Reviews
stephen.walsh
What, anyway, is The Makropulos Case all about? Is it simply about the horrors of unnatural longevity; or does it expose the limitations of the rational mind confronted by the irrational; is it about love of a distorted ideal, like some updated Hoffmann tale? Or is it simply a well-made play disrupted by theatre of the absurd and turned for good measure into a tragic music drama?The truth is that it’s all these things and more, a work of stunning complexity both dramatically and, especially, musically. And the best thing I can say about Olivia Fuchs’s new production is that it takes account Read more ...
Helen Hawkins
It’s only nine years since Moira Buffini’s Handbagged had its premiere at Kilburn’s Tricycle theatre (renamed the Kiln in 2018), but it triumphantly returns to the same venue as a copper-bottomed classic. Its timing is uncanny: Margaret Thatcher was dying the year it made its debut; now it resurfaces just as its other protagonist, HM the Queen, has passed away.Here they are again, handbags at the ready (black patent for the younger and older Thatchers, what looks like a black Launer for the two versions of the Queen), as they square up to slug it out in telling the story of their 11 Read more ...
aleks.sierz
Britain is a divided nation, but one of the divisions that we don’t hear that much about is that between Pakistani gay men. Written by Waleed Akhtar (who also stars in this impressively heartfelt two-hander), The P Word is about the differences in life experiences between one asylum seeker and one Londoner, and comes to the Bush Theatre in a production which has been supported by Micro Rainbow, the first safe house in the UK for LGBTQ asylum seekers and refugees. So what’s it all about?Set in contemporary London, the 85-minute play begins with two parallel life stories: one is that of 31-year Read more ...
Rachel Halliburton
Hell hath no fury like a teenager scorned. In this perplexing play, we see a highly successful doctor put on trial by his rebellious 18-year-old daughter and found miserably wanting. Ibsen’s influence hangs heavily over an evening in which Sir Neil Marriot throws a party to celebrate his new knighthood and his birthday, only to find that elements of his past are hiding in the panelled dining room waiting to challenge him. As a result it ends up being an evening of sound and fury – though what it signifies is anyone's guess.It’s a red herring that the acclaimed director Richard Eyre’s first Read more ...
Veronica Lee
It's a pleasure to see Rob Rouse back doing standup, as these days he's as well known for his acting – he plays the idiot savant Bottom in BBC's Upstart Crow, the theatre version of which is opening shortly in the West End after its 2020 premiere run was truncated by Covid.Rouse performed his latest comedy show, No Refunds, at the Gilded Balloon at the Edinburgh Fringe last month and it's now possible to catch up with it on comedy streamer NextUp, which is running Rewind the Fringe, a week in which it is showing live recordings of shows at the 2022 festival.Rouse, wearing a shirt a little on Read more ...
Gary Naylor
It can’t have been an easy pitch. “Popes. Both foreign, yes. German and Argentinian – sorry, can’t change either. Eighty-something and the other’s a decade younger. Mainly just talking about their pasts and their different approaches to Roman Catholic theology. No chorus of angels, no. Can't cross-promote with Sister Act, no. We thought we’d open in Northampton…”Anthony McCarten’s play, The Two Popes, did open in Northampton, at the Royal & Derngate in 2019, and went on to be adapted into a feature film that won nominations for Academy Awards, BAFTAs and Golden Globes. Now it comes to the Read more ...
Sarah Kent
Life is messy and so is Carolee Schneeman’s work. She wanted it that way. Breaking down the barriers between art and life, between inhabiting a woman’s body and using it as primal material, was a key objective.And if this meant appearing naked in performances or filming herself having sex, so be it. “Can I be an image and an image-maker?” was a question she sought to answer over and over again in her work. And in the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s, the male-dominated art world of New York responded with a vehement “No!”.In 1954, for instance, she was kicked off the undergraduate course at Bard College Read more ...
Heather Neill
Antigone, the forceful young woman who takes on the male establishment, has long resonated with idealists; Sophocles' play, written about 441 BCE, has been revived and adapted frequently, often reflecting different times and causes. Among others, Polly Findlay's National Theatre production a decade ago referenced contemporary politics, including terrorism.So, Inua Ellams' version, focusing on the experience of British Muslims, although comprehensively rewritten, is part of an established tradition. Sophocles' Antigone fearlessly confronts her uncle, King Creon, who has decreed that her Read more ...
Nick Hasted
Crimes of the Future is a nostalgic return to classic Cronenberg, a comforting catalogue of body horror and fleshy biosynthesis, paranoid plots and shadowy cabals. Sharing a title with his 1970 debut, the director is still fascinated by our physical adaptation to future shocks.In his vague, allegorical sci-fi future, humanity’s “insurrectional” evolution has largely eradicated pain and produced surplus organs of uncertain consequence. Saul Tenser (Viggo Mortensen) and ex-trauma surgeon Caprice (Léa Seydoux, pictured below, right with Mortensen) are performance artists on a posh, illicit Read more ...
Helen Hawkins
As Dipa Baruwa-Etti’s latest play, The Clinic, reminds us, the Tory party has a strong showing of Black MPs – Badenoch, Cleverly, Kwarteng. It was finished long before the latest Cabinet appointments, but presciently picked those three names, all now with key ministerial roles. But the title isn’t strictly a reference to the regular meeting MPs hold with the public, even though one of the characters, Amina (Mercy Ojelade), is a struggling Labour MP. The term is what one upwardly mobile Nigerian family believe they can offer less fortunate Black people – and, in particular, Wunmi (Toyin Read more ...
Helen Hawkins
[Here be spoilers.] If you have been glued to the second season of The Capture, just ended, does it bother you that its content is borderline science fiction? Probably not. Writer Ben Chanan’s depiction of artificial intelligence may outstrip the reality of what it can currently achieve, but he can sure spin a gripping TV series around AI's potential for creating chaos in the wrong hands. But which are the right hands? In season two, Chanan upgraded the AI he mapped out in season one, which pitted DCI Rachel Carey (Holliday Grainger) against her own intelligence service, appalled Read more ...
Simon Thompson
Once the shock of Queen Elizabeth’s death has faded, attention will surely turn to the many organisations and institutions of which she was patron. This concert not only marked the Royal Scottish National Orchestra’s debut at the Lammermuir Festival, but it was also the first the orchestra had played since the departure of Her Majesty.Dressed in sombre black ties, the players preceded the main programme with the national anthem and a minute’s silence, out of which emerged the chalky darkness of Sibelius’ Fourth Symphony. The circumstances were oddly appropriate for the way this symphony Read more ...