All stories by Mark Lawson on BroadwayStars

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Unearthed Arthur Miller play is the first sign of a budding genius by Mark Lawson

A lost work is often buried for a reason, but the recent rediscovery of a seminal Miller play, No Villain, confirms his brilliance and anticipates later masterpiecesThe biggest dream of all …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:39AM
Sunday, December 6, 2015

From XS Churchill to XL Shakespeare: sizing up London's new shows by Mark Lawson

Recent openings present theatregoers with a choice between interval-free one-acters such as Here We Go and epics including Henry VIt struck me recently how useful it would be if theatre tick…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:24PM
Friday, December 4, 2015

Tom Stoppard's Hapgood comes in from the cold by Mark Lawson

Mixing spy thriller with quantum physics, Stoppard’s play Hapgood received rude and confused reviews in 1988. Will a rare revival reverse its fortunes?In March 1988, Tom Stoppard gave an i…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:44AM
Wednesday, December 2, 2015

Song-and-dance man Daniel Evans is a great creative choice for Chichester by Mark Lawson

The appointment of Sheffield Theatres’ artistic director to lead at Chichester Festival theatre reflects his talent for musicals – and his innovative recordDaniel Evans has been appointe…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:42AM
Monday, November 30, 2015

The Homecoming and Little Eyolf: new views stay faithful to Pinter and Ibsen by Mark Lawson

The temptation to update the text of an old play for a modern audience is resisted in two productions that refresh the originals in more intelligent waysTwo striking revivals last week – o…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:16AM
Friday, November 20, 2015

Brief is beautiful: how Caryl Churchill conquered British theatre by Mark Lawson

As a female playwright who didn’t give interviews, Churchill has in the past been underestimated. So how has she come to be celebrated as one of Britain’s greatest dramatists?In the last…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:34AM
Wednesday, November 18, 2015

Last Night a DJ Saved My Life review – the Hoff hits the decks in Ibiza musical by Mark Lawson

Wolverhampton GrandDavid Hasselhoff plays a nightclub owner who once, strangely, starred in Baywatch in this creaky addition to his personality cultMany actors, rattling around Britain in a …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:33AM
Friday, November 13, 2015

Scene changes – the traffic jams of theatre by Mark Lawson

Theatres can't keep asking us to hang about in the dark while actors move house. We may as well go to the cinemaAll performers hope for applause – but the new London West End production of…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:28AM
Thursday, November 12, 2015

All the world's a stage: how theatre fell in love with itself by Mark Lawson

From Gypsy to Harlequinade and The Moderate Soprano, London’s theatres are awash with shows about showbiz. Are they a valid celebration of the power of art, or just for self-indulgent luvv…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:13AM
Friday, November 6, 2015

From the West End to Westminster: which playwrights should run Britain? by Mark Lawson

Chancellor Caryl Churchill, foreign secretary Gore Vidal, defence minister David Greig … Ahead of the National Theatre’s revival of Harley Granville Barker’s explosive play, Waste, Mar…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:44AM
Tuesday, November 3, 2015

Lawrence and Chekhov: reimagined or violated? by Mark Lawson

New projects at the National Theatre and Chichester Festival theatre substantially rework the material of two great authors, raising questions of fidelity and freedomIf there is an afterlife…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:48AM
Tuesday, October 27, 2015

The power of shame: why Measure for Measure is more relevant than ever by Mark Lawson

Measure for Measure has been staged three times in London this year. It goes to show just how resonant its themes of sexual licentiousness and twisted democracy are today – especially in R…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:36AM
Friday, October 16, 2015

Dame Angela Lansbury marks 90th birthday with Oscar Hammerstein award by Mark Lawson

Lifetime achievement in music theatre acknowledges Lansbury’s prolific career in theatre and film spanning seven decadesPeople like to pass landmark birthdays in meaningful places, so it s…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:16AM
Friday, October 9, 2015

Are these the 10 best Shakespeare screen adaptations? by Mark Lawson

Macbeth, starring Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard, joins Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet and Orson Welles’s Chimes at Midnight in my top 10 films based on the Stratford playwright’s w…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:13AM
Monday, October 5, 2015

Variety's last hurrah: Des O'Connor and Jimmy Tarbuck at the Palladium by Mark Lawson

The jokes were dated and non-PC, the delivery perfectly timed: for one night only, the showbiz survivors teamed up to create a piece of theatre historyWith the two performers having a combin…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:50PM
Wednesday, September 23, 2015

You Me Bum Bum Train: my trip with the Kafkaesque theatrical cult by Mark Lawson

The secretive immersive-theatre sensation is back for another sellout run. It’s an uplifting and unsettling experience – think Disneyland meets DismalandAt the curtain call for Agatha Ch…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:37PM
Friday, September 18, 2015

