Pantomime in East London – Aladdin: Love it or hate it, pantomime season is well and truly upon us…. Panto is a quintessentially British institution, but it was in fact developed from the Italian street theatre of the commedia dell’arte in the 16th Century. Here in Britain, we have made it a very Christmassy tradition […]
The Night Before Christmas – Review
The Night Before Christmas at the Southwark Playhouse: Are you already feeling jaded by all the marketing hype that Christmas brings? Had enough of Wham!? Seen A Christmas Carol umpteen times? Or just not ‘feeling it’? We may have found the perfect little pick-you-up play now on at the Southwark Playhouse. Written by […]
BOYS – The Pappy Show
BOYS review at the New Diorama Theatre As a woman, I am forever questioning the mystery of man… But surely the messages boys are fed from an early age about the world’s perceptions of manhood must be very confusing. It can’t be easy to navigate the expectations of masculinity perpetuated by society, or the strong […]
Dusty Limits in Cabaret at Watermans Arts Centre
Watermans Friday Night Live: Thank God it’s Friday. It’s been a long week… Feeling a little jaded and in need of a ‘pick-me-up’? The Watermans Arts Centre in Brentford has just the thing – funfilled Cabaret Fridays, with Dusty Limits and friends. On Friday nights, Watermans are hosting a series of Cabaret evenings. There’s plenty […]
Bill Frisell at the Cadogan Hall – EFG London Jazz Festival
EFG London Jazz Festival Review: I first went to see guitarist Bill Frisell playing at some point near the end of the 1980s. It was at the long-lamented Bass Clef jazz club run by veteran bass player Peter Ind in a pre-commodified Hoxton Square. As with this EFG London Jazz Festival outing, Frisell was playing […]
Hadestown at the National Theatre – review
Hades is coming to town… Hamilton eat your hat, Hades is coming to town. If Hades is king of the Underworld, Hermes is the king of Soul. And Soul is what this play exudes, in bucket loads. From the moment Hermes (the brilliant Andre De Shields) walks on stage in his 70’s silver grey shiny […]
The RSC’s Romeo and Juliet at the Barbican Theatre
Romeo and Juliet, Barbican Arts Centre, London The Royal Shakespeare Company’s dystopian, youthful production of Romeo and Juliet is as topical as it is tragic. With our capital in thrall to a series of dreadful knife attacks, Shakespeare’s Verona is transposed here, now, London, 2018. In Erica Whyman’s streetwise staging, passions flare, daggers are drawn […]
Drowned or Saved?
Review – Drowned or Saved by Geoffrey Williams: Drowned or Saved?, a new play written and directed by Geoffrey Williams, was the most harrowing 75 minutes I have spent in the theatre in many years. A play of visceral and psychic pain, it depicts Primo Levi’s attempt to complete a new story while he struggles […]
China National Peking Opera Company at Sadler’s Wells – Review
Peking Opera Classics at Sadler’s Wells: I’m a big opera fan but have to confess that when I was asked to review the China National Peking Opera Company at Sadler’s Wells, I had no real sense of whether it going to be Mozart in Mandarin or a more indigenous form of entertainment. I went the troupe of 65 performers […]
Macbeth at the Barbican – Review:
Royal Shakespeare Company production of Macbeth – Barbican Arts Centre: Macbeth is a startlingly gruesome play. It begins with the ending of a war but the slaying of the great and the good, adults, families and children alike, continues throughout. By the bloody end of the play, both the actors and the audience are exhausted […]