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 02:32AMRoyal 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 07:48AMTheatre 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 07:04AMLive 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 08:42AMColiseum, 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 08:12AMCast, 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 03:36PMNorthern 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 02:06AMLive 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 01:04PMTraverse, 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 08:24AMUnity, 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 06:33AMRoyal 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 08:36AMTraverse, 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 03:04PMTheatr 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 01:33AMRoyal 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 11:32AMTramway, 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 02:36AMVictoria 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 06:54AMRoyal 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 11:04AMThe 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 08:54AMAssembly 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 06:36AMRoundabout 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 01:54AMAssembly 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 03:18AMSummerhall, 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 11:04AMThe 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 04:24PMRoundabout @ 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 07:32AMSummerhall, 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★★★☆☆/★★★★☆ Traverse/Underbelly Cowgate, EdinburghIn two new works, the playwright contrasts how the disenfranchised struggle to wrest control from a system they cannot i…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:06AMPleasance Dome, EdinburghSome signature sex gags raise the odd laugh and a late religious theme intrigues – but really, the end can’t come too soonWhen Frank Skinner was on the way up as…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:48AMGilded Balloon Teviot, EdinburghThe IT Crowd actor turns playwright with this subtle monologue play in which three studio sitters bare their emotional woundsThe trick to writing a monologue …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:54AMTraverse, EdinburghThe activist-comedian takes the temperature of universal healthcare and delivers a grave diagnosisMark Thomas is standing centre stage, feet splayed, shoulders feeling the…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:48AM
