Sunday, September 14, 2025

London City Ballet: Momentum review – lovely dancing set to beautiful music by Lyndsey Winship

Sadler’s Wells, LondonAlina Cojocaru is breathtaking, Ratmansky’s music zings and Joseph Taylor gets a fantastic angry solo It’s exciting when artists push boundaries, melt genres, re…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:12AM
Saturday, September 13, 2025

The Guide #208: How theatre is holding its own in the age of artificial intelligence by Lucinda Everett

In this week’s newsletter: Live performances offering authentic human connection are drawing crowds to the stage, as AI-driven drivel worms its way into other creative industries Last year…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:24AM
Friday, September 12, 2025

Self Esteem to star as raging rock star in revival of David Hare’s Teeth ’n’ Smiles by Chris Wiegand

Rebecca Lucy Taylor will play Maggie, a role originated by Helen Mirren, in a ‘landmark’ 50th anniversary production in London in March Fifty years after Helen Mirren originated the role…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:36PM

‘I haven’t even googled how to write a play!’: Nima Taleghani bringing rap to the National Theatre by Miriam Gillinson

The Heartstopper star’s exhilarating reboot of Euripides is the first debut play to grace the hallowed Olivier stage – but it nearly didn’t happen. ‘Its not in my bones,’ he says N…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:36PM

Dr Freud Will See You Now, Mrs Hitler review – dangerous jokes as bedwetter grows into a psychopath by Mark Lawson

Upstairs at the Gatehouse, LondonFizzing with intelligence and featuring a catastrophic misunderstanding and a deeply symbolic cigar, this richly imagined play feels all too plausible If the…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:24AM

Seagull: True Story review – Putin’s war overshadows a heroically meta staging of Chekhov by Arifa Akbar

Marylebone theatre, LondonRussian director Alexander Molochnikov’s play within a play raises vital questions about the cost and creativity of exile but is undone by its own cleverness This…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:18AM

Murmuration Level 2 review – mesmerising dance multiplies in tutting fractal forms by Lyndsey Winship

Peacock theatre, LondonStarting from a single dancer, an intricate moving patterns of limbs forms a complex weave of shifting patterns in Sadeck Berrabah’s technically impressive show Ther…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:12AM

Endgame review – Mathew Horne and Douglas Hodge bring macabre fizz to Beckett by Arifa Akbar

Ustinov Studio, BathAs a pair of wisecracking vaudevillian entertainers, the stars balance the comedy and desolation in Lindsay Posner’s production This desolate masterpiece by Samuel Beck…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:02AM

Letter: Giles Havergal obituary by Gordon McDougall

Through the long hot summer of 1964 I was assistant director to Giles Havergal in weekly rep at Her Majesty’s theatre, Barrow-in-Furness. Its main entrance was the width of a normal doorwa…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:54AM
Thursday, September 11, 2025

Kenneth Branagh returns to the RSC for The Tempest and The Cherry Orchard by Chris Wiegand Stage Editor

Next summer, the star will appear in Stratford-upon-Avon first as Prospero and then alongside Helen Hunt in Chekhov’s classic More than 40 years after his star-making performance as Henry …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:36PM

Ideal review – stage return for Johnny Vegas’s TV weed dealer fails to score by Nick Ahad

Lowry, Salford Reprise of Graham Duff’s cult comedy delights the series’ fans but there’s not much here for anyone else If you are a fan of the cult BBC Three sitcom Ideal, you should …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:12AM

The Last Stand of Mrs Mary Whitehouse review – Maxine Peake takes us behind moral crusader’s curtain by David Jays

Nottingham PlayhouseDeft and witty drama follows the religious conservative campaigner as she rails against blasphemy, porn and homosexuality A culture warrior before her time, Mary Whitehou…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:02AM

Cow | Deer review – extraordinary sound journey into the lives of animals by Chris Wiegand

Royal Court theatre, London Katie Mitchell, Nina Segal and Melanie Wilson’s ‘experiment in performance’ uses expressive performance and inventive sonic effects to bring a wordless worl…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:02AM
Wednesday, September 10, 2025

Our Brother review – power games with Pol Pot by Mark Fisher

Òran Mór, GlasgowA naive Scottish academic is granted an audience with the genocidal Cambodian dictator in Jack MacGregor’s play If you met a genocidal dictator how would you react? For …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:12AM

The mystery of the coffee-shop meltdown – told by dancers, a drummer and a brown bear by Lyndsey Winship

Frauke Requardt and Vivienne Franzmann’s dance-theatre show Anatomy of Survival examines 23 versions of reality in ‘powder keg’ cities One morning, playwright Vivienne Franzmann was qu…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:24AM
Tuesday, September 9, 2025

Billy Porter recovering from ‘serious case of sepsis’ as Broadway show closes early by Sian Cain

