All stories by Libby Purves on BroadwayStars

Monday, December 19, 2016

St JOAN Donmar, WC1 by Libby Purves

THE MAID OF ORLEANS AND HER TORMENTORS   For fifteen minutes as the audience troops in Gemma Arterton, in chainmail and breastplate, kneels on a dais in rapt contemplation: mouthing pra…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:06PM
Saturday, December 17, 2016

A CHRISTMAS CAROL Arts Theatre, WC1 by Libby Purves

FRESH AS PAINT,  THE OLD STORY     “Marley was dead…”. Oh how we need Dickens’ story every year. You can do it panto or earnest, screen or stage, Tommy Steele or Alistair …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 12:20PM
Wednesday, December 14, 2016

CINDERELLA Palladium, W1 by Libby Purves

OH YES IT IS, IT REALLY IS…   Want to see Julian Clary in a feather headdress and spangles, looping the loop on a flying Vespa over the front stalls.? Course you do! Hungry for pumpki…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 08:41PM
Tuesday, December 13, 2016

LOVE Dorfman, SE1 by Libby Purves

LIVES IN LIMBO   At the Connection at St Martin’s they say that none of us is more than two bad decisions away from the pavement. The street homeless we know, a little. Less plainly l…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 04:50PM
Monday, December 12, 2016

HEDDA GABLER Lyttelton, SE1 by Libby Purves

A COLD-BURNING BRILLIANCE     A century ago Henrik Ibsen saw, with more clarity than the strait bourgeois world around him, that it wouldn’t do. Not the hypocrisies, not the …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:17PM
Sunday, December 11, 2016

THE SCREWTAPE LETTERS Park, N4 by Libby Purves

BETTER TO RANT IN HELL..   Magnificent in military jacket as he lectures the College of Tempters, then at ease in his study in fine brocade against a marvellous backdrop of skulls and b…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 10:04AM
Friday, December 9, 2016

ALL THE ANGELS – Sam Wanamaker Playhouse by Libby Purves

All the Angels is a fascinating, moving examination of the power of music to inspire, to challenge, and to regenerate souls, as well as an unnerving glance at the strange intimacy between co…

SOURCE: mytheatremates.com at 09:30AM

WILD HONEY. Hampstead NW3 by Libby Purves

LUKE JONES BUZZES HAPPILY ROUND THE HONEY   Where Ivanov, The Seagull and Uncle Vanya mull, the youthfully fresh and fashionably unfinished Platonov rattles along like the TGV. Michael …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 04:10AM
Thursday, December 8, 2016

SHE LOVES ME Menier, SE1 by Libby Purves

O THE PRETTINESS, O THE JOKES…     Our heroine gets a job as sales clerk in Maraczek’s perfumery by selling a customer ia gorgeous hand-painted musical candy box. Which sum…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 03:29AM
Tuesday, December 6, 2016

ONCE IN A LIFETIME Young Vic, SE1 by Libby Purves

HURRAH FOR HOLLYWOOD, AND LONG LIVE FOOLS   ’Tis the season to be silly, and the Young Vic’s revival of a screwball 1930’s Hollywood satire hit the spot triumphantly with this the…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:48PM
Saturday, December 3, 2016

PETER PAN Olivier, SE1 by Libby Purves

PULLING THE FAIRY STRINGS IN AN URBAN NEVERLAND   Wendy is grown up now, earthbound , with her own child to tell about the wonder and danger of Neverland and Pan. She can’t leave the …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 10:27AM
Thursday, December 1, 2016

BURIED CHILD, Trafalgar Studios SW1A by Libby Purves

IN WHICH LUKE JONES TRIES AND FAILS TO DISINTER DEEP TRUTHS   As in  all slow-burning plays there moments where you tune out for a second and ask yourself ‘is this a masterpiece or …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 08:06PM

THE LITTLE MATCH GIRL and… Wanamaker at Shakespeare’s Globe, SE1 by Libby Purves

THE BLEAK AND THE BOUNCY…RICE COOKS UP A CHRISTMAS PUD   Emma Rice’s warm, candelit take on Hans Christian Andersen, inventive and full-hearted as ever, raises a certain anxiety: I …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:51PM

THIS HOUSE Garrick , WC1 by Libby Purves

DIVISIONS…DIVISIONS…DIVISIONS….   The Parliamentary chaos of the 1970’s – hung parliaments, fragile alliances and lost divisions which predated the dawn of Mrs Tha…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:32AM
Wednesday, November 30, 2016

AFTER OCTOBER Finborough, SW10 by Libby Purves

THE 1930’S SPEAK TO US AGAIN…   It’s 1937, hard times for the just-managing family. The Monkhams are broke, dreading creditors and bailiffs. The great hope is that the son…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:08AM
Friday, November 25, 2016

