sun 24/11/2024

Theatre Buzz

Chariots of Fire is coming!

Jasper Rees

There'll be no avoiding Chariots of Fire this summer. The Olympics being shortly upon us, Hampstead Theatre are soon to launch a stage verison of the Oscar-winning 1981 film.

Read more...

2012 Olivier Awards: comedy sidelined as Matilda enters the record books

Matt Wolf

Matilda, the Royal Shakespeare Company-spawned musical about an extraordinary young girl, managed the extraordinary feat Sunday of snaring a record seven trophies at last night’s 36th Laurence Olivier Awards. Its rampaging hold over the black-tie ceremony at the Royal Opera House came at the expense of such comic hopefuls as One Man, Two Guvnors and The Ladykillers, which had 10 nominations between them and emerged with no awards.

Read more...

2012 Olivier Awards nominations announced

theartsdesk

In how many categories is it possible for a show to be nominated for this year's Olivier Awards? Answer: 10. The producers of Matilda the Musical will be smiling from ear to ear after the nominations for next month’s awards were revealed, with the RSC’s Roald Dahl adaptation nominated in all 10. Tim Minchin is in the running for best score, and the four young actresses who share the lead are also nominated.

Read more...

A Spoonful of Sugar: Robert Sherman, 1925-2012

Jasper Rees

Robert Sherman, who has died at the age of 86, was three years older than his brother Richard, and much quieter.

Read more...

Charles Dickens, Theatre and Dance Critic-at-Large

Ismene Brown

When a young Charles Dickens visited New York in 1842 with his wife, he strolled down Broadway, happened upon an unusual dance and naturally checked out theatreland. As his bicentenary is celebrated, here, from his journal, American Notes For General Circulation, are some of his observations on the arts and culture of this foreign city, intervals of refreshment between the widespread social ills that he was principally reporting upon.

 

Read more...

One theatre, five awards

theartsdesk

When the London theatre critics gathered to hand out their annual awards at lunchtime today in person, a notable percentage of the gongs were carried off by the National Theatre.

Read more...

Hall family and Wales shine in nationwide stage awards

Ismene Brown

Port Talbot’s staging of The Passion with Michael Sheen won the highest accolade at the Theatre Management Association Awards yesterday, which honour the best of work touring Britain beyond London during the 2010-11 season.

Read more...

The Arts Desk Birthday Event - Join Us on 9/9!

Ismene Brown

On 9 September theartsdesk, Britain's first professional arts journalism site, will be two years old. To celebrate we’re holding a live debate with four leading performers during the Kings Place Festival. An actor, a singer, a dancer and an instrumentalist will share their different experiences of performance. Join us, live or online, for a stellar event.

Read more...

Who is Eduardo de Filippo?

Jasper Rees

The phenomenal Eduardo de Filippo has no parallel in British theatre. Cross Olivier with Ayckbourn and you get a national institution who acted in and directed his own plays in his own theatre. Born in 1900, it seems odd that he had to wait until 1977 for his first honorary doctorate, odder that the award came not from his native Naples but from the University of Birmingham.

Read more...

Belarus Free Theatre: no gags on art

David Nice

Whatever the quality of the material with which they're grappling, there are two undeniable truths about the Belarusian actors who've put their already curtailed freedom on the line by coming to the Almeida Festival this week: they're skilled practitioners of their art and courageous human beings. Read their biographies in the programme and you'll see that the words "detained", "arrested", "attacked", "dismissed" crop up rather a lot.

Read more...

Pages

Advertising feature

★★★★★

A compulsive, involving, emotionally stirring evening – theatre’s answer to a page-turner.
The Observer, Kate Kellaway

 

Direct from a sold-out season at Kiln Theatre the five star, hit play, The Son, is now playing at the Duke of York’s Theatre for a strictly limited season.

 

★★★★★

This final part of Florian Zeller’s trilogy is the most powerful of all.
The Times, Ann Treneman

 

Written by the internationally acclaimed Florian Zeller (The Father, The Mother), lauded by The Guardian as ‘the most exciting playwright of our time’, The Son is directed by the award-winning Michael Longhurst.

 

Book by 30 September and get tickets from £15*
with no booking fee.


latest in today

Help to give theartsdesk a future!

It all started on 09/09/09. That memorable date, September 9 2009, marked the debut of theartsdesk.com.

It followed some...

Music Reissues Weekly: Stefan Gnyś - Horizoning

For most of Canada’s listening public, their country-man Stefan Gnyś – pronounced G'neesh – wasn’t a concern. The 300 copies of his 1969 single...

Wicked review - overly busy if beautifully sung cliffhanger

"No one mourns the wicked," we're told during the immediately arresting beginning to Wicked, which concludes two hours 40 minutes later...

Akram Khan, GIGENIS, Sadler’s Wells review - now 50, Khan re...

London-born Akram Khan has come a long way in a 35-year career. He performed as a young teen in Peter Brook’s production of The ...

Snow Leopard review - clunky visual effects mar a director...

Pema Tseden's final film Snow Leopard is a Chinese Tibetan-language drama that addresses wild animal preservation. It serves as a kind of...

King James, Hampstead Theatre review - UK premiere drains a...

Cleveland is probably the American city most like the one in which I grew up. Early into the icy embrace of post-industrialisation, not...

Album: Kim Deal - Nobody Loves You More

The progress of Kim Deal has been one of the great delights of modern music. Much as one wishes Pixies well, they have never been the same without...

Kavakos, Philharmonia, Blomstedt, RFH review - a supreme val...

From a privileged position in the Festival Hall stalls, I could see 97-year old Herbert Blomstedt’s near-immobile back as he sat on a piano stool...

Hannah Scott, Worthing Pavilion Theatre Atrium review - fill...

London-based singer-songwriter Hannah Scott has warned her next song may reduce us to tears. It is, she says, inspired by events following the...