Sunday, September 24, 2017
Young Vic, LondonThe actor gives an extraordinary performance, but even she cannot quite convey the turmoil of a woman who has suffered a strokeSometimes Juliet Stevenson looks like a parach…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:18AMHampstead theatre, LondonRobert Lindsay plays the role of the late cinematographer Jack Cardiff with astonishing skill, but the play lacks focusTerry Johnson has given himself a hard task wi…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:18AMNational Theatre, LondonA riveting reimagining of the secret talks that set up the historic Oslo peace accordsI went into Oslo expecting to be informed, and fairly confident of being interes…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:18AMSunday, September 17, 2017
Orange Tree, RichmondSue Wallace and Ian Gelder are outstanding as a bickering elderly couple in David Storey’s play about a family reunionIt is a long time since I have seen a tasselled l…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:24AMGlobe, LondonGina McKee is a brave, bloody-minded queen of the Iceni in Tristan Bernays’s vigorous and earthy playOutside the House of Commons stands one of the few London statues of a wom…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:24AMSunday, August 20, 2017
King’s theatre; Church Hill theatre; Traverse, EdinburghA six-hour Alan Ayckbourn epic is outdone by some tiny model figures, a true-life transgender tale and two marooned women with a sec…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:04AMSunday, August 13, 2017
Trafalgar Studios, LondonA caustic Channing battles gamely to save Alexi Kaye Campbell’s cliched family bust-upStockard Channing gives a good withering. It’s hard to tell whether her phy…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:24AMSunday, August 6, 2017
Finborough; Royal Court, London Cicely Hamilton’s forgotten feminist drama hits home, while John Tiffany delivers rage and vaudeville in a bravura revival of Jim Cartwright’s RoadHistory…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:12AMSunday, July 30, 2017
Old Vic; Dorfman; Apollo, LondonConor McPherson weaves magic with Bob Dylan’s songs, Olivias Colman and Williams ignite Lucy Kirkwood’s new play, and Sienna Miller’s Cat fails to sizzl…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:54AMSunday, July 23, 2017
Regent’s Park Open Air theatre, LondonA Tale of Two Cities mashup nearly does for Dickens in a rare flop at Regent’s ParkEvery couple of years someone writes a column saying how she has …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:54AMRoyal Court, LondonVivienne Franzmann examines the economics and human cost of surrogacy in this thought-provoking dramaVivienne Franzmann has made her name with dramas – Mogadishu, The Wi…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:54AMSunday, July 16, 2017
Museum of Science and Technology; Royal Exchange; Home; Mayfield, Manchester A captive audience is ruffled in immersive refugee drama The Welcoming Party. Elsewhere, powerful tales of sons a…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:12AMSunday, July 9, 2017
Centenary Building, Salford A doomed attempt to mix disaster survival and party games gets the otherwise promising Manchester international festival off to a shaky startJohn McGrath, foundin…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:42AMLondon Palladium A technical hitch gave rise to a welcome burst of spontaneity from Rufus Hound as Mr Toad in this otherwise tame tale of wildlife“Poop, poop”, as Toad so aptly puts it. …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:42AMDonmar Warehouse, London Sandra Marvin is imperious as Camila Batmanghelidjh but this verbatim reconstruction needs more vimJosie Rourke keeps pushing at the Donmar. All-female Shakespeares.…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:42AMSunday, July 2, 2017
Wyndham’s, LondonA bad gig for the jazz legend is a great one for McDonald as she embodies the troubled singer one wild night in PhiladelphiaLady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill supplie…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:24AMOrange Tree, RichmondBranden Jacobs-Jenkins’s ingenious reworking of a 19th-century slave drama continues an exceptional new lease of life at this tiny theatreWhat Paul Miller has done at …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:24AMAlmeida, LondonCarvel is a natural as the media mogul in James Graham’s engrossing play charting the rise of the Sun newspaperIs Ink indelible? Not really. Is it the talk of the theatrical…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:24AMSunday, June 18, 2017
Minerva, ChichesterNearly 60 years after Edna O’Brien’s novel outraged the establishment, the gallivanting girls are as vital as ever in this skilled stage versionWhen Edna O’Brien pub…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:48AMRoyal Court, LondonAlice Birch’s riveting play, expertly directed by Katie Mitchell, examines how devastating sadness can seep through generations of womenWhen sadness runs through a famil…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:48AMFestival theatre, ChichesterJonathan Kent summons arresting moments from Tennessee Williams’s drama but can’t fully rescue a play that fails to meld personal and politicalTennessee Willi…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:48AMSunday, June 11, 2017
Dorfman, LondonAn African world full of anecdote and argument is conjured up at the barber’sIsn’t this what all playwrights would wish for? To come across in their daily lives a dramatic…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:42AMOlivier, LondonWords fail everyone in a play about the loss of common land in the early 1800sHow has this to pass come? Lower down explain will why like this I write. DC Moore author of good…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:42AMFriday, June 9, 2017
The Observer's theatre critic chooses the 10 sets that changed the face of modern theatre, from a 1912 Hamlet to Punchdrunk's immersive Faust Continue reading...
SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:48AMSunday, June 4, 2017
The Other Palace, LondonSally Cookson’s take on the cinema classic makes for magical theatre with just bare boards, smoky light and a fine, versatile castThere is nothing like a woman with…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:54AMRoyal Court, LondonGary Owen continues his exploration of male dysfunction through the generations with this fierce three-handerTwo years ago Gary Owen’s Violence and Son viscerally sugges…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:54AMRegent’s Park Open Air theatre, LondonBernstein’s music, three strong women and Drew McOnie’s choreography drive his inventively staged productionI was completely taken aback by On the…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:54AMSunday, May 28, 2017
Two decades ago, Susannah Clapp filed her first theatre review for the Observer. Here, she reflects on the quirks of the job, the joy of spotting new stars – and how the role of the critic…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:18AMSunday, May 21, 2017
Minerva, Chichester Sharon D Clarke is extraordinary as the defiant heroine of Tony Kushner and Jeanine Tesori’s dynamic musical set in 60s AmericaPolitical punch, moral intricacy – and …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:54AMRoyal Court, London Seeing a man read out an anonymous woman’s sexual fantasies on stage produces curious resultsNo one knows who wrote the words of Manwatching. No one can see a script be…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:54AMYoung Vic, London Brendan Cowell brings Brecht’s rebel scientist to combative life in Joe Wright’s coruscating productionHow to see what’s really going on? How to recognise interesting…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:54AM 
