Theatre
British empire? What British empire?
Here’s a tip for play-goers. When the curtain goes up on a garden, prepare for some feeble plotting. The glory…
Toffs rule!
This is a strange one. Simon Paisley Day’s new play feels like a conventional comedy of manners. Three couples pitch…
David Tennant plays Richard II like a casual hippie
Gregory Doran, now in command at Stratford in succession to Sir Michael Boyd, launches his regime with Richard II, intending…
The Light Princess badly needs a mission
There are many pleasures in The Light Princess, a new musical by Tori Amos. George MacDonald’s fairy story introduces us…
Did gay Conservatives have it easier in the past? Tory Boyz makes me think they did
Bang! The race is on. James Graham is the celebrated author of This House, a superb examination of Labour’s administrative…
An audience with the Queen and Mrs Thatcher
A feast of pleasures, and some annoyances, at the Trike. Handbagged, by Moira Buffini, is a fictional account of the…
The peril with Brecht is that he will always be Brecht
Brecht in the West End? Quite a rarity. Jonathan Church’s zippy and stylish version of The Resistible Rise of Arturo…
Barking in Essex: a hit with hen-night hysterics
How appropriate. Barking in Essex, a farce about gangsters, has been dishonestly billed as ‘a new comedy’. The script was…
Hysteria is a pile-up of unmotivated absurdities
Terry Johnson’s acclaimed farce Hysteria opens in Sigmund Freud’s Hampstead home in 1938. The godfather of psychobabble is ambushed by…
Mark Ravenhill’s take on Voltaire’s Candide
Ah yes, Candide, the adventures of an innocent abroad in ‘the best of all possible worlds’, as philosophers of the…
Theatre review: Fleabag's scandalous success
Suddenly they’re all at it. Actors, that is, writing plays. David Haig, Rory Kinnear and Simon Paisley Day are all…
Blue Stockings defames women in order to defame men; Thark succeeds thanks to a trio of great perfomances
More un-Shakespearean drama at London’s leading Shakespeare venue. The Globe has pushed the Bard off stage to make way for…
Henry Goodman interview: How to make Brecht fun
Lloyd Evans talks to Henry Goodman about his role in the playwright’s political allegory
Chimerica is a triumph
Chimerica. The weird title of Lucy Kirkwood’s hit play conjoins the names of the eastern and western superpowers and promises…
Crash-for-cash scam at the Donmar
High summer and it’s blockbuster time. The Donmar’s latest show is by the acclaimed Nick Payne, whose play about string…
The best satire at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe
Lloyd Evans finds politics everywhere: not only in the architecture but at the Fringe too
A mega-musical that’s like watching the Downton cast crammed into a telephone kiosk
Hats off for theatrical recklessness. The producer Danielle Tarento has taken a $10-million Broadway mega-musical and staged it in the…
Thwarted love between geriatrics
This is brilliant. The new play by Oliver Cotton, a 69-year-old actor, is set in New York in 1986. An…
The National Theatre of Scotland has done more to demean Scotland’s cultural reputation than anything I can think of
West End producers are itching to get their hands on the new show at the Bush. Mama Mia’s director, Phyllida…
A cast of celebs fails to bring any oomph to The Ladykillers
The Ladykillers is back. Sean Foley’s adaptation of the classic Ealing comedy introduces us to a crew of villains who…
Private Lives at the Gielgud: Spot the sexual tension between Anna Chancellor and Toby Stephens
It’s always a problem with Macbeth: what accents to use? The Globe is applying the traditional remedy. Lord and Lady…
Theatre: Responsible Other: an assured effort from newcomer Melanie Spencer; The Moment of Truth: Peter Ustinov fails to impress as a playwright
Dominic Cooke did it at the Royal Court. Now Ed Hall is having crack as well. Cooke’s crazy decision to…
