Andrew Lloyd Webber’s beloved feline fantasy is back in a dazzling new production that prowls, pounces and ultimately leaves you purring with delight. It can’t be easy bearing the responsibility of bringing one of the most successful and iconic musicals of all time back to the London stage (where it ran for 21 years from […]
About Jeanne Horak
Trainspotting: The Musical (Theatre Royal Haymarket)
Much-loved 90s Scottish cult classic movie about heroin addiction gets a slightly baffling musical makeover Thirty years ago back in my provincial hometown, I sat down in the local movie theatre to watch Trainspotting. The subject matter (heroin addiction) did not sound like something that I would ordinarily be interested in, but everyone was talking […]
Relics – Hammersmith Lyric
Family secrets and sibling quibbling in Ben Ockrent’s darkly funny play about the physical and emotional relics we inherit “Where there’s a will, there’s a way” is a great motivational phrase. That is, unless there is an inheritance involved…! Throw in four siblings with widely divergent ways of dealing with their family trauma and dynamics, […]
The Harder They Come – Theatre Royal Stratford East
Joyful theatre adaptation of the film that “brought reggae music to the world” returns to the London stage If the distinctive sound of reggae music makes you think of lazy Caribbean holidays and rum cocktails on the beach, then you are probably not alone. But if you consider for a moment the origins of reggae […]
Club Carnivore at Vivat Bacchus
Feast on the best of South Africa at this celebration of red wine and red meat We all know that every club has rules. The first rule of Fight Club was famously that we do not talk about Fight Club. But then there are some clubs that come with far less secretive (and more hospitable!) rules. Club […]
Jaja’s African Hair Braiding – Hammersmith Lyric
Joyful, award-winning Broadway play makes its UK debut, revealing touching individual stories underlying the immigrant experience This timely play by Ghanaian-American playwright Jocelyn Bioh premiered on Broadway as part of the Manhattan Theatre Club’s 2023–2024 season and quickly caught the public’s attention. Its run was extended twice during its limited season, and a series of […]
Konrad Mägi – Dulwich Picture Gallery
Step into a world of bold colour to discover the greatest Nordic modernist painter you’ve never heard of Think about Modernist painters and I’ll bet the usual suspects come to mind: Picasso, Matisse, Dali, Munch, Seurat. But one name that probably does not leap to mind is Estonian artist Konrad Mägi, despite being a contemporary […]
Ballet Black at 25 – Linbury Theatre, RBO
A striking double bill with a South African pedigree from Europe’s first black professional neoclassical ballet company, celebrating their 25th anniversary Dance is one of the most primal human urges, born out of a combination of raw emotion, atavistic response to rhythmic sounds and the urge of a community to move as one. There is […]
Opera Locos – Sadler’s Wells
Opera does not do greatest hits albums, but if they did… Giuseppe Verdi meets Bob Marley in Opera Locos, a show that blends opera’s best-known and loved arias with a sprinkling of pop hits Let’s be honest: opera can be a bit of a hard sell. Perhaps not to those who know and love the […]
Sweet Mambo by Pina Bausch – Sadler’s Wells Theatre
Legendary choreographer Pina Bausch’s richly textured penultimate work makes its long-awaited London premiere Legendary German choreographer Pina Bausch once famously said she was less interested in how people move than she was in what moves them. It is this idea that lies at the heart of Sweet Mambo, Bausch’s beautiful, emotionally intense penultimate work, which […]