Wilton's Music Hall, London Matthew Kelly plays good and evil spirits in a magical, visually arresting adaptation of John Masefield's classic children's book Related: Long before Harry Potte…
The Swan, Stratford-upon-AvonMike Poulton's two-part adaptation of Harris's trilogy is an exhilarating and timely political drama about a democracy descending into tyrannyRome wasn't built i…
Hampstead theatre, LondonThe uneasy relationship between convicted traitor George Blake and the anarchic Irishman who helped him escape Wormwood Scrubs is exposed yet still enigmatic in Simo…
There are problems in paradise in Richard Bean's ingenious look at a failed attempt to create an island utopiaRichard Bean has hit upon a good subject: Fletcher Christian's attempt to create…
Royal Shakespeare theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon David Edgar's lively adaptation for the RSC foregrounds the tale's reforming message and features Phil Davis as a grotesquely good ScroogeThe g…
Rare revivals of plays by Israel Zangwill, Jerome K Jerome and JM Barrie give lie to the idea that only a precious few classics deserve revisitingOne of the hoariest critical cliches is that…
Royal Court, LondonLiwaa Yazji's play is named after the animals that Syrian villagers were given as an inadequate, absurd compensation for the loss of family membersThe last time we saw a g…
Ustinov Studio, BathGreg Hicks plays an ailing father who cruelly mocks his wife, children and brother in Will Eno's acid examination of family lifeJust when you thought the American family …
Old Vic, London Jack Thorne's superb retelling mines the ghosts of Scrooge's past in a timely production brimming with love and affectionTwo months after Dickens's story first appeared at Ch…
Theatre in the Park, ChichesterChichester has acquired a 25-metre-high big top to stand in for the temporarily closed Festival theatre. It would seem appropriate that it opens with a revival…
Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, LondonAnders Lustgarten plays fast and loose with history in his tale of the espionage network surrounding Elizabeth I, but the result is vivid and pungentHistory pl…
Royal Court, LondonThere are echoes of Sarah Kane in Natal'ya Vorozhbit's powerful play exploring the collateral damage suffered by women during Ukraine's conflictTheatre can sometimes jolt …
Octagon, BoltonStella Feehily's passionate, urgently topical play captures the mix of care and chaos in wards up and down the countrySince the NHS is never out of the headlines and directly …
Jermyn Street theatre, LondonHoward Brenton's new adaptation of the Swedish master's tragedy is given a classy staging that strikes the right note of intimate realismWe endlessly revive Stri…
National Theatre, LondonThe Breaking Bad star is magnetic as a raging anchorman in writer Lee Hall and director Ivo van Hove's extraordinary version of the prophetic satireI am normally wary…
Minerva, ChichesterIn resurrecting the case of a trio convicted of trying to defraud Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?, James Graham reminds us we live in a quiz-obsessed cultureTheatre has oft…
Royal Shakespeare theatre, Stratford-upon-AvonThis take on the classic comedy plays too heavily on its Victorian setting but delivers rapturous speeches, splendid sets and some clever ideasC…
Playhouse, London A tip-top cast play David Mamet's desperate salesmen turned robbers in his scorching condemnation of the dangers of male ego-driven capitalismHow well does David Mamet's pl…
The Other Palace, LondonGrammer's turn as a dad with a penchant for tall tales is the best part of this middling paean to narcissistic fantasy, based on Tim Burton's movieAnyone drawn to thi…
The Playground, London Terry d'Alfonso's study of the painter and his serial infidelities is staged on a circular sandpit at a smart new London theatreGiven the economic climate, it is encou…
Orange Tree, RichmondLot Vekemans' play about a separated couple forced to relive a traumatic past makes for uncomfortable but compelling viewingWatching this prize-winning play by the Dutch…
Old Vic, LondonKevin Spacey has lately enjoyed an excellent run of form at the Old Vic. It comes to an abrupt halt, however, with this ham-fisted American political thriller by Joe Sutton.Si…
Southwark Playhouse, LondonEnergetic Denise and stuck-in-his-ways Harry bond during a series of brief encounters in a community centre, in Stewart Pringle's prize-winning play Oldsters are b…
David Hare's trilogy was an incisive portrait of British society in 1993, but is it still relevant, asks Michael BillingtonIn 1993 David Hare's trilogy about contemporary Britain at the Nat…
With a gag for every occasion, the tattyfilarious comic clocks up 50,000 miles a year performing his epic standup shows. He talks about stage fright, playing Yorick for 'Sir Kenneth All-Bran…