Theatre Reviews
The Band Back Together, Arcola Theatre review - three is a dangerous numberSunday, 15 September 2024
We meet Joe first at the keys, singing a pretty good song, but we can hear the pain in the voice - but is that the person or the performance? When Ellie walks in, he leaps up like a cat on a hot tin roof, nervous as a kitten, and we know - it was the person. Read more... |
The Real Ones, Bush Theatre review - engrossing, enjoyable and quietly inspiringSaturday, 14 September 2024
Platonic love should be simple – basically you’re best mates. And without the complications of sex, what could go wrong? Waleed Akhtar, whose big hit The P Word was also performed here at the Bush, takes this idea and complicates it – by making it about a gay boy and a straight girl. Read more... |
Our Country's Good, Lyric Hammersmith review - lively but patchy revivalFriday, 13 September 2024
The latest Greatest Hit to land at the Lyric is Timberlake Wertenbaker’s 1988 award-winning play about a performance of Farquhar’s The Recruiting Officer by British convicts in a New South Wales penal colony. Read more... |
Why Am I So Single?, Garrick Theatre review - superb songs in Zeitgeist surfing showFriday, 13 September 2024
Going to the theatre can be a little like going to church. One communes on the individual level, one’s faith in the stories underpinned by a psychological connection, but also on the collective level, belief rising on a tide of shared emotions. Those complementary sensations, in an ever more individualised, screen-and-earplugs world, are rare – and an example of why people pay big bucks for Glastonbury, Taylor Swift and Oasis. Read more... |
The Silver Cord, Finborough Theatre review - Sophie Ward is compellingly repellentSaturday, 07 September 2024
One of the Finborough Theatre’s Artistic Director, Neil McPherson’s, gifts is an uncanny ability to find long-forgotten plays that work, right here, right now. He’s struck gold again with The Silver Cord, presenting its first London production for over 95 years. Read more... |
Art, Theatre Royal Bath review - Yasmina Reza's smash hit back on tour 30 years after Paris premiereFriday, 06 September 2024
For men, navigating through life whilst maintaining strong friendships is not easy (I’m sure the same can be said for women, but Yasmina Reza’s multi-award winning play, revived on its 30th anniversary, is most definitely about men). What brings blokes together – work, sports, pubs – is seldom founded on deep emotional connections, though it can be and sometimes does morph into that. Read more... |
The Real Thing, Old Vic review - Stoppard classic keeps on givingWednesday, 04 September 2024
When it was first produced in 1982, The Real Thing was a turning point for Tom Stoppard, the play that added to the existing perception of him as an immensely witty, intelligent, very theatrical crafter of dazzling conceits, albeit perhaps a little cold, as someone who could also touch people’s emotions: clever, still, but cutting to the heart. Read more... |
G, Royal Court review - everyday realism blitzed by urban mythMonday, 02 September 2024
I live in Brixton, south London; in my street, for many years, a pair of trainers were up in the sky, hanging over the telephone wires. They were there for years, getting more and more soggy, more and more decayed. Urban myth called them a tribute to a dead gangster. Read more... |
A Night with Janis Joplin: The Musical, Peacock Theatre review - belting Blues singing in an oddly sanitised formatThursday, 29 August 2024
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 an evening for them, more a concert than a piece of musical theatre. Read more... |
Edinburgh Fringe 2024 reviews: L'Addition / Long Distance / The Sun, the Mountain and MeSaturday, 24 August 2024
L’Addition, Summerhall ★★★★ Read more... |
Pages
Advertising feature
★★★★★
‘A compulsive, involving, emotionally stirring evening – theatre’s answer to a page-turner.’
The Observer, Kate Kellaway
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.
★★★★★
‘This final part of Florian Zeller’s trilogy is the most powerful of all.’
The Times, Ann Treneman
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.
Book by 30 September and get tickets from £15*
with no booking fee.
latest in today
The Band Back Together, Arcola Theatre review - three is a d...
We meet Joe first at the keys, singing a pretty good song, but we can hear the pain in the voice - but is that the person or the...
Music Reissues Weekly: Sean Buckley & The Breadcrumbs
Although Dagenham’s Sean Buckley & The Breadcrumbs are less than a footnote in the story of beat boom-era Britain, appearances on archive...
The Critic review - beware the acid-tipped pen
The setting is the lively 1930s London theatre world, but any sense that The Critic will be a lighthearted thriller should soon be...
Van Gogh: Poets & Lovers, National Gallery review - pass...
Van Gogh: Poets & Lovers includes many of his best known pictures and, amazingly, it is the first exhibition the...
Kim's Convenience, Riverside Studios review - KC and th...
One wonders what sitcom writers will do when supermarkets finally sweep the last corner shops away with nobody left old enough to buy...
The Real Ones, Bush Theatre review - engrossing, enjoyable a...
Platonic love should be simple – basically you’re best mates. And without the complications of sex, what could go wrong? Waleed...
Prom 71, Seong-Jin Cho review - refined Romantic journeys
Out of emergencies may come revelations. Sir András Schiff has broken his leg, and we wish him a super-speedy recovery. At the Proms, his promised...
Frang, LSO, Pappano, Barbican review - a concerto performanc...
Hauntings, memories, echoes: Antonio Pappano has started his official tenure as chief conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra by looking back...
The Perfect Couple, Netflix review - an inconvenient death r...
Based on the novel by Elin Hilderbrand, The Perfect...