Soften the Grey – Hope Theatre
My first impressions of 6 Foot Stories’ production of Soften the Grey is that I may have accidentally stumbled upon the final of the ‘London Hipster Beard Wars 2015’. Both actors are sporting such impressive facial fuzz that for the first minute and a half I am completely startled and am just waiting for the […]
Sleeping Beauty – Churchill Theatre, Bromley
English Christmas pantomimes are inherently formulaic, so there is a list of things one expects from the local panto- men dressed as women, glittering costumes, top forty hits and thinly veiled adult jokes that keep the wine-tipsy parents entertained whilst their kids waive glow toys in the air. This year’s production of Sleeping Beauty […]
Miss Saigon
Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil’s follow up to the 1985 West End hit Les Miserables (which is still running almost 30 years later) was the 1989 production of Miss Saigon. Based on the Puccini Opera Madame Butterfly, the musical opened at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane in 1989 where it played for just over 10 […]
A World Elsewhere
Think about the swinging sixties. The era of student protest and copious amounts of drugs being smoked in ratty college dorm rooms. Ladies liberated sexually and students punching the air in protest. It was also the era of half-baked ideas wrapped up in whiny folk music and falseness. Alan Franks new play A World […]
Blind / Doing The Buisness
I have never seen anything at The Courtyard Theatre Studio before and my first impressions were positive. Great space, nice atmosphere and not to far from the tube. One thing I will say is that the auditorium was freezing cold which wasn’t great. Our night kicked off with Doing The Business. A two […]
Faster-Higher-Stronger-Straighter
The faintly audible external hum of Queen’s ‘Under Pressure’ provides the perfect atmosphere for Damien Tracey’s latest work, unravelling from the Dominion Theatre’s Studio space, he shines a spotlight on the seething, fearful creature that is the Russian government. A clever mutation of the Olympics’ motto, Faster-Higher-Stronger-Straighter is a no-nonsense war cry of outrage that resounds with […]
No Way To Treat A Lady
The Landor Theatre in Clapham continues to prove itself one of the most interesting and vibrant of London’s fringe venues with this deliciously dark comedy thriller. Originally a novel by William Goldman and famously made into a film starring Rod Steiger, Lee Remick and George Segal, it was turned into a stage musical by Douglas […]
The World Goes Round
The World Goes Round (a Kander and Ebb songbook) opened at The Union Theatre this weekend, coincidentally in the same week that the Sondheim retrospective opened at the St James Theatre. There is something very charming about the intimacy of the Union Theatre. There are no microphones, no elaborate sets and there is no where […]
Lost Boy
Peter Pan represents what none of us can ever be – eternally young and innocent. It’s a great premise to consider what would happen to a generation of ‘lost boys’ – J. M. Barrie’s readers – when they find themselves facing the reality of war. Unfortunately, that’s not really what this musical is about. What […]
A Spoonful of Sherman
Family, and the wealth of inspiration found therein, is the clear theme in Robert J. Sherman’s musical tribute to his late father Robert B. Sherman. Son of the genius behind the hugely celebrated Mary Poppins and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Sherman stirs his audience into a flurry of romantic nostalgia as he charmingly adorns the studio of the […]