Theatre
The Arthur Conan Doyle Appreciation Society, Traverse Theatre, EdinburghSaturday, 08 December 2012
What is truth? Is it fixed or fluid, personal or universal? Does it require hard evidence or merely faith? These are the areas of interest poked and prodded in this co-production between the Traverse and Peepolykus, the company which previously... Read more... |
Everyday Maps for Everyday Use, Finborough TheatreFriday, 07 December 2012
Woking and Mars both provide subject matter for cartographers. John, who reckons he’s an achiever, is updating the local A to Z, while Behrooz, once a colleague of John’s, is exhibiting his paintings of the red planet. There’s a neat overlap in... Read more... |
Old Money, Hampstead TheatreThursday, 06 December 2012
We never glimpse the source of the old money in Sarah Wooley’s new play, for it’s his funeral that opens proceedings. We will get no sense of the man, or the extent of his wealth, or the way he spent it. The eventual irrelevance of such a specific... Read more... |
Extract: In Two Minds - Jonathan MillerThursday, 06 December 2012
When I first mentioned to a colleague that I was embarking on a biography of the doctor/director Jonathan Miller, he instantly yelped, “My God, your work’s cut out! The man must have met half the famous names in the twentieth century!"My subsequent... Read more... |
The Bodyguard, Adelphi TheatreThursday, 06 December 2012
It's Academy Award season within the showbiz-centric world of The Bodyguard, but even the greatest of Oscar obsessives - count me among them - would be hard-pressed to toss many a trophy in the direction of the 1992 film or toward the largely... Read more... |
Julius Caesar, Donmar WarehouseWednesday, 05 December 2012
There’s no ignoring gender in Julius Caesar. Whether it’s Portia’s “I grant I am a woman” speech, an enfeebled Caesar likened to a “sick girl”, or Cassius raging against oppression – “our yoke and sufferance make us womanish” – the issue is written... Read more... |
Rats' Tales, Royal Exchange, ManchesterTuesday, 04 December 2012
Having 30 “rats” running around hardly seems the stuff of festive fare, but since the begetter of the show is Carol Ann Duffy, known in her children’s writing for dark fairy tales, we might expect something different. And, after all, these rodents... Read more... |
Cinderella, Royal Lyceum, EdinburghMonday, 03 December 2012
The idea of making the princely hero of Cinderella a preening, vacuous lead character from some BBC Three-style reality show is a good one. These days the notion of a smart, self-respecting young woman limiting her horizons by playing accessory to a... Read more... |
At Your Service: The Birth of Privates on ParadeSaturday, 01 December 2012
It was in Singapore in 1947 that my real education began. For the first time I read Lawrence, Forster, Virginia Woolf, Melville, Graham Greene and Bernard Shaw’s political works, becoming a lifelong Leftie. When Stanley Baxter explained... Read more... |
Hero, Royal Court TheatreFriday, 30 November 2012
Is discretion really the better part of valour? This question arises in a particularly acute form in this new play, which looks at Danny, a gay primary school teacher who decides to come out — despite the risk of being seen as a paedo. But although... Read more... |
Merrily We Roll Along, Menier Chocolate FactoryThursday, 29 November 2012
On Broadway, Merrily We Roll Along remains forever scarred as the Stephen Sondheim musical that ground to an abrupt halt, closing after two weeks in 1981. But New York's theatrical failures often exist to be discovered anew across the Atlantic, and... Read more... |
Kiss Me Kate, Old Vic TheatreWednesday, 28 November 2012
Cole Porter’s musical spin on Shakespeare demands the fluidity, fizz and acidity of champagne. In Trevor Nunn’s revival, which transfers to London after a successful run in Chichester, it’s more like gelato. It has sweetness, and a rich abundance of... Read more... |
