Theatre Reviews
Kyoto, Soho Place Theatre - blistering, darkly witty play raises more questions than it answersMonday, 20 January 2025
It took a while for journalists to identify the chain-smoking, Machiavellian figure who was a permanent presence at early international gatherings to hammer out a strategy on climate change. When Time Magazine nominated “endangered” Earth as its planet of the year in 1989, politicians and climate campaigners leapt into action – but so too did the fossil fuel lobby, with the US lawyer Don Pearlman appointed as “High Priest” of this sinister “Carbon Club”. Read more... |
A Good House, Royal Court review - provocative, but imperfectMonday, 20 January 2025
Most Brits don’t know much about South Africa today, but we do know about house values, so this new comedy by South African playwright and screenwriter Amy Jephta is comprehensible – even in its incoherent moments (of which there are several). Read more... |
Oliver!, Gielgud Theatre review - Lionel Bart's 1960 masterpiece is Bourne againWednesday, 15 January 2025
Into a world of grooming gangs, human trafficking and senior prelates resigning over child abuse cases comes Oliver!, Lionel Bart’s masterly musical. Is its grim tale of workhouses, pickpockets and domestic violence an awkward fit with today’s values? Read more... |
The Maids, Jermyn Street Theatre review - new broom sweeps clean in fierce revivalMonday, 13 January 2025
There are two main reasons to revive classics. The first is that they are really good; the second is that they have something to say about how the world is changing, perhaps more accurately, how our perception of it is changing. Both are true of Annie Kershaw’s slick, sexy, shocking production of Martin Crimp's translation, up close and personal, at the Jermyn Street Theatre. Read more... |
Titanique, Criterion Theatre review - musical parody sinks despite super singingFriday, 10 January 2025
This Celine Dion jukebox musical has been a big hit in New York, but crossing The Atlantic can be perilous for any production, so, docked now at the Criterion Theatre, does it sink or float? Read more... |
Best of 2024: TheatreFriday, 27 December 2024
It's the images that linger in the mind as I think back on a bustling theatre year just gone. Sure, the year fielded excellent productions (and some duds, too), but as often as not it's a particular sight that sticks in the mind. Read more... |
Twelfth Night, Royal Shakespeare Theatre review - comic energy dissipates in too large a spaceSunday, 22 December 2024
It is not just Twelfth Night, it’s Twelfth Night, or What You Will in The Folio, a signpost of the choices the inhabitants, old and new, of Illyria must make. Perhaps it’s also an allusion to Will’s own choices as an actor/playwright in the all-male company who cross-dressed (and maybe more) as women and girls without batting an eyelid. Read more... |
You Me Bum Bum Train, secret location review - a joyful multiverse of anarchic creativityFriday, 20 December 2024
This feels like the theatrical equivalent of being in a centrifuge – a wild, spinning ride through different forms of reality that deftly separates out the different layers of who you think you are. It’s a multiverse that’s like a cross between Alice in Wonderland and Everything Everywhere All At Once – both liberating and challenging as you hurtle from one situation to another. Read more... |
The Tempest, Theatre Royal, Drury Lane review - Sigourney Weaver's impassive Prospero inhabits an atmospheric, desolate worldFriday, 20 December 2024
Shakespeare must have relished the opportunities brought by the indoor Blackfriars Theatre in 1611: sound magnified in a way impossible outdoors, magical stage effects in the semi-darkness, possibly even fireworks - and all at a time when the masque was the most fashionable theatre form. The Tempest, written especially for the venue, includes a masque and has masque-like properties throughout. Read more... |
Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812, Donmar Warehouse review - a blazingly original musical flashes into the West EndWednesday, 18 December 2024
Broadway shows sometimes hit the West End like, well, like a comet, burning brightly but briefly (Spring Awakening, for example), while others settle into orbit illuminating Shaftesbury Avenue with a neon blaze every night for years. 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
'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages...
