO ANOTHER The main causes of crime, said the famous American defence lawyer Darrow, are “Poverty, ignorance, hard luck and, generally, youth”. A century …
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:14PMTuesday, June 3, 2014
A WICKED WIT, WITH HEART ON SLEEVE : LIPPA TAKES LONDON Here is Summer Strallen as Cinderella, ripping off her rags and scorning the ballgown for a dominatrix PVC corset and whip. Her…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:52PMMonday, June 2, 2014
DEATH , TRUTH, TORMENT : THE REBIRTH OF A NATION “What” asks the calm academic , “should our attitude be to people who have committed atrocities?”. From Belfast to the Balka…
SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:45PM 
