Wednesday, December 19, 2018
New Vic, Newcastle-under-LymeAn immersive show for the under-fives strikes gold and acts as a primer for Peter Leslie Wild’s inventive and boisterous main stage productionAs is often the c…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:54AMTuesday, December 11, 2018
Hull TruckA sumptuous choral score is key to this slick, polished production featuring an impressive female Fagin and tightly drilled young companyThe statistics about the working poor in Th…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:04PMSunday, December 9, 2018
From Victorian penury to Caribbean party music, new productions at Leeds Playhouse and Northern Stage in Newcastle revisit Dickens’s festive favouriteIt isn’t only the ghosts of Christma…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:12PMTraverse, EdinburghKieran Hurley’s gripping Edinburgh-set two-hander confronts the economic divide in the city and the stranglehold the middle-classes have on the artsKieran Hurley’s pro…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:32AMTuesday, December 4, 2018
Pantomime legend Johnny McKnight does his usual festive double, starring in Mammy Goose at the Tron in Glasgow – and writing Sleepin’ Cutie at Macrobert, StirlingIs pantomime a reactiona…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:32AMMonday, December 3, 2018
Royal Lyceum, EdinburghElla Hickson’s adaptation of JM Barrie’s story is a funny and heartbreaking coming-of-age tale for its swashbuckling heroinePeter Pan is as much a concept as a cha…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:48AMFriday, November 30, 2018
Theatre Royal, NewcastlePlacing the story in the context of two rival circuses, Michael Harrison’s show boasts jugglers, skaters and motorcyclistsIf you want the secret behind the UK’s f…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:04AMThursday, November 22, 2018
Live theatre, NewcastlePlaying themselves with humour, grace and honesty, a former inmate and her daughter tell their story and reveal their bond Cheryl and Abigail Byron are on adjacent cha…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:42AMMonday, November 19, 2018
Coliseum, OldhamKevin Shaw’s colourful panto is an enjoyable sugar rush seemingly powered by E-numbersFine Time Fontayne and Simeon Truby make their first entrance as the Ugly Sisters wear…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:12AMFriday, November 9, 2018
Cast, Doncaster Anna Jordan tunes into intertwined lives and captures the oblivion and camaraderie of the dancefloor in her new dramaIt’s no spoiler to reveal that Pop Music ends with Come…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:36PMThursday, November 8, 2018
Northern Stage, NewcastleStaged in the round, Elayce Ismail’s production relocates Dylan Thomas’s dramatic poem about the people of Llareggub In divided times, there’s something comfor…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:06AMFriday, October 26, 2018
Live theatre, Newcastle Edgar Allen Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher is restaged in a Tyneside mental hospital in a poignant and politically charged musicalIt sounds like a challenge f…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:04PMThursday, October 25, 2018
Traverse, EdinburghAnna Jordan’s four-hander for Frantic Assembly, unfolding across time to tell parallel war stories, is performed with heart and focusA man is trying to cross the sea to …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:24AMThursday, October 18, 2018
Unity, LiverpoolDeparting from convention and reality, Leo Butler’s simulated psychedelic experience crashes around with jolly abandonYou can imagine an Open University programme that sets…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:33AMWednesday, October 17, 2018
Royal Exchange, ManchesterSarah Frankcom gives Arthur Miller’s decline-and-fall drama an extra edge in this powerful productionDon Warrington’s Willy Loman is at the centre of his own un…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:36AMWednesday, October 10, 2018
Traverse, EdinburghClare Duffy’s play skirts the big issues as an ecowarrior and her mother clash in a locked bathroom Opening in the week the UN has made dire warnings about climate chang…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:04PMMonday, October 1, 2018
Theatr Clwyd, MoldWilliam Golding’s fable of desert-island anarchy is reinvented for the modern age in Emma Jordan’s brutal, bold productionThere’s a theory being pushed by the psychol…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:33AMWednesday, September 19, 2018
Royal Lyceum, Edinburgh With 50/50 gender-split casting, this comedy of disguise and identity enjoys a playful makeoverYou get a sense of the playfulness of Wils Wilson’s trippy take on Sh…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:32AMFriday, September 7, 2018
Tramway, Glasgow The thwarted lover story, retold in dazzling Glaswegian Scots, has raucous spirit and flamboyant hairpieces but its verbal flourishes are lost in acoustic fogEdwin Morgan’…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:36AMTuesday, September 4, 2018
Victoria and Albert Museum, LondonA brutal score by Jerskin Fendrix is the driving force behind this bleakly topical reworking of Alfred Jarry’s Ubu RoiSince its premiere in 1896, Alfred J…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:54AMThursday, August 23, 2018
Royal Lyceum, EdinburghA man sits outside a prison in self-imposed punishment, in this philosophically provocative but dramatically inert dramaThe set is not a million miles from Druid Theat…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:04AMWednesday, August 22, 2018
The Studio, EdinburghStewart Laing sensitively takes Édouard Louis’s groundbreaking coming-of-age story from page to stageWhen Édouard Louis was growing up in a poor working-class villag…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:54AMTuesday, August 21, 2018
Assembly Checkpoint, EdinburghFrom corrupt cartels to ‘snakehead’ smugglers, the journalist-cum-author presents a plain-talking breakdown of complex global illsWhen Misha Glenny ventured…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:36AMMonday, August 20, 2018
Roundabout at Summerhall, EdinburghDating apps and cute cat gifs are stifling a couple’s ability to communicate in Eve Nicol’s play for Middle ChildWhat’s a monogamist to do in the age…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:24AMSummerhall, EdinburghShould Jon stay or should he go? That is the question in a drama of short sentences, questions and heavy sighsBig Aftermath of a Small Disclosure is a play. The play is …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:54AMSaturday, August 18, 2018
Assembly George Square theatre, EdinburghKaren Cogan is compelling as a pleasure-seeking thirtysomething in this vivd solo show staged by Fishamble and Soho theatreYou can imagine another wr…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:18AMFriday, August 17, 2018
Summerhall, EdinburghA sobering examination of British children caught in media crossfireIn the spring of 2014, what was the Trojan horse? Was it the Islamist doctrine allegedly smuggled int…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:04AMWednesday, August 15, 2018
The Edinburgh festival’s Big in Belgium season features daft whimsy, a Eurovision anthem and a headlong charge into uncomfortable territoryWhen the Smiths released Paint a Vulgar Picture ,…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:24PMSunday, August 12, 2018
Roundabout @ Summerhall, EdinburghA desperate love story is set against a broader picture of government hostility in Ed Edwards’ gritty two-handerAccording to this urgent two-hander, the n…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:32AMSaturday, August 11, 2018
Summerhall, EdinburghIn monologue and song, Chris Thorpe explores nationality, identity and not accepting the story you’re given about BrexitChris Thorpe says his one-man show is not about…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:12AMTraverse, EdinburghA history lesson on the American civil war becomes an exploration of race relations in the US today but soon stirs up ugly racist sentimentsMost arguments about inequality…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:04AM 
