Small boats are Rishi’s big problem
Small boats are becoming a big problem for Rishi. Four Tory backbenchers raised the issue at PMQs. Andrew Selous asked…
Megaphonic honks
Simon Stone claims that his new comedy, Phaedra, draws on the work of Euripides, Seneca and Racine. In fact, the…
Chatterbox crackdown
A romcom with an irritating title, Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons, has opened at the HP Theatre starring Jenna Coleman…
What a drag
Sound of the Underground is a drag show involving a handful of cross-dressers who spend the opening 15 minutes telling…
Pure, heavenly escapism
The Unfriend is a smart new family comedy which opens on the sunlit deck of a cruise ship. Peter and…
PMQs gets worse every week
Gruesome rhetoric at PMQs. The horror began with Sir Keir Starmer revealing that he can tell the time. ‘It’s three…
Close to perfection
Watch on the Rhine is the curiously misleading title chosen by Lillian Hellman for a wartime family drama that became…
Polar exploration
The National’s new comedy by April De Angelis is a clever and amusing attempt to deliver that most elusive artefact,…
Harry’s interview is an explosive, flame-throwing spectacle
Bombs away! Prince Harry’s mission to dump ordnance on his nearest and dearest continued last night in a riveting interview…
Pre-Raphaelite Tintin
Orlando opens with a pack of Virginia Woolfs on stage. All wear the same costume of horn-rimmed spectacles, long tweed…
Pitched battle
The Wagatha Christie affair began in 2019 when Coleen Rooney accused Rebekah Vardy of selling stories from her private Instagram…
Manhattan transfer
Crude eccentricities damage the potential brilliance of Othello at the National. Some of the visual gestures seem to have been…
Christmas cracker
Elf opens with an unbelievable premise. Buddy was abandoned as a baby and adopted by Santa’s elves and he spent…
Undramatic melodrama
A heroic Asian woman parachutes into occupied France to work for the resistance and help overthrow the Nazis. This sounds…
Mad about the girl
Viewers watching a good romcom need to fall in love with three things. The boy, the girl and the affair…
Insane profligacy
The UK Drill Project is a cabaret show that celebrates greed, criminality and drug-taking among black males in London. It…
Matt Hancock: Star of the ‘I’m a Celeb’ jungle
Has Matt Hancock gone mad? Maybe not. His appearance in ‘I’m A Celebrity – Get Me Out of Here’ is…
Who will be next week’s ministerial exit?
For the past fortnight, it was Suella Braverman. Now it’s Sir Gavin Williamson. The media aims to destroy two careers…
The National Theatre deserves to have its budget cut
The arts cuts have arrived. The biggest loser is English National Opera whose annual award of £12.6 million will be…
Bad education
King Hamlin is a shock-horror drama about gang crime in London. Hamlin, aged 17, has left school without learning any…
PMQs: Starmer’s astonishing Nigel Farage imitation
The small boats have landed. PMQs was dominated by the migration issue and the flotillas of dinghies struggling across the…
Clown or vicar – who cares?
London has a brand-new theatre – yet again. Last summer, a cabaret venue opened in the Haymarket for the first…
How long before Rishi fatigue sets in?
The Prime Minister has an Asian background. You wouldn’t know that if you listened to the Tories at PMQs because…
Three roled into one
Good, starring David Tennant, needs more dosh spent on it. The former Doctor Who plays John, a literary academic living…
The gripping spectacle of Truss’s fight for survival
A week of sheer hell for the Tory leader. Plots and rumours have swirled around Westminster. Rebels are said to…
