tue 02/09/2025

Theatre Reviews

Edinburgh Fringe 2025 reviews: Lost Lear / Consumed

David Kettle

Lost Lear, Traverse Theatre

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Make It Happen, Edinburgh International Festival 2025 review - tutting at naughtiness

David Kettle

You could distinctly hear the murmurs of recognition from the Edinburgh audience – responding to knowing mentions of the city’s Leith and Morningside areas, the building of Royal Bank of Scotland’s immense Gogarburn HQ, the institution’s towering greed and ambition – during James Graham’s epic new history of RBS, its single-minded CEO Fred Goodwin and the 2008 financial crisis that was unveiled at the Edinburgh International Festival.

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Edinburgh Fringe 2025 reviews: I'm Ready To Talk Now / RIFT

David Kettle

I’m Ready to Talk Now, Traverse Theatre

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Top Hat, Chichester Festival Theatre review - top spectacle but book tails off

Gary Naylor

After 76 years, you’d have thought they could’ve come up with a better story! Okay, that’s a cheap jibe and, given the elusive nature of really strong books in stage musicals, not quite as straightforward as meets the eye.

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Edinburgh Fringe 2025 reviews: Alright Sunshine / K Mak at the Planetarium / PAINKILLERS

David Kettle

Alright Sunshine, Pleasance Dome

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The Daughter of Time, Charing Cross Theatre review - unfocused version of novel that cleared Richard III

Helen Hawkins

Following confirmation that he was the owner of the bones found in a Leicester car park in 2012, Richard III has never been a hotter, or cooler, subject. So his fans will welcome a new play, based on an old book, about the misrepresentation of his character. The uninitiated, possibly not so much.

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Evita, London Palladium review - even more thrilling the second time round

Matt Wolf

Would Jamie Lloyd's mind-bending revival of Evita win through twice in four weeks, I wondered to myself, paraphrasing a Tim Rice lyric from his 1978 collaboration with Andrew Lloyd Webber?

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Maiden Voyage, Southwark Playhouse review - new musical runs aground

Gary Naylor

As the nation basks in the reflected glory of The Lionesses' Euro25 victory, it could hardly be more timely for the Southwark Playhouse to launch a new musical that tells the tale of The Maiden. That was the boat, built and sailed by Tracy Edwards and her crew of resourceful, resilient women, in the Whitbread Round The World Yacht Race 1989, the first such crew to finish the gruelling challenge.

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The Winter's Tale, RSC, Stratford review - problem play proves problematic

Gary Naylor

There’s a deal to be made when taking your seat for The Winter’s Tale. It’s one the title alone would have signalled to the groundlings as much as those invited to rattle their jewellery upstairs back in the 17th century – it’s a fairytale, a fantasy, a funny-peculiar play. Perhaps the only play outside pantomime in which a bear gets involved. 

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Brixton Calling, Southwark Playhouse review - life-affirming entertainment, both then and now

Gary Naylor

What a delight it is to see the director, the star, even the marketing manager these days FFS, get out of the way and let a really strong story stand on its own two feet. Like a late one at the Brixton Academy itself, this is a helluva night out.

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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.


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