Theatre Reviews

Through a Glass Darkly, Almeida Theatre

Matt Wolf Thursday, 17 June 2010

Perhaps it's because the Almeida had a major hit with Festen (well, everywhere but Broadway) that the Scandinavian back catalogue of movies seems every bit as ripe for plunder as is mainstream Hollywood when it comes to feeding musicals on Broadway and the West End.

Comment

Like a Fishbone, Bush Theatre

aleks Sierz Monday, 14 June 2010

Sarah Smart (Mother) and Deborah Findlay (Architect): who is best authorised to represent a grieving community?

One of the many absent friends in contemporary British drama is the play that tackles questions of religious belief. At a time when more and more people take their faith more and more seriously, this lacuna at the heart — or should that be soul? — of new work is surely regrettable. But perhaps the tide is now turning: in May, Drew Pautz’s Love the Sinner at the National examined belief and sexuality; now Australian playwright Anthony Weigh, whose new play opened last night, wrestles...

The Fantasticks, Duchess Theatre

Matt Wolf Thursday, 10 June 2010

Just when you thought it was safe to go back to the musical theatre (Paradise Found, anyone?), along comes The Fantasticks, and we are returned to square one.

After the Dance, National Theatre

David Nice Wednesday, 09 June 2010

A pall of ennui hangs over the 1930s drawing room of the National’s latest Rattigan revival, as deadly as the boredom its burnt-out party people all dread.

The Crucible, Regent's Park Open Air Theatre

alexandra Coghlan Friday, 04 June 2010

Usually a seasonal home for the pastel-coloured delights of drawing-room farce, musical comedy and the odd Shakespeare pastoral, Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre is this year offering a programme of rather darker hue.

Comment

The Late Middle Classes, Donmar Warehouse

aleks Sierz Wednesday, 02 June 2010

Helen McCrory and Laurence Belcher: upper-middle-class characters and their difficulties with communication

The late Simon Gray, who died in 2008, lived a ragged, bruised and battering life. I usually think of him as the John Prescott of playwrights, except that he was miles more articulate, and eventually rewarded by a CBE rather than a peerage. Anyway, he was pugnacious and out of step with playwriting trends. In an age of lefty state-of-the-nation dramas, Gray explored the emotions of upper-middle-class characters and their difficulties with communication. Although he could be irascible, and his...

All My Sons, Apollo Theatre

Ismene Brown Thursday, 27 May 2010

A young Arthur Miller wrote this highly moralistic, redemption-seeking play soon after the Second World War, a parable about an older generation’s dubious pragmatic principles versus the bewildered idealism of their children who were Miller’s generation, the soldiers’ generation.

Paradise Found, Menier Chocolate Factory

Matt Wolf Thursday, 27 May 2010

There's bizarre, and then there's Paradise Found, a new musical that falls so short of the not always clearly defined mark that audiences may likely be mulling over what went wrong for years. What do the two acts have to do with one another? What in heaven's name is the point? How much weight in water is leading man Mandy Patinkin losing per performance?

Ingredient X, Royal Court Theatre

aleks Sierz Wednesday, 26 May 2010

Nick Grosso is a good example of the “now you see him, now you don’t” playwright. In the mid-1990s, he was feted as a lads’ writer for his funny plays about masculinity, such as Peaches, Sweetheart and Real Classy Affair. Then he dropped out of view. He resurfaced briefly in 2002 with the deliciously surrealistic Kosher Harry. Then nothing. Until now.

Henry VIII, Shakespeare's Globe

Matt Wolf Wednesday, 26 May 2010

A history play with heft: Dominic Rowan as Henry VIII

After Wolf Hall and The Tudors, Shakespeare's Globe is arriving rather late at this particular historical party, especially given that the Bankside venue brings with it a closer connection to the period than most. Can this theatre animate a rarely performed Shakespeare play - well, make that Shakespeare and John Fletcher, in accordance with...

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Direct from a sold-out season at Kiln Theatre the five star, hit play, The Son, is now playing at the Duke of York’s Theatre for a strictly limited season.

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Written by the internationally acclaimed Florian Zeller (The Father, The Mother), lauded by The Guardian as ‘the most exciting playwright of our time’, The Son is directed by the award-winning Michael Longhurst.

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