The 55-year-old actor has been playing Emcee in Cabaret, which will now shut a month earlier than planned Billy Porter is “recovering from a serious case of sepsis”, forcing the early cl…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:24AM

The play that changed my life: ‘Pinter’s Betrayal made me think: this is how I want to write’ by Hannah Patterson

In his reverse-chronology play about a married couple dealing with an affair, Harold Pinter asked the audience to find meaning in unspoken words I didn’t see Harold Pinter’s Betrayal on …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:24AM

‘We spent a week on the cow birth!’ The eye-opening play about animals with sound effects instead of words by David Jays

Cow | Deer gets ‘between the ears’ of animals, creating mouse noises with polystyrene balls and comparing wild creatures with industrialised ones. So if there’s no dialogue, what did i…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:24AM
Monday, September 8, 2025

Hedda review – Ibsen gets a Saltburn makeover in Amazon’s ill-advised romp by Richard Lawson In Toronto

Toronto film festival: Nia DaCosta ups the nastiness of Hedda Gabler in a stylish but over-egged adaptation with lead Tessa Thompson losing the film to a standout Nina Hoss Henrik Ibsen’s …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:48PM

Hamnet review – Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal excel in stately Shakespeare drama with overwhelming finale by Richard Lawson In Toronto

Toronto film festival: The two stars are knockouts in Chloé Zhao’s poignant adaptation of Maggie O’Farrell’s 2020 novel with a stirring tearjerker ending Maggie O’Farrell’s lauded…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:48PM

‘It will be frightening but you have to do it’: Andrew Lincoln and Alicia Vikander’s nerve-shredding stage return by Emma John

Can two world-famous actors and auteur Simon Stone bring 19th-century Norway screaming into the modern world? They talk mean directors, bathtub revelations and reinventing Ibsen’s The Lady…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:36AM

Bill Posley: The Day I Accidentally Went to War review – veteran comic drops truth bombs by Brian Logan

Soho theatre, LondonThe US comic and TV writer’s account of his military service in Iraq is exuberant, enlightening, and flies the flag for the plight of veterans At one point in Bill Posl…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:36AM
Sunday, September 7, 2025

Home at Seven review – a superbly acted time-slip mystery by Mark Lawson

Tabard theatre, LondonA man returns home having been reported missing for 24 hours in this welcome revival of RC Sherriff’s postwar hit Our perceptions of the first world war are greatly s…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:32AM

The Party Girls review – Mitford sisters get-together is missing some life and soul by Emma John

Marlowe theatre, CanterburyAmy Rosenthal’s drama explores the aristocratic It girls’ politics and sibling dynamics, but doesn’t bring much new to the party – or accentuate the contem…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:12AM
Saturday, September 6, 2025

“It’s a secret garden”: National Theatre turns roof into a riot of colour with dye plants by Helena Horton Environment Reporter

Textile artists are reshaping how the theatre makes its costumes with the aim of replacing harsh synthetic dyes Squint at the roof of the grey, brutalist National Theatre on London’s Sout…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:18AM
Friday, September 5, 2025

Newly discovered portrait may depict ‘fair youth’ of Shakespeare’s sonnets by Dalya Alberge

Earl of Southampton may have given writer the miniature by Nicholas Hilliard, which has defaced heart on its reverse The discovery of a previously unknown portrait miniature by one of Elizab…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:02PM

Deaf Republic review – a town under military occupation falls defiantly silent by David Jays

Royal Court theatre, LondonUkrainian-born Ilya Kaminsky’s book-length poem is a potent theatrical force of many moving parts – signing, speech, surtitles, even a drone hovering over the …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:02PM

Metropolitan gatekeeping has kept Marlowe marginalised | Letters by Guardian Staff

Ray Mia says to honour the playwright we must also honour those who risk bringing him back; Roger Thomas thinks he is less accessible than Shakespeare. Plus a letter from Richard Digby Day T…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:02PM

Here & Now review – Steps supermarket musical is a sweep of bangers, bops and ballads by Michael Cragg

Manchester Opera HouseEndlessly entertaining jukebox show frames its plot around a seaside store’s workers to purvey the band’s hits Under a stark spotlight a woman sings an ode to her s…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:42AM

Whoopi Goldberg: Live review – like reading a boomer relative’s Facebook by Ryan Gilbey

Hammersmith Apollo, LondonThe Egot-winning actor presents semi-formed thoughts on things from ageing to AI in an undemanding show Beginning an evening of amiable waffling, Whoopi Goldberg an…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:36AM

Haywire review – early history of The Archers inspires behind-the-mic farce by Mark Lawson

Barn theatre, CirencesterFeaturing extraordinary voice acting, this play about the birth of the BBC’s farming drama will equally satisfy superfans and everyday folk Even regular listeners …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:36AM

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