Kyoto’s Chiten Theatre presents a Japanese version of Dostoevsky’s The Gambler ‘Write what you know’ is a familiar maxim for novelists. Perhaps that was why, when Dostoevsky faced the challenge of writing a novel in 30 days, he wrote The Gambler. He, too, like his protagonist, was addicted to roulette and was no stranger to […]
Ballet Nights #010 – DecaDance
Ballet Nights Returns to Cadogan Hall in Glowing Form DecaDance was the 10th London iteration of the Ballet Nights brand, now comfortably installed in Chelsea’s Cadogan Hall. Having seen all its predecessors, I feel confident in stating that it was the best so far. The brainchild of former dancer Jamiel Devernay-Laurence, Ballet Nights’ founder and […]
Debate: Baldwin vs Buckley – Wilton’s Music Hall
Historic 1965 Cambridge Union Debate reimagined In 1965, an electrifying debate took place at the Cambridge Union Society. The speakers were James Baldwin, an acclaimed American novelist and civil rights activist, and William F. Buckley Jr., a conservative intellectual. The motion debated was ‘The American Dream is at the expense of the American Negro’. The […]
Arcadia
Heaven Is a Place on Earth The critical consensus considers Arcadia to be the late Tom Stoppard’s most brilliant play. Tonight is the press night for Arcadia’s second major London revival at the playwright’s home from home, The Old Vic, where he made his name with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. An extremely witty and […]
The Tempest – Sam Wanamaker Theatre, The Globe
Do you have favourite theatres in London? Sam Wanamaker is one of mine. It’s a tiny indoor theatre next door to the better-known Globe Theatre. Perfect, perhaps, for The Tempest, one of Shakespeare’s best-loved plays and one that conjures up a magical world. It is lit entirely by candlelight; the Jacobean-style playhouse is warm and […]
Boris Godunov at the Royal Opera House
Terfel Returns with a Monumental Boris Director Richard Jones’ take on Modest Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov is having its third outing at the Royal Opera House; previous productions were in 2016 and 2019, with Bryn Terfel reprising his role as the haunted Czar. Mussorgsky drafted his own libretto for Boris Godunov from Pushkin’s drama and Karamzin’s […]
Julia Phillips at the Barbican Curve
Inside, Before They Speak Exhibