thu 14/11/2024

physical theatre

L’Addition, BAC review - top billing for physical comedy duo

Can experimental theatre survive the decades? This year marks the 40th anniversary of the Forced Entertainment theatre company, whose mission is summarised (by themselves) as “tearing up the rulebook”.It is also the 50th anniversary of this venue,...

Read more...

Metamorphosis, Lyric Hammersmith review - vivid images, but where's the drama?

Franz Kafka’s Metamorphosis is a novella whose cultural resonance has echoed loudly down the years. As a modernist metaphor for alienation in our times it has frequently been adapted for the stage. There have been classic, and popular, adaptations...

Read more...

Kin, National Theatre review - heartfelt show makes its demands, but yields its rewards

Waiting in the National Theatre’s foyer on press night, a space teeming with people speaking different languages, boasting different heritages – London in other words – news came through that leading members of the government had resigned because...

Read more...

A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings, Brighton Festival 2023 review - Gabriel Garcia Marquez in a creative retelling

Brighton Festival has a knack for choosing children’s theatre that is in equal measure as magical and captivating as it is simple and easy to understand. It’s an equation that means both adults and children alike can be sure to have an experience...

Read more...

The Wedding, Gecko Theatre, Barbican review - eccentric, ebullient exploration of our contract with society

You never forget your first Gecko production. I experienced mine almost 20 years ago at the Battersea Arts Centre, when the company performed Tailors’ Dummies, its ingenious surreal show about obsession. This had all the hallmarks that would make...

Read more...

Project Dictator, New Diorama Theatre review - anarchic satire

When Rhum + Clay conceived this show, the idea of a comic becoming a political leader might have prompted thoughts of Boris Johnson's carefully cultivated buffoonery on "Have I Got News For You" and elsewhere. Since then, a certain Volodymyr...

Read more...

Wuthering Heights, National Theatre review - too much heat, not enough light

“If you want romance,” the cast of Emma Rice’s new version of Wuthering Heights say in unison just after the interval, “go to Cornwall.” They’re using the modern definition of romance, of course – Emily Brontë’s novel is full of the original meaning...

Read more...

The Ocean at the End of the Lane, Duke of York's Theatre review - pure theatrical magic

This show has been a long time coming. Neil Gaiman had the first inklings of The Ocean at the End of the Lane when he was seven years old and living near a farm recorded in the Domesday Book. Several decades later, he wrote a short story for his...

Read more...

The Flying Lovers of Vitebsk, Bristol Old Vic/Kneehigh/Wise Children online review – ravishing vision of Chagall's early life

One of Marc Chagall’s last commissions was for a stained-glass window in Chichester Cathedral, which channelled his characteristically exuberant spirituality into a response to the verse from Psalm 150, “Let everything that has breath praise the...

Read more...

Institute, BBC Four review – masculinity and memory in a nightmarish world of work

Missing the office? Or dreading the day you have to return? What’s your relationship to the people you work with and for, and how does it intersect with your personal life? Do your paymasters know you? Do they care about you? Are there days when the...

Read more...

Peter Pan Goes Wrong, Alexandra Palace Theatre review - JM Barrie's classic as you have never seen it before

Mischief Theatre is a wonder of modern commercial theatre. In 2008, a group of young actors who had met at drama school started the ensemble – writing, producing, directing and performing their own work. They had their big breakthrough with The Play...

Read more...

Edinburgh Fringe 2019 review: Birth

Physical theatre company Theatre Re are virtually Fringe royalty these days, with a several-year history of fine shows under their belts, plus success internationally and at the London Mime Festival. And judging by their assured and richly resonant...

Read more...
Subscribe to physical theatre