NICE FISH Harold Pinter Theatre, SW1 by Libby Purves

HERE’S THE PLAICE TO BE…   Ah ,universal truths! We are all living on thin ice, knocking up inadequate shelters, fishing hopefully down holes into the chilly truth beneath, accepti…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:15PM
Thursday, November 24, 2016

THE CHILDREN Royal Court, SW1 by Libby Purves

GUEST CRITIC LUKE JONES CHEERS KIRKWOOD AT THE COURT     The Children are the focus of this play,  in their absence. Instead we have The Pensioners. Parents and a non-parent sink…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:02PM
Wednesday, November 23, 2016

THE SHAKESPEARE TRILOGY – Donmar at Kings Cross by Libby Purves

O BRAVE NEW WORLD, IN BRAVE CAPTIVITY   Three years ago the Donmar’s all-woman Julius Caesar, set in prison, left me feeling that something genuinely new had happened: a revolution, a…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 02:11AM
Friday, November 18, 2016

THE TEMPEST Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford upon Avon by Libby Purves

O BRAVE NEW WORLD….     The talking-point is Ariel: a daring innovation for live theatre. Motion-capture technology sensors on Mark Quartley’s graceful body – skintig…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 04:15AM
Thursday, November 17, 2016

LA SOIREE Leicester Square, WC1 by Libby Purves

THEY’RE BACK.  OH YES.  INCLUDING URSULA.    There comes a time in the year when the spirit yearns for a stiff drink and a whoop-along night in a mirrored tent, watching men in…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:41AM
Wednesday, November 16, 2016

AN INSPECTOR CALLS Playhouse, WC2 by Libby Purves

TRUTH, BRINGING DOWN THE HOUSE    Nearly 25 years on from its first outing at the National, Stephen Daldry’s interpretation of the old JB Priestley standard – not least due to …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 12:12PM

KING LEAR Barbican by Libby Purves

LUKE JONES ON THE RSC’s NEW LEAR.. (interesting contrast of response with LP’s Stratford review  , here on http://tinyurl.com/gnu73zq . We both love Essiedu’s Edmund tho…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:53AM
Monday, November 14, 2016

SCHOOL OF ROCK New London Theatre WC2 by Libby Purves

TWO LORDS A-ROCKING…   Now we know why Lord Lloyd Webber got so grumpy about being summoned back from the US to vote. Been head-down and happy, revelling in his first Broadway hit sin…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 06:33PM
Thursday, November 10, 2016

DEAD FUNNY Vaudeville, WC2 by Libby Purves

COMEDY AS PAIN, PAIN AS COMEDY   A late catch-up, this: I was away on press night, so it seemed a good wheeze to dive into the Vaudeville for a matinee on Trumpageddon day. And here ind…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 04:59AM
Tuesday, November 8, 2016

SAVING JASON Park 90, N4 by Libby Purves

THE AGE OF ECSTASY AND AFFRONT     It’s not the first time that the idea of a family “intervention” has tempted a dramatist. Why wouldn’t it? You’ve got one character out…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:57PM
Friday, November 4, 2016

KING LEAR Old Vic SE1 by Libby Purves

A DIFFERENT AND (ALMOST) GREAT LEAR…   This is, of course, “event theatre”. Glenda Jackson, aged 80 , after 25 years off the stagedourly battling as a Labour MP, returns to th…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:36PM

CYMBELINE Barbican E1 by Libby Purves

LUKE JONES CONTEMPLATES THE RSC’S ANCIENT BRITONS   The first impression of this RSC import to London is messiness. The staging; nipped and tucked from the RSC thrust to the Bar…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 05:13AM
Tuesday, November 1, 2016

COMUS Wanamaker, SE1 by Libby Purves

A MIRTHFUL MORALITY If Lucy Bailey’s wickedly funny interpretation of Milton’s moralising work gets another run (make it so!) anyone auditioning should make sure they are one of the part…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:27PM
Sunday, October 30, 2016

RAGTIME Charing Cross Theatre, SW1 by Libby Purves

AMERICA’S STORY, EVERYBODY’S SONG     America’s twentieth century belongs to all of us, and its events and themes echo round the world: the rise of corporate power, the racia…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 02:05PM
Saturday, October 29, 2016

GLOBE GREATS REMEMBERED by Libby Purves

This is an unusual post, not about any current production,  and far too long.   And the latest current reviews are available below, AMADEUS at the top and well worth it.    But there has…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 02:00PM
Wednesday, October 26, 2016

AMADEUS Olivier, SE1 by Libby Purves

ONE OF THE GREAT NIGHTS   The old man’s eye is unforgiving, his squat wrecked strength of will cows the vast room as he invokes us – “ghosts of the future” – t…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 07:07PM