Adorning Shakespeare’s Globe theatre’s ornate and columned stage loom two large blackened missiles directed toward the soggy groundlings who are fighting the rainy elements on the day of this performance. This is my first play experience in the classic Globe and what better play to to take in than Shakespeare’s iconic story of teenage star-crossed […]
The Royal Court’s associate designer, Chloe Lamford, got five writers ‘exploring performance through language, physicality and the power of the imagination’. They wrote a piece each. I caught two of those. I’ll be writing this review in past tense because the plays were on for three nights, and I wanted time to think over them. […]
We all have bad experiences with teachers; some are worse than others. Jam tells the story of a history teacher named Bella (Jasmine Hyde) who, haunted by a rough past with an old student, has moved towns in an attempt to start a new life. Ten years later, Kane (Harry Melling) visits her classroom in […]
As the festivities on London’s South Bank get under way the big purple tent opens its bovine-adorned folds up to a fitting act of spectacle and astonishment. Catch Me (or Attrape Moi) comprises a group of young artists and circus performers from Quebec—a proving ground for the talented entertainers of this sort of thing. Running […]
Othello was written 400 years ago but remains shockingly prescient in this day and age. A society unaccepting of a woman falling in love with a black man, does that ring a bell? In Tobacco Factory Theatres’ production at Wilton’s Music Hall, director Richard Twyman takes the modern relatability even further by presenting a distinctly contemporary production […]
I enjoy comic relief in a tragedy. Some say it butchers the essence of the play but I like it. Richard III at the Arcola takes a rebellious spin turning the hunchback king into a leather jacket-wearing sarcastic bad boy played by Greg Hicks. He turns to the audience and speaks in a way that […]
I’m gaslighting myself in going to the big shows. Shows that scream, shows that flash, shows that flail their banality around like spaghetti and people clap. They clap! They clap. Why review? It’s hard to be in a room with 890 people who probably disagree with you. I wasn’t in love with Angels; I don’t […]
It was an Event. Jez Butterworth is The Playwright. An Architect. Racy and gnomic. Not a priori great—David Hare was The Playwright and he’s made no great work since Skylight. But look at any recommendations of the century’s best plays: Jerusalem ranks one. Since 2009 Butterworth’s done minor work, like The River, and disconcertingly/reassuringly added […]