Shakespeare
Richard III, Tobacco Factory, BristolThursday, 21 February 2013
Performing Shakespeare in a former cigarette factory in South Bristol has become something of a ritual for Andrew Hilton and his close-knit company. Any act of ritual requires a dedicated space and the red-tiled floor on which the drama unfolds on... Read more... |
Television: 10 of the Best from 2012Monday, 31 December 2012
Far be it from me to try to impose shape or meaning on the past 12 months of television. You'd need teams of statisticians and psephologists to have any chance of drawing conclusions from the whirling cosmos of TV, and its infinite variety of soaps... Read more... |
Theatre: The Best of 2012Thursday, 27 December 2012
For much of 2012, London theatre seemed to celebrate the playhouse as much as the play, turning certain venues into essential destinations. I'm thinking, of course, of Shakespeare's Globe, whose mindblowing Globe to Globe season - its namesake's... 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... |
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... |
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... |
Twelfth Night/Richard III, Apollo TheatreMonday, 19 November 2012
Something new is happening in the West End. Just up the road from Thriller and down a bit from Les Misérables a billboard the colour of weak tea (positively consumptive compared to the full-colour, neon assaults on either side) proclaims the arrival... Read more... |
Red Velvet, Tricycle TheatreWednesday, 17 October 2012
Wow, what a lot of debuts. Adrian Lester (Hustle, Bonekickers, Merlin) makes his Tricycle Theatre debut in this new play about a black actor in Regency London, and it’s written by his wife, the actress Lolita Chakrabarti. The play is her first... Read more... |
Much Ado About Nothing, Noël Coward TheatreFriday, 28 September 2012
Never quite at the top of the Shakespearean canon, Much Ado About Nothing now seems more vital and adaptable than ever – and vastly darker than, say, Kenneth Branagh’s sun-kissed screen romp acknowledged back in 1993. The cult director Joss Whedon... Read more... |
What You Will, Apollo TheatreWednesday, 19 September 2012
As long as Simon Callow is around, London’s theatre scene will never be short of one-man shows, nor of Shakespeare. A new pretender to the Shakespearian throne, a rival for the hollow crown (and, just occasionally, the hollow laugh) has however... Read more... |
Wild Oats, Bristol Old VicFriday, 14 September 2012
John O’Keeffe’s 18th century classic Wild Oats is a play about players and an uproarious love letter to the theatre: a perfect fit for the re-opening, after 18 months of massive refurbishment, of Bristol’s Old Vic, originally constructed in 1766 and... Read more... |
King Lear, Almeida TheatreWednesday, 12 September 2012
He arrives in a blaze of light and trumpets, but Jonathan Pryce’s King Lear seems as much charming, lovable father as imposing monarch as he sets about carving up his kingdom. What follows, though, brings a prickling sense of horror, as Michael... Read more... |
