Lords and Fairies Frolic in Gilbert and Sullivan’s Iolanthe Walk through the large wooden doors into Wilton’s Music Hall, and you’ll find a rabbit warren of bars serving cocktails, beer, wine and food. It’s an intimate, atmospheric setting with stripped-down wood, bare plaster, and mismatched chairs and tables, making it a great place to meet […]
The Shitheads at Royal Court Theatre
A tumble through dark prehistory Quentin Tarantino is Hollywood’s prophet of violence. His knack for purifying stories into gory climaxes is notorious in modern cinema. Yet, upstairs at the Royal Court in the intimate Jerwood Theatre, Jack Nicholls’s debut play, The Shitheads, gives Quentin a run for his money. The Shitheads is part period piece, […]
Cable Street – Marylebone Theatre
A musical adaptation of a slice of London’s history Following two sellout runs in 2024 at Southwark Playhouse, Cable Street has now opened in north London at Marylebone Theatre. The musical tells the story of remarkable resistance to the march of Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists (funded by the Nazi Party in Germany) in […]
Gawain and the Green Knight at Park Theatre
A witty workplace comedy enlivens a medieval tale Cult British sitcom The Office (2001) set the standard for comedy drama about apparently unremarkable people. The show’s co-creator, Stephen Merchant, said in an interview that a great story “jolts [a person] out of their life and gives them a way of reframing it”. There couldn’t be […]
Jack and the Beanstalk – Adult Only – King’s Head
Raucous and risqué fun that’s really well done This is the second year that the King’s Head Theatre (KHT) has put on special 18+ performances of its otherwise family-friendly Christmas pantomime. It was my first time visiting the KHT in its current venue, which opened in 2024 in a new building behind the King’s Head […]
The Hunger Games on Stage, Canary Wharf Troubadour
There is certainly anticipation awaiting this new lavish production of The Hunger Games, but are the odds in its favour? This is a big production with a proper emotional heart and an ever-apposite message. As a West End show outside of the West End, The Hunger Games is sure to help Canary Wharf become a […]
Coven at Kiln Theatre
An exhilarating musical that subverts the witch hunt Like Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Coven opens with the voices of (so-called) witches. Like Macbeth, it speaks strongly to audiences’ obsession with pagan magic and ‘fallen’ women. But where Shakespeare’s pillar of theatre bends to tastes for sinister femininity, from its first beat, Coven reverts and resists the doctrine […]
Faustus in Africa! William Kentridge & Handspring Puppet Company
The Story of Faustus Reimagined for Modern Day Africa I have a thing about puppets. That is to say, I love them. Not the simplistic Punch and Judy type, but rather the more sophisticated variety, detailed and realistic effigies skilfully manipulated to tell a complex story in ways that enraptures both children and adults. So […]
Fatherland at Hampstead Theatre
An unrelenting road trip through family dysfunction ‘My name is Winston Smith and only good things happen to me’ incants the protagonist of Fatherland. It’s a prophecy, a mantra and a delusion – the meanings of which fuel a father-daughter drama that resists easy reconciliations. Road journeys are hard to accomplish in theatre. Chloé Zhao’s […]
Kindling – Park Theatre
“If they loved me and I loved them, surely they will love each other” – or The One Where Five Perimenopausal Women Get Lost In a Forest There is an old joke that every woman should find a man who is a good cook; a man who is a good listener; a man who is […]