Lyndsey Turner, Hamlet theatre director who shuns the limelight by Mark Lawson

Tipping the Velvet has opened to less fanfare than her Benedict Cumberbatch production, but Turner seems to prefer it that wayThe last time the theatre director Lyndsey Turner opened a produ…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:18PM
Thursday, September 17, 2015

Abi Morgan and Mike Bartlett are our new superstar dramatists by Mark Lawson

Doctor Foster, Suffragette, Game, Splendour … hits keep on coming for Abi Morgan and Mike Bartlett. The success of these British playwrights comes from transcending the limits of both stag…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:30PM
Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Edinburgh festival 2015: the six shows you shouldn't miss by Lyn Gardner, Mark Lawson and Brian Logan

A Desert Island Discs spoof, brooding circus performers who strip naked and a Yoko Ono-inspired love-fest … our critics choose their hot tickets at this year’s fringeO No!In less skilled…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:49AM
Friday, August 14, 2015

Islamic State replaces SNP as hot topic at Edinburgh festival fringe by Mark Lawson

Last year, with the referendum imminent, playwrights turned their hand to the subject of Scottish independence. This year the big issue is IsisIn Scotland, Labour has largely been replaced b…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:37AM
Thursday, August 13, 2015

Blair, Boris and Thatcher: the politicians providing material at this year's fringe by Mark Lawson

Edinburgh festival has a long tradition of taking on leaders and legislation as dramatic subject matter and this year sees performers’ satire as sharp as everWho is the odd one out among T…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:09PM
Wednesday, August 12, 2015

Echoes at Edinburgh festival review – dark and daring look at colonial cruelty by Mark Lawson

Gilded Balloon, EdinburghHenry Naylor’s impressive work tells the story of a modern-day British jihadi bride in Syria and a Victorian bluestocking in Afghanistan – and manages to conjure…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:00AM
Tuesday, August 11, 2015

Angel in the Abattoir at Edinburgh festival review – a dark and uneasy monologue by Mark Lawson

Gilded BalloonAn amoral anti-love story about the sexual abuse of a Spanish immigrant in Scotland is challenging, and begs the question: what shall we as viewers do?The title will make Anglo…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:28PM
Sunday, August 9, 2015

Edinburgh festival review: Impossible – a duel between Houdini and Conan Doyle by Mark Lawson

Pleasance Dome, EdinburghBizarre miscasting and stodgy dialogue scupper this account of a meeting between the master illusionist and the Sherlock Holmes creatorIn the teeming marketplace of …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:45AM

Jim Cartwright's RAZ at Edinburgh festival review – a real night on the town by Mark Lawson

Assembly George Square Studios, EdinburghJim Cartwright’s raucous, lively study of living for the weekend has the feel of another crossover work from the author of the Rise and Fall of Lit…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:31AM
Saturday, August 8, 2015

Man to Man five-star review at Edinburgh festival – a world of shadows and shape-shifting by Mark Lawson

Underbelly Potterow, EdinburghMargaret Ann Bain sculpts her body and voice to become a cast of dozens in this story of an East German woman forced to take over her dead husband’s identity …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:52AM
Friday, July 24, 2015

Are British theatres falling out of love with bricks and mortar? by Mark Lawson

From radical reinventions of the proscenium arch, to productions that march outside of the theatre altogether, the boards of the British stage are dissolving under a wave of innovationFootba…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:33AM
Friday, July 10, 2015

Bold, versatile and fiercely democratic: an ode to Maxine Peake by Mark Lawson

Actor defied early rejections from drama schools to become one of Britain’s most exciting stage names, winning plaudits for her roles as well as her personalityIt is a mark of the boldness…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:12PM
Thursday, July 2, 2015

Want to lift your spirits? Try four hours of Greek tragedy by Mark Lawson

The Oresteia starts with a child sacrifice – and then gets darker. But it managed to cheer me up even more than the tremendously funny Rules for LivingDoes theatre, as the Greeks believed,…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:26PM
Friday, June 19, 2015

Lion King director Julie Taymor: 'it's so much harder for women to get the opportunity' by Mark Lawson

After a painful failure with Spider-Man, Taymor has bounced back with stage and now film versions of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Here she talks about why there are still few female director…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:56PM
Thursday, June 18, 2015

Theatre of dreams: the best 11 plays about football by Mark Lawson

Patrick Marber has scored a hit with The Red Lion at the National Theatre. Here’s a first XI of stage dramas inspired by the beautiful gameAlthough football is England’s most popular tea…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:38AM