318 stories from John Morrison
I was a student when I first saw Eileen Atkins on stage In 1970, at the Chichester Festival Theatre where she played Elizabeth I in Vivat Vivat Regina, a play by Robert Bolt. While missing m…
There are plays which are technically superb but never quite get into top gear, while others that are deeply flawed (John Osborne's are a good example) grab the audience by the guts and won'…
'You must feel such grief.' 'I take it to dull the pain.' 'We are artists. We must have a surfeit of everything!' 'Was it really seven years ago you placed your poems in Lizzie's coffin?' Ye…
In olden days a hint of stocking was looked upon as something shocking, but that didn't stop them using electric vibrators to bring women to orgasm -- strictly for medical reasons, of course…
After completing an inordinately long online RSC online survey about how much I enjoyed the live cinema broadcast of David Tennant's RIchard II, I barely have the energy to blog about it. Ok…
More than 40 years ago David Storey wrote a terrific series of plays, three of which I saw at the Royal Court and elsewhere when I was a student. Home, directed by Lindsay Anderson in 1970, …
'Old Ibsen is as dead as a doornail' wrote the Pall Mall Gazette after the first London performance in 1891 of Ghosts, a Scandinavian in-yer-face shocker. Well, Ibsen is still a household na…
Yes, I forsook the final round of the Great British Bake-Off for a night at the theatre. But who needs technicolour TV cheffing when you can see Jessica Raine and Linda Bassett cooking away …
Henry Goodman is one of our greatest stage actors, and his performance in Bertolt Brecht's satire on the rise Hitler is an unmissable masterclass. Arturo Ui starts the play as a washed-up Ch…
A trip to the Finborough, one of London's smallest and best fringe theatres not far from Earls Court, almost always pays off, and last night was no exception. Black Jesus is an 80-minute pol…
No, I wasn't in New York, just at the IMAX cinema at Waterloo to watch Saturday's live relay from the Metropolitan Opera, the first in the annual HD season. Technically, apart from one or tw…
At the risk of spoiling the plot, I can tell you that there is no ritual slaughter in this play. Gorge Mastromas is alive at the end. And though his name is spelt Gorge, it's pronounced Geor…
Orford in Suffolk is a magical place and I love taking pictures of the weird landscape, half natural and half man-made, particularly around Orford Ness. So naturally I was drawn to the Finbo…
No, this isn't the title of a play. This blog is getting a sudden deluge of spam 'comments' from alleged readers who are actually trying to sell bathrooms, garden furniture and other less de…
At the end of the day (sorry) there's only one question that has to be answered about a farce: is it funny? I'm afraid that the answer regarding this production at the Park Theatre is no. Be…
I'm not sure why or how I missed Alexi Kaye Campbell's The Pride when it was first on stage at the Royal Court in 2008 (though I did see Apologia at the Bush the following year). The origina…
Two really exciting shows in one week! First Jessica Swale's Blue Stockings at the Globe. And now Marlowe's Edward II at the National Theatre, which kept me on the edge of my seat for nearly…
Contemporary plays have mostly struggled to make an impact in the daunting arena of the Shakespeare's Globe, where the Bard's ghost lurks behind every oaken pillar. But this one is different…
I was drawn to see this show at the Tricycle in Kilburn for two reasons. The first was the name of Denton Chikura, one half of the Zimbabwean 'Two Gents' who staged The Two Gentlemen of Vero…
Like most reviewers, I loved Nick Payne's two-hander Constellations when it transferred to the West End from the Royal Court a few months ago. On the back of that deserved success, the Donma…
Here's a declaration of interest: these two Camden Fringe plays are written by members of Player-Playwrights, which I chair, and our group is supporting them a small amount of funding. But I…
There are some theatre directors who seem to have a better sense of time and space than others. James Macdonald is one of them. He uses the relativity of time and space to conjure exquisite …
Which British theatre director also has a PhD in anthropology and wrote a classic study of spirit mediums and guerrilla fighters in Zimbabwe? The answer is David Lan, for the last 13 years t…
Shakespeare's Globe is a wonderful open air venue for music -- not just the musical accompaniment to Shakespeare's plays which has always been part of the theatrical mix, but potentially for…
When he's good he's very very good. I mean Tennessee Williams, with his soaring dialogue, his larger-than-life characters, and that peculiar recreation of the Old South, a ship of fools fuel…
