Judaism
The Merchant of Venice, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse review - enormous empathyThursday, 10 March 2022![]() The Merchant of Venice is a comedy, you say? Shakespeare, as ever, refuses to be confined to convenient boxes, his best plays’ extraordinary pliability and longevity a testament to the piercing eye he cast towards the slings and arrows that assail... Read more... |
Antony Sher: 'I discovered I could be other people'Monday, 06 December 2021![]() The energy of Antony Sher, who has died at the age of 72, was prodigious. He not only acted like a fizzing firecracker. He wrote books about his most celebrated roles, and several novels set in his native South Africa. He also wrote plays, and he... Read more... |
'The din is loud these days': playwright Cordelia Lynn on her imminent premiere at the Donmar WarehouseMonday, 11 October 2021![]() As I write this, we've just had our final day in the rehearsal room and are going into tech onstage next week with my new play, which is also reopening the Donmar not only to live performance but follows major renovations at their home address.It’s... Read more... |
Rose, Hope Mill Theatre online review - a performer at her peakThursday, 10 September 2020![]() Solo plays and performances are, of necessity, the theatrical currency of the moment, whether across an entire season at the Bridge Theatre or last week at the Old Vic in the too briefly glimpsed Three Kings, starring a rarely-better Andrew Scott.... Read more... |
The Merchant of Venice, BBC iPlayer review – a parable on the limits of toleranceFriday, 31 July 2020![]() Ah, 2015. Those halcyon days of packed theatres. Thank God the RSC had the presence of mind to film Polly Findlay’s production of The Merchant of Venice, now streaming on BBC iPlayer. Condensed into just over two hours, it’s a thoughtful take on... Read more... |
The Prince of Egypt, Dominion Theatre review - Moses musical goes big and broadWednesday, 26 February 2020![]() The theatre gods rained down not fire and pestilence, but a 45-minute technical delay on opening night of this substantially revised musical – a stage adaptation of the 1998 DreamWorks animated movie. But nothing could entirely halt this juggernaut... Read more... |
'You’re Jewish. With a name like Neumann, you have to be'Monday, 24 February 2020![]() It was during my first week at Tufts University in America, when I was 17, that I was told by a stranger that I was Jewish. As I left one of the orientation talks, I was approached by a slight young man with short brown hair and intense eyes. He... Read more... |
Mother of Him, Park Theatre review – lean domestic drama unsure where it standsWednesday, 25 September 2019![]() Mother of Him was written a decade ago, but its most prescient moment happens in the first five minutes of Max Lindsay's production at the Park Theatre. Brenda Kapowitz (Tracy-Ann Oberman) presents a sheaf of papers to Robert (Simon Hepworth, ... Read more... |
Old Stock: A Refugee Love Story, Wilton's Music Hall review - klezmer revue is moving and inventiveFriday, 20 September 2019![]() Canadian playwright Hannah Moscovitch’s “refugee musical” – now there’s a phrase you don’t expect to write – is a treat. Harking back to the early 20th century pogroms of Eastern Europe, it’s darkly steeped in history, conveying the sorrows of... Read more... |
Falsettos, The Other Palace review - affecting search for the new normalFriday, 06 September 2019![]() William Finn and James Lapine’s musical – which combines two linked one-acts, March of the Falsettos and Falsettoland, set in late 1970s/early 1980s New York – picked up Tony Awards in 1992 for its book and score, and was nominated again in... Read more... |
Magda Szabó: Katalin Street review - love after lifeSunday, 13 January 2019![]() This is a love story and a ghost story. The year is 1934 and the Held family have moved from the countryside to an elegant house on Katalin Street in Budapest. Their new neighbours are the Major (with whom Mr Held fought in the Great War) and his... Read more... |
Fiddler on the Roof, Menier Chocolate Factory review - family matters in this sensitive musical revivalThursday, 06 December 2018![]() There’s a welcome alternative to panto hijinks in this gem of a Trevor Nunn musical revival – more attuned to the biting hardships of winter, and to the elegiac aspect of change, than to festive jollies. Which is not to say that there isn’t rousing... Read more... |
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