Theatre Reviews

The Master Builder, Old Vic

David Nice Thursday, 04 February 2016

Demons, trolls and dead souls have a habit of latching onto Ibsen's bourgeois Norwegians. Surely the best way for actors to handle them is to keep it natural, make them part of the furniture and, in Dostoyevsky's words, "render the supernatural so real that one is almost forced to believe it". But very little seems real or spontaneous in Matthew Warchus's production of The Master Builder.

Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, National Theatre

Matt Wolf Wednesday, 03 February 2016

"One... Two... You know what to do": that coolly delivered rehearsal intro from a trombonist called Cutler (Clint Dyer) could serve as a synoptic appraisal of the simply overwhelming National Theatre revival of Ma Rainey's Black Bottom.

Red Velvet, Garrick Theatre

Marianka Swain Wednesday, 03 February 2016

Lolita Chakrabarti’s impassioned debut has only gained topicality since its 2012 Tricycle incarnation. Trevor Nunn’s all-white Wars of the Roses and #OscarsSoWhite, among others, have fanned its flames, while quips about a paranoid Russian regime and the limits of English openness to change seem all too pertinent. Cameron might well borrow the woolly idea of “new based on the old” during the European referendum debate.

Jeepers Creepers, Leicester Square Theatre

Veronica Lee Monday, 01 February 2016

You might think that the combination of a play about one of the funniest comics of the second half of the 20th century, written by his biographer and directed by a member of Monty Python would be a winning one. But sadly Robert Ross's Jeepers Creepers: Through the Eyes of Marty Feldman is anything but.

Escaped Alone, Royal Court Theatre

aleks Sierz Friday, 29 January 2016

Caryl Churchill is a phenomenon. Now 77 years old, she remains not only prolific but also immensely inventive, having notched up more than 35 original plays, many of which have been innovative in form and imaginative in content. Added to this, she has penned dramas for radio and television, as well as adaptations of the classics. She also retains the power to annoy: the National Theatre staging of her Here We Go last autumn provoked walkouts and howls of critical derision.

The Mother, Tricycle Theatre

Marianka Swain Wednesday, 27 January 2016

Anne longs for her 23-year-old son Nicholas to return home. One night, he appears. Or does he? Welcome back to the queasily elliptical world of Florian Zeller, where certainty fractures as familiar elements are repeated, dissected, made strange and menacing. Zeller used this immersive dislocation to powerfully communicate the experience of dementia in The Father, which last year travelled from Theatre Royal Bath to the Tricycle and on into the West End.

Pink Mist, Bush Theatre

aleks Sierz Wednesday, 27 January 2016

The war in Afghanistan has not exactly been neglected by contemporary British theatre, and the plight of returned soldiers is a standard trope of new writing. These distant wars function in our culture like worse-case scenarios, an excoriating version of hell on earth, where survivors come back to haunt the comfortable, and to tell us things about being human that we never really wanted to know.

Yen, Royal Court Theatre

aleks Sierz Tuesday, 26 January 2016

Feral kids are a media stereotype, but they make good strong subjects for drama. In Anna Jordan’s new play, which was first seen at the Manchester Royal Exchange last year after winning the Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting in 2013, we are introduced to two young brothers who have been abandoned by their parents. Hello Hench, who’s 16 years old; and hello Bobbie, who’s only 13.

Herons, Lyric Hammersmith

aleks Sierz Friday, 22 January 2016

Be careful what you wish for. I’ve often moaned about the fact that British theatre is too naturalistic, and that its stagings are too banal, full of quotidian detail and a specific sense of place, but strangers to the wildness of the imagination. So I have found myself wishing for more exciting settings, and bolder directing.

The Rolling Stone, Orange Tree Theatre

Tom Birchenough Thursday, 21 January 2016

I’m still pondering the title of Chris Urch’s new play. On the surface it’s clear enough: The Rolling Stone is a weekly newspaper in Uganda that has been notorious for pursuing that country’s anti-gay agenda. In particular, at the beginning of the decade, it started a campaign of publishing the photographs and addresses of those it believed to be homosexual.

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★★★★★

‘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.

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