Performing Arts Reviews:
2008–2022

  The Royal Court Theatre presents ESCAPED ALONE, by Caryl Churchill, in the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs, Sloane Square, London, 21 January – 8 March, 2016. An elderly woman, a Mrs Jarrett (Lindsay Barrett), looks at us and says: “I’m walking down the street and there’s a door in the fence and inside are three women I’ve seen before.” and she goes in. So, we spend an hour with three old, comfortable friends, Sally (Deborah Findlay), Lena (Kika Markham) and Vi (June Watson) and a neighbour on a summer afternoon on a small grassed backyard lawn having tea in rickety chairs.…

Photo by Rupert Reid Thread Entertainment in association with Red Line Productions  present 80 MINUTES NO INTERVAL, by Travis Cotton, at the Old Fitz Theatre, Cathedral St. Wooloomooloo, 11 March – 9 April. One of my mantras has been when working in the theatre: “The writer is God.” I have always held the writer in the highest esteem, especially the playwright, and in my working as an Actor, Director or Teacher of Acting, I have always applied a kind of ‘forensic fanaticism’ to the writer’s words and clues, including the syntax and even the lay out on the printed page,…

Red Line presents THE WHALE, by Samuel D. Hunter, at the Old Fitz Theatre, Cathedral St Wooloomooloo. 4 Feb – 4 March. THE WHALE, written by American writer, Samuel D. Hunter in 2012, has all of the ingredients of a classically constructed play – it ticks all (most) of the boxes of ‘good’, audience-friendly playwriting, tried and still true. A realist environment we all know; characters (we might nearly know) with complicated back stories; enough contemporary issues that we can, relatively, associate with: morbid obesity, religious tyranny and its corroding influence, sexual taboos, gay (bi-sexual) family, adolescent angst; and a…

  A Night of Play presents BULLY BOY, by Sandi Toksvig, at the Blood Moon Theatre at The World Bar, Bayswater Rd., Kings Cross. 10 March – 26 March. BULLY BOY is the nickname belonging to a group of British soldiers assigned to the war in Afghanistan. It concerns the investigation of an ‘incident’ in the heat of war, where a mother and son were killed during a skirmish – the 8 year-old boy thrown down a well, where he drowned – ‘collateral damage’. BULLY BOY, written in 2011, by Sandi Toksvig, is a play for two actors. Over the…

Photo by Hugo Glendinning Fiery Angel and Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company present The Tricycle Theatre Production of RED VELVET, by Lolita Chakrabarti, at The Garrick, West End, London, UK. RED VELVET is a new play by Lolita Chakrabarti that has already had a season in London at the Tricycle Theatre in 2012 (2014) and later at St Anne’s Warehouse in Brooklyn in 2014. Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company has included the production Directed by Indhu Rabasingham and starring Adrian Lester into their season of plays. The play tells of part of the career of an African/American actor, Ira Aldridge, in the…

Photo by Alastair Muir Robert Fox, Matthew Byam Shaw for Playful Productions and Royal Court Theatre Productions present, the Royal Court production of HANGMEN, by Martin McDonagh, at the Wyndham’s Theatre, in the West End, London, U.K. (closes 5 March) HANGMAN, by Martin McDonagh, has transferred from the Royal Court Theatre for a limited season at the Wyndham’s Theatre in London’s West End.  It has been Directed by Matthew Dunster. It has been some time since we have seen a new play from Mr McDonagh. His last play was A BEHANDING IN SPOKANE, seen on Broadway in 2010. He seemed…