new writing
Lisa Halliday: Asymmetry review - unconventional and brilliantSunday, 04 March 2018
Lisa Halliday’s striking debut novel consists of three parts. The first follows the blooming relationship between Alice and Ezra (respectively an Assistant Editor and a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer) in New York; the middle section comprises a... Read more... |
The B*easts, Bush Theatre review - Monica Dolan is almost flawlessTuesday, 20 February 2018
Lila had breast implants at the age of eight. Karen, her mother, is required to take psychotherapy sessions on account of the fact that she arranged for the operation. Tessa (played by Monica Dolan, pictured top and below) is a psychotherapist who... Read more... |
Girls & Boys, Royal Court review - Carey Mulligan is stunningly brilliantFriday, 16 February 2018
This is Carey Mulligan week. She appears, improbably enough, as a hard-nosed cop in David Hare’s BBC thriller Collateral, as well as onstage at the Royal Court in London’s Sloane Square (she’s much better live than on film). In a 90-minute monologue... Read more... |
Gundog, Royal Court review - tedious and inconsequentialThursday, 08 February 2018
First the goats, and now the sheep – has this venue become an urban farm? Rural life, which was once so central to our English pastoral culture, is now largely absent from metropolitan stages. And from our culture. Apart from The Archers or the... Read more... |
Collective Rage, Southwark Playhouse review - a rollicking riotWednesday, 07 February 2018
“Pussy is pussy” and “bitches are bitches” but Jen Silverman’s Collective Rage at Southwark Playhouse smashes tautologies with roguish comedy in a tight five-hander smartly directed by Charlie Parham.The play is set in New York and follows the ad... Read more... |
Paines Plough Roundabout, Orange Tree Theatre review - too brief to really rockMonday, 05 February 2018
Hype is a dangerous thing. It often raises expectations beyond the reasonable, and disappointment inevitably follows. It also prioritises PR over artistic activity, putting the publicity cart before the creative horse, sucking energy away from plays... Read more... |
Booby's Bay, Finborough Theatre review - a bit fishySaturday, 03 February 2018
Carry on out of London past the Finborough Theatre and you hit the A4. Follow it east as it becomes the M4, take a southern turn at Bristol for the M5 and you’re in the West Country. Bude and Bodmin, Liskeard, St Austell, Padstow, Mousehole, Newquay... Read more... |
The Open House, The Print Room review - razor wit, theatrical brioMonday, 29 January 2018
The American family has seldom looked more desperate. Will Eno’s The Open House depicts a gathering of such dismal awfulness that it surely sets precedents for this staple element of American drama. Yet for viewers who relish humour in its most... Read more... |
Belleville, Donmar Warehouse review - prickly and unnervingFriday, 15 December 2017
The city of love provides a backdrop for marital discord and worse in Belleville, Amy Herzog's celebrated Off Broadway play now receiving a riveting British premiere at the Donmar. The director, Michael Longhurst, is rivaling Dominic Cooke (of... Read more... |
Parliament Square, Bush Theatre, review – uncomfortable blaze of angerWednesday, 06 December 2017
The political story of our time is the upsurge in support for Jeremy Corbyn, leftwing leader of the Labour Party, mainly by young activists who are both idealistic and energetic. But what would happen if one of them decided to go freelance, and... Read more... |
Poison, Orange Tree Theatre review - study of grief is both courageous and subtleTuesday, 14 November 2017
Should Brexit ministers need help understanding the cultural mindset of their continental counterparts, they might consider a subscription to the Orange Tree, the compact Richmond producing house that is defiantly opening its arms to Europe. This... Read more... |
Soldier On: a theatrical treatment of PTSDSaturday, 11 November 2017
I was invalided out of the army in 1986. I’d been an army scholar through school and had a bursary at university. I went on to drama school then became an actor, and subsequently a writer and director. But I’ve always been passionately interested in... Read more... |
