Theatre Reviews
Tina, Aldwych Theatre review - new Tina Turner bio-musical is simply OKWednesday, 18 April 2018
It is, perhaps, a tale that suffers from overfamiliarity. Tina Turner’s rags-to-riches story – from humble beginnings as little Anna Mae Bullock in Nutbush, Tennessee, to her discovery, reinvention and sickening abuse by husband and manager Ike Turner, and finally her rebirth as a solo rock'n'roll star – is the stuff of showbiz legend. Read more... |
Instructions for Correct Assembly, Royal Court review - Jane Horrocks in Middle England 'Westworld'Monday, 16 April 2018
There’s a whole universe which British theatre has yet to explore properly – it’s called the sci-fi imagination. Although this place is familiar from countless films and television series, it is more or less a stranger to our stages. Read more... |
The Moderate Soprano, Duke of York's Theatre review - love and opera with a flinty edgeSaturday, 14 April 2018
"What could be more serious than married life?" asked Richard Strauss, whose operas became a surprising pillar of Glyndebourne's repertoire some time after the early days dramatised in David Hare's play. Read more... |
Chicago, Phoenix Theatre review - baggy revival picks up later paceFriday, 13 April 2018
Chicago has been on, in one form or another, for a very long time. Read more... |
Quiz, Noël Coward Theatre, review - entertaining confectionWednesday, 11 April 2018
You could be forgiven for not remembering the “coughing major” brouhaha in 2001, coming as it did the day before 9/11, when we had rather more pressing matters to attend to than a contestant being accused of cheating on television quiz show. But playwright James Graham has mined an entertaining confection from the affair and its subsequent court case in 2003. Read more... |
The Country Wife, Southwark Playhouse review – knowing Restoration updateThursday, 05 April 2018
Even in its successful early days Wycherley’s 1675 comedy was notorious, but it was considered too lewd to be staged at all between the mid-Eighteenth Century and 1924. Although the play has found an affectionate place in the canon in more recent times, it makes a kind of sense to transpose the goings on of louche Restoration aristocrats to the era of the Bright Young Things, the time of its rediscovery. Read more... |
White Guy on the Bus, Finborough Theatre review - a moral tale of Pennsylvania's divisionsSaturday, 31 March 2018
Ros and Ray are old hippies made good. She’s a hard-bitten, hard-working teacher in an inner-city Pennsylvania school where her pupils rob 7-Elevens on Fridays and the staff have a betting pool on how many times she gets called "white bitch". Read more... |
The Inheritance, Young Vic review - a long day’s journey into lightThursday, 29 March 2018
About a decade ago, theatre-makers started routinely describing themselves as being in the business of storytelling. Read more... |
Black Men Walking, Royal Court review - inspiring and exhilaratingFriday, 23 March 2018
In the same week that saw the arrival of Arinzé Kene’s Misty, a play that passionately questions the clichés of plays about black Britons (you know, gun crime, knife crime and domestic abuse), Black Men Walking opens at the Royal Court. Read more... |
Misty, Bush Theatre review - powerful meditation on how we tell storiesFriday, 23 March 2018
Arinzé Kene is having a bit of a moment. He won an Evening Standard Film Award for The Pass opposite Russell Tovey in 2016, is about to appear in a BBC drama with Paddy Considine, and has just finished lending his lovely tenor to Conor McPherson’s Girl from the North Country in the West End. Read more... |
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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.
Book by 30 September and get tickets from £15*
with no booking fee.
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