fri 01/08/2025

Theatre Reviews

Pah-La, Royal Court review - complex ideas, wild storytelling

aleks Sierz

Theatre can give a voice to the voiceless – but at what cost?

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After Edward, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse review - delightfully risky

Rachel Halliburton

A loo with fuschia-pink carpet to catch splashback; an Archbishop of Canterbury who’s in it for the skirts; a gobbing Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz.

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Wilderness, Hampstead Theatre review - stark portrait of modern divorce

Laura De Lisle

“We don’t love you any less.” A natural sentiment to express to your child when you’re separating from your partner, but the very fact of saying it plants doubts in the child’s mind as to whether you really mean it.

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Top Girls, National Theatre review - dazzlingly perceptive classic

aleks Sierz

Caryl Churchill is a phenomenal artist. Not only has she written a huge body of work, but each play differs in both form and content from the previous one, and she has continued to write with enormous creative zest and flair well into her maturity. Now in her 80th year, she can look over her shoulder at a back-catalogue which is stuffed full of contemporary classics, and a handful of masterpieces.

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The Crucible, The Yard Theatre review - wilfully over-stirred

Tom Birchenough

The Crucible is a play that speaks with unrelenting power at times of discord, most of all when the public consciousness looks ripe for manipulation.

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Grief Is the Thing with Feathers, Barbican Theatre review - Cillian Murphy soars and sweeps

aleks Sierz

Wow, what a collection of talent: this show stars Peaky Blinder Cillian Murphy, and Enda Walsh's adaptation, Grief Is the Thing with Feathers, is based on Max Porter's award-winning novel of the same name.

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Fiddler on the Roof, Playhouse Theatre, review – energetic production whips up an emotional storm

Rachel Halliburton

In an age where political, social, and gender norms seem to be in perpetual meltdown, it should be pretty much impossible for a musical that begins with a song celebrating ‘Tradition’ to strike a chord.

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Local Hero, Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh - captivating musical with a harder edge

David Kettle

“Cult” is probably an over-used adjective, especially when it comes to movies.

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The Phlebotomist, Hampstead Theatre review - thought-provoking dystopian thriller

aleks Sierz

Contemporary British theatre loves time travel — and not just to the past. It also enjoys imagining the future, especially the bad stuff ahead. So Ella Road's debut play, The Phlebotomist, is set in a convincingly coherent dystopia where genetic profiling reigns supreme, and one blood test can fuck up all your life chances.

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Mary's Babies, Jermyn Street Theatre review - rollercoaster investigation of early fertility treatment

Heather Neill

Obstetrician Dr Mary Barton had the best of intentions. As a missionary in India she had observed the poor treatment of childless women and, back home in England, she took positive action to help women who wanted babies. This being the period between the late 1930s and 1967, there was as yet no legal framework for artificial insemination; indeed it was disapproved of and kept secret.

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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.


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