1,418 stories from theatrecat.com
GRAND PLIE, FIRST POSITION, TURN…TWERK…    My friend and comrade-in-the stalls Mr Letts of the Mail has suggested ( by means of Twitter ,review on Friday, alway…
RAN IN MAIL (STAND-IN TEMPORARY CRITIC COULDN’T RESIST THIS.. SO HERE FOR THEATRECATTERS WHO MIGHT MISS IT.. THE LEAGUE OF GENTLEMEN LIVE Â Â Â Â Â Â SEC Glasg…
WAS STANDING IN AS DAILY MAIL CRITIC FOR A WEEK, SO DID NOT DO THESE ON THEATRECAT. HERE THEY ARE FOR T/CAT FOLLOWERS Â THOUGH, SLIGHTLY EXPANDED. COPENHAGENÂ Â Â Minerva, Chiches…
DARK LADY DEMANDING LIMELIGHT    The Globe has had some tremendous new-writing about history, for which it is nicely suited. Remember Howard Brenton's Anne Boleyn and…
WHAT LARKS… There is a swimming-pool ladder, a rubber-ring shaped like a swan, a robotic golf cart, some decorative flamingos (one used as a weapon) , and a statue of Queen E…
GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI MARVELS AT GREEK PERFECTION AT GRIMEBORN Like the roar of an older, bolder London, Mark-Anthony Turnage's GREEK bounces snarling onto the Grimeborn stage, cel…
LA PETITE PIAF, REVENANTE..   I grew up with Piaf, a temporary French schoolchild in 1960, skated around the patinoire with my friends snarling along with the endless plays of "J…
GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI FINDS THE BOYS GET ALL THE DRAMA AT GRIMEBORN Lucia di Lammermoor is an opera of shocking brutality, with savage emotional aggression rivalling physical viole…
DREAMS AND LEGENDS OF DECAY Brian Friel's gift is humane ambiguity, refusing to allow tidy judgements on his characters . Or even – though his theme is Ireland's history…
HIP HOP HURRAH ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE TRACKS Here's a hot one, in every sense. Clapped till my hands stuck together at this youthful, truthful, touching and funny tale of acroba…
GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI FINDS REVOLUTION NOT GOING FAR IN A WORLD PREMIERE AT GRIMEBORN Prometheus stole fire from the gods in order to ensure human progress, and met with a grisly e…
A HANDBAG?  You're not often given a surprise by Lane the butler in in his short appearance,  as he delivers those immortally celebrated cucumber sandwiches to the piano-st…
DANCE AND DEFIANCE BELOW THE WAVES    Metta theatre's hit JUNGLE BOOK was fashionably hip-hop before Hamilton hit (and was certainly the only time I ever heard gri…
GUEST CRITIC  and sharp-eyed millennial BEN BLACKMORE DOES THE STATE (well, theatrecat) SOME SERVICE…. Rating three   box office shakeapearesglobe.com  to 13 Oct I have ne…
RETROMANIA AS A ROAD TO RUIN In a lovely dolls-house set, Judy bustles about happily in a gay flouncy full skirt and pinny. She runs hubby's morning bath, makes his packed…
GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI VOTES FOR ETHEL SMYTH AT GRIMEBORN The celebrations of the centenary of Women's Suffrage in Britain have reached Dalston's cultural heartland as Spectra Ensem…
MADNESS, MENACE, MAJESTY        You need not be aged – or even a man – to be a memorable Lear. But there is an intense and concentrated emotion to …
A FERTILE DESPAIR This is two hours of  treasure. Barry Humphries of course always was one, in all his characters, and this time he puts on "the most subtle and intricate disguise"…
A CLASSIC OF POWER, PUZZLEMENT AND A DIFFICULT WOMAN     Sometimes less is more and understatement gives a show its sharpest edge. Which is not to suggest, perish t…
BEYOND THE JOKES, A WHIFF OF SULPHUR…     Danny Robins' funny, credible, sharp-tongued play pivots round four figures of central cultural importance to modern Bri…
RATHER LATE BUT WORTH IT….A FERTILE ARGUMENTÂ Forty years ago as a Today reporter I helped cover the first IVF baby , Louise Brown. A Scottish cardinal told me that it was si…
DRIPS 'N DRUGS 'N ROCK 'N ROLL… Â Â Alan Bennett may fear he is a national teddy bear these days, but the crafty old bugger still has a gnarled finger on the nation's trick…
A TREE, A TEENAGER, A FAMILY TRAGEDY This is billed for ten years old or more, and its protagonist is a boy of thirteen. But warned: this  Old Vic young adult su…
MARIA MARTEN STRIDES AGAIN: A WOMAN'S STORY   Founding this touring company 36 years ago, Ivan Cutting swore a great oath that one local story they wouldn't do …
FLUENT, FASCINATING,  FUN. FIVE!  This show has no right to be so much fun.  Over three hours, two intervals, three middle-aged blokes in black suits in a revol…
