REVIEW: FOUL PAGES (The Hope Theatre) ★★★
Foul Pages is a compelling hour and a half long play set in Wilton Hall, where the Countess of Pembroke has enlisted William Shakespeare himself to put on a play that will make the King look favourably on her lover Sir Walter Raleigh who languishes in prison, accused of a plot to depose him. Some […]
REVIEW: THE YORK REALIST (Donmar Warehouse) ★★★★★
The York Realist, currently playing at the Donmar Warehouse before a brief stint at The Sheffield Crucible, is a play by Peter Gill, written in 2001 but set in the early 1960s. The play tells the story of George, a Yorkshire farm labourer (Ben Batt) who is cast in a production of the York Mystery […]
REVIEW: FLASHDANCE (New Victoria Theatre) ★★★★
Being a child of the 70’s, I fondly remember listening to the Soundtrack of Flashdance on my cassette recorder and then queuing up at my local cinema to watch Jennifer Beales strut her stuff in a leotard and leg warmers. For those of you too young to remember the 1983 film Flashdance, it tells the […]
REVIEW: THE TROTH (Curve Leicester) ★★★
Curve Leicester plays host to the UK premiere of Akademi’s powerful production The Troth this week. The story was born out of a desire to simultaneously celebrate the centenary of the Great War, and to pay homage to the 60,000 Indian soldiers killed, whilst acknowledging 70 years since India’s independence from the British Empire. A […]
REVIEW: LE BODYGUARD (Palais des Sports) ★★★
Based on the 1992 film starring Whitney Houston, The Bodyguard Musical opened in London in 2012 where it played for eighteen months before heading out on tour around the UK. The French production of the show has just opened in Paris for a six week run before it tours around France with songs performed in […]
REVIEW: Osric Omand and the Story of Hope ★★★★ (Drayton Arms Theatre)
Well – what was that?! Last night I saw the closing night of Osric Omand and the Story of Hope and I am none the wiser. Billed as a ‘horror-action-comedy’ it certainly delivered all three elements, although the comedy was the pervading influence throughout the whole piece. In fact, it was the funniest thing I […]
REVIEW: Austentacious (Piccadilly theatre) ★★★★
Imagine what a lost Jane Austen novel might look like and perhaps you’d come up with something akin to ‘Seasonings and Seasonality’ – at least that’s the audience suggestion that won the day in Austentacious at the Piccadilly theatre this week. Fully improvised across 90 minutes, the show was suitably peppered with jokes and some […]
REVIEW: BOAT PEOPLE (Pentameters Theatre) ★★★
Boat People is a confident first outing from emerging playwright, Emma Park, with a mini courtroom drama, packed with dramatic testimony. In the High Court, before a sedate Mr Justice Barebones, (Bryan Hands), the animated Captain Papangelos (played expertly by Giorgio Galassi) is called as a witness, in defence of his employers. The captain is pitted against […]
REVIEW: Thriller Live (Sunderland Empire) ★★★★
Thriller Live was performed in the West End for the first time in 2006, embarking on its first UK tour and eventually finding a home at Lyric Theatre on Shaftesbury Avenue in 2008, making it one of the longest running shows in the West End. With tours and shows currently playing in over 31 different […]
REVIEW: GIRLS AND BOYS (Royal Court) ★★★★★
My love for both Dennis Kelly and Carey Mulligan – possibly equal in measure – meant I approached this production with the cool trepidation all reasonably self-aware fangirls should channel: don’t be biased, remain objective and neither scream nor cry. I just about managed it. Girls and Boys is brilliant because it’s such a precious […]