National Theatre
Extraordinary power and simplicity: Lehman Trilogy reviewed
Stefano Massini’s play opens with a man in a frock-coat reaching New York after six weeks at sea. The year…
This adaptation of Miss Julie is a textbook lesson in how to kill a classic
Polly Stenham starts her overhaul of Strindberg’s Miss Julie with the title. She gives the ‘Miss’ a miss and calls…
Why has the National given over its largest stage to one of the nation’s smallest talents?
The National has made its largest stage available to one of the nation’s smallest talents. If Brian Friel had been…
A dated and remote two-hour polemic basking in #MeToo topicality: The Writer reviewed
Ella Hickson’s last play at the Almeida was a sketch show about oil. Her new effort uses the same episodic…
A glorious theatrical feast at the National: Foodwork reviewed
There is a restaurant on the stage at the National Theatre in London. It is called Foodwork, and it is…
An overrated news satire directed by an inexplicably popular director: Network reviewed
The inexplicable popularity of Ivo Van Hove continues. The director’s latest visit to the fairies involves an updated version of…
Does disability make a difference to art – or does art transcend disability?
The moment you invite friends to some new ‘cutting-edge’ disability theatre or film, most swallow paroxysms of social anxiety. What…
Family planning
Beginning starts at the end. A Crouch End party has just finished and the sitting room is a waste tip…
Animal or vegetable?
Against by Christopher Shinn sets out to unlock the secrets of America’s spiritual malaise. Two main settings represent the wealthy…
Starting block
Conor McPherson’s new play is set in dust-bowl Minnesota in 1934. We’re in a fly-blown boarding house owned by skint,…
The good Palestinian
Shubbak, meaning ‘window’ in Arabic, is a biennial festival taking place in various venues across London. The brochure reads like…
All the world’s a stage
James Woodall talks to the Belgian director Ivo van Hove, who has brought a swathe of Shakespeare’s history plays to the stage in Dutch (four hours of it)
Deluded continent
Les Blancs had a troubled birth. In 1965 several unfinished drafts of the play were entrusted by its dying author,…
Tragedy trumped by porn
Big fuss about Cleansed at the Dorfman. Talk of nauseous punters rushing for the gangways may have perversely delighted the…
Alice in cyberspace
Damon Albarn and Rufus Norris present a musical version of Alice in Wonderland. A challenging enterprise even if they’d stuck…
Tricycle’s Ben Hur is magnificent in its superficiality – a masterpiece of nothing
It’s the target that makes the satire as well as the satirist. Is the subject powerful, active, relevant and menacing?…
Why is there no one at the National Theatre preventing these duds getting staged?
Wallace Shawn is a lovely old sausage. A stalwart of American theatre, he’s taken cameo roles in classic movies like…
All white on the night
Trevor Nunn is staging Shakespeare’s Wars of the Roses without a single black actor. So what, says Robert Gore-Langton
Walking with cadence
I often regret that I’m writing in the past tense here, but never more than about milonga. It is such…
His dark materials
Will Gore talks to the playwright who has brought Jimmy Savile’s crimes to the stage
Pinter without the bus routes
David Mamet is Pinter without the Pinteresque indulgences, the absurdities and obscurities, the pauses, the Number 38 bus routes. American…
Losing the plot
Enter Rufus Norris. The new National Theatre boss is perfectly on-message with this debut effort by Caryl Churchill. Her 1976…
Ayckbourn again
Experts are concerned that Alan Ayckbourn’s plays may soon face extinction. Fewer than 80 of these precious beasts still exist…
All in the mind
Big event. A new play from Sir Tom. And he tackles one of philosophy’s oldest and crunchiest issues, which varsity…
Filling in the blanks
‘So — take heart,’ said Alan Bennett, sending us out from his play, Cocktail Sticks, on a cheery note. The…
