Theatre
Cost of Living at Hampstead Theatre isn’t a bad show – and it contains a star in the making
Hampstead has become quite a hit-factory since Ed Hall took over. His foreign policy is admirably simple. He scours New…
A winning hoax: When We Have Sufficiently Tortured Each Other reviewed
The NT’s new play is an update of Pamela, a sexploitation novel by Samuel Richardson. It opens with Stephen Dillane…
A facile indulgence: Pinter Six reviewed
The cast of Party Time includes John Simm, Celia Imrie, Ron Cook, Gary Kemp and other celebrities. They play a…
What a relief we can finally admit Jimmy Porter was a pain in the neck
Gary Raymond must have been wondering if it was the end of a promising career — curtains. He was starring…
One masterpiece, one dud and one interesting rediscovery: Pinter Five reviewed
One masterpiece, one dud, and one interesting rediscovery. That’s Pinter Five. Victoria Station is a hilarious sketch which might have…
A masterpiece of pro-Trump propaganda: Sweat at the Donmar Warehouse reviewed
Sweat, set in the Pennsylvanian rust belt, looks at a blue-collar community threatened by a factory closure. The script uses…
‘Brexit unleased something monstrous’: James Graham interviewed
‘I try to interpret the most generous version of somebody’s actions,’ says the dramatist James Graham. This rare ability to…
Dick Clement on Porridge, Kirk Douglas and having seven projects on the go
Given their track record, you might think that Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais would be spared the struggles that…
A horror show that appeals to the intellect but not the gut: The Tell-Tale Heart reviewed
The Tell-Tale Heart is based on a teeny-weeny short story by Edgar Allan Poe. The full text appears in the…
Gary Kemp on pop, Pre-Raphaelites, politics and playing Pinter
The first thing Gary Kemp bought when Spandau Ballet started making money was a chair. He’s very proud of that…
I couldn’t wait to escape this opaque, witless horror show: True West reviewed
Sam Shepard was perhaps the gloomiest playwright ever to spill his guts into a typewriter. The popularity of his work…
David Schwimmer on his new BBC film
There is very little art about modern poverty, because who wants to know? It is barely acknowledged, unless there is…
Lyric Theatre’s Dick Whittington is the opposite of festive garbage
One of the biggest stars of the 1970s was the professional lard-bucket Mick McManus, who plied his trade as an…
Intelligent, unfussy, literate – the West End needs more plays like this: Switzerland reviewed
I know nothing about Patricia Highsmith. The acclaimed American author wrote the kind of Sunday-night crime thrillers that put me…
Join a Jacobean jury at the Globe. Early modern theatre goes immersive – will it work?
James I and VI liked to term himself Rex Pacificus. Like most politicians who talk a lot about working for…
One of the finest productions I’ve seen at the Globe – a triumph of crony casting: Macbeth reviewed
Michelle Terry, chatelaine of the Globe, wants to put an end to penis-led Shakespeare by casting women in roles intended…
Lee Evans’s acrobatic clowning is the best thing about Pinter Three
Pinter Three appeals to opposite poles of the play-going spectrum. The birdbrains like me will enjoy the music-hall sketches while…
One of the best plays I’ve ever seen: I and You at the Hampstead Theatre reviewed
Lauren Gunderson’s play I and You opens in the scruffy bedroom of 17-year-old Caroline. Lonely, beautiful and furious, she’s unable…
Mean-spirited, muddled, idiotic and puerile: Martin McDonagh’s A Very Very Very Dark Matter reviewed
In the year since it opened, the Bridge has given us the following: a harmless Karl Marx comedy by Richard…
The Inheritance isn’t theatre — it’s mesmerically boring TV
Stories by Nina Raine is a bun-in-the-oven comedy with a complex back narrative. Anna, in her mid-thirties, had a boyfriend…
Women should boycott David Hare’s slanderous new play: I’m Not Running reviewed
Sir David Hare’s weird new play sets out to chronicle the history of the Labour movement from 1996 to the…
Critics hated Julie Burchill’s Brexit play. What does that say about them?
There is a new book out about the sun — the bright thing in the sky, not the newspaper. It…
Radio 4 treats its radio listeners as second-best in favour of those who listen to podcasts
How very odd of Radio 4 not only to release The Ratline as a podcast before broadcasting it on the…
Pinter comes across as an eccentric lightweight scribbler: Pinter Two reviewed
Pinter Two, the second leg of the Pinter season, offers us a pair of one-act comedies. The Lover is a…
After 1980 Pinter began to write like a student troll: Pinter at the Pinter reviewed
The drop-curtain resembles a granite slab on which the genius’s name has been carved for all time. The festival of…