3,543 stories from The Arts Desk
Waleed Akhtar's new play is about platonic love in a contemporary context
Platonic love should be simple " basically you're best mates. And without the complications of sex, what could go w…
Timberlake Wertenbaker's updated version takes particular aim at colonialism
The latest Greatest Hit to land at the Lyric is Timberlake Wertenbaker's 1988 award-winning play about a performa…
★★★ WHY AM I SO SINGLE?, GARRICK THEATRE Six's writers lay bare their souls in new musical
Marlow and Moss are back with deeply personal exploration of how lives are liv…
★★★★ THE SILVER CORD, FINBOROUGH THEATRE Narcissism up-close and disturbingly relevantÂ
Beautifully staged and acted revival of Sidney Howard's century-old blac…
★★★★ ART, THEATRE ROYAL BATH Three men fall out over a painting in a very French comedy
Male friendships buckle as egos clash, with a resonance for today's culture…
James McArdle is immense as Stoppard's true romantic
When it was first produced in 1982, The Real Thing was a turning point for Tom Stoppard, the play that added to the existing perc…
Award-winning new writing is full of mystery and metaphor, but a bit too literary
I live in Brixton, south London; in my street, for many years, a pair of trainers were up in the sky, hangin…
A wealth of musical talent keeps this gig musical afloat
The signs in the Peacock's foyer warn that this show features "very loud music". Exactly what Janis Joplin fans want to hear. This is…
From meta-theatrical mayhem to dreams of freedom and escape in three shows from the Fringe's closing days
L'Addition, Summerhall ★★★★Â
★★★★ SHIFTERS, THE DUKE OF YORK'S THEATRE Winning and witty 21st century love story
Only the third West End written play by a black woman will not be the last
Pete…
Jewish gangsters and ice-cold adolescents in two strong shows at Summerhall
REVENGE: After the Levoyah, Summerhall ★★★★★Â
Patrick Barlow's brand of silly still delivers a sly Hitchcock spoof
Before the Plays That Went Wrong and the multi-role six-hander Operation Mincemeat, there was Patrick Barlow's adaptat…
Two solo shows merge poetry, rap, spoken word and theatre to compelling effect
Ã’ran, Pleasance Courtyard ★★★★Â
★★ THE FABULIST, CHARING CROSS THEATRE Plenty of ambition, but achieves very little
Beautiful music, but curious decisions in scripting and staging sink the show
On opening ni…
Boys playing girls playing boys in two joyful queer shows at the Pleasance Dome
Ni Mi Madre, Pleasance Dome ★★★★Â
A troubling take on the climate emergency and a pile of suitcases containing tall tales in two intimate shows at Summerhall
Bellringers, Roundabout @ Summerhall ★★★★�…
The Globe stretches the theatrical experience with this bilingual BSL production
More surely than any other London stage, the Globe has opened up our theatrical perspective on different lang…
★★★★ THE BIRTHDAY PARTY, USTINOV STUDIO, THEATRE ROYAL BATH Landmark play revived to shock and surprise all over again
Jane Horrocks garners the laughs in a very d…
Debut two-hander explores a gentle love story of two practicing Muslims
At one point, in John Fowles's 1977 novel The Magus, the guru character in the story compares sexuality before and af…
Roy Williams and Clint Dyer's protagonists rage against the limits of their lives
Two boys in east London, one Black, one white, grow up together, play pranks at school, then decades later h…
One-man play about a sporting great, and a hot topic served cold
Adam Riches: Jimmy Summerhall ★★★
Unexpected twists in relationships mark out two dramas at the Traverse Theatre
The Sound Inside, Traverse Theatre ★★★★★
Mental health and food form the themes behind two strong dramas at the Traverse Theatre
In Two Minds, Traverse Theatre ★★★★Â
The National's finely acted staging of Steinbeck's grim classic is a tough watch
It's a brave company that embarks on a staging of John Steinbeck's award-winning 1939 novel The Grapes of Wra…
French "hybrid memoir" comes blazingly alive onstage in London
The title sounds as if we ought to be in for an evening of Virginia Woolf, and, indeed, one of the astonishing women on view (…