Theatre
Show up and show off
The Edinburgh Festival was founded as a response to war. The inaugural event, held in 1947, was the brainchild of…
Heavy-handed
Oliver Cotton is an RSC stalwart who looks like a man born to greatness. Google him. He has the fearless…
Out of sorts at the RSC
The RSC’s summer blockbuster is about Queen Anne. It’s called Queen Anne. It opens at the Inns of Court where…
Three hours of vomit, fellatio and menstruation: Isabelle Huppert on Phaedra(s)
A blushing James Woodall is riveted by Isabelle Huppert’s performance in Phaedra(s)
Derek Jacobi as Mercutio is half-genius, half-prank: Romeo and Juliet at the Garrick reviewed
Out come the stars in Kenneth Branagh’s Romeo and Juliet. He musters a well-drilled, celebrity-ridden crew but they can’t quite…
I came out feeling euphoric and disorientated: Young Vic’s Blue/Orange reviewed
Blue/Orange by Joe Penhall enjoys the dubious status of a modern classic. A black mental-health patient, Christopher, is about to…
The Royal Court is the Eddie the Eagle of theatre
If there were an Eddie the Eagle award for theatre — to recognise large reputations built on minuscule achievements —…
Wasn’t Lawrence of Arabia more annoying than this new play suggests?
T.E. Lawrence is like the gap-year student from hell. He visits a country full of exotic barbarians and after a…
A literary lap dance: Doctor Faustus reviewed
Great excitement for play-goers as a rare version of a theological masterpiece arrives in the West End. Doctor Faustus stars…
Down and Out in Paris and London is a chav safari
Down and Out in Paris and London is a brilliant specimen from a disreputable branch of writing: the chav safari,…
This year's must-see Shakespeare? Four hours of history in Dutch
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)
Was there a cover-up over Shakespeare’s death?
How did Shakespeare kick the bucket? Lloyd Evans considers the evidence
The Heckler: the Shakespeare anniversary has stripped the Bard of his beauty
The feeding frenzy over the 400th anniversary of William Shakespeare’s death has reached its peak. Recently we’ve had Shakespeare’s complete…
Les Blancs at the Olivier is good-ish, but it won't be a classic
Les Blancs had a troubled birth. In 1965 several unfinished drafts of the play were entrusted by its dying author,…
I didn’t enjoy it but I couldn’t help loving it: Sunset Boulevard reviewed
Sunset Boulevard is a tale of fractured glory with Homeric dimensions. The movie presents Hollywood as a never-ending Trojan War…
Slapstick enthusiasts will love this Branagh and Brydon farce: The Painkillers reviewed
Sir Ken’s excellent West End residency continues with a sugar-rich confection. Sean Foley has adapted and updated an elderly French farce…
Catherine Tate’s talents are wasted on this meandering musical about nuclear fallout
Miss Atomic Bomb celebrates the sub-culture that grew up around nuclear tests in 1950s America. The citizens of Nevada would…
Jean Genet’s fascinating play, The Maids, is botched at Trafalgar Studios
The Maids is a fascinating document. Written in 1947, Jean Genet’s drama portrays a pair of serving girls who enact…
Why does drama always end up sneering at religion?
Theo Hobson explores the enduring appeal that religion has for dramatists
Sarah Kane's Cleansed is a thin, vicious pantomime
Big fuss about Cleansed at the Dorfman. Talk of nauseous punters rushing for the gangways may have perversely delighted the…
Kit-car Chekhov: Uncle Vanya at the Almeida reviewed
Director Robert Icke has this to say of Chekhov’s greatest masterpiece: ‘Let the electricity of now flow into the old…
A great, weird play to rival Shakespeare: Old Vic's The Master Builder reviewed
The Master Builder, if done properly, can be one of those theatrical experiences that make you wonder if the Greeks…
The Mother is meaningless - I predict great things for it
Florian Zeller has been reading Pinter. And Pinter started out in repertory thrillers where suspense was created by delaying revelations…
Serious, popular art: Peter Shaffer's Five Finger Exercise reviewed
A beautiful crumbling theatre in Notting Hill is under threat. The Coronet, which bills itself as the Print Room, faces…
Is there a difference between being prejudiced and being a connoisseur of prejudice?
Paul Minx ventures boldly into Tennessee Williams country with The Long Road South. It’s 1965 and the Price family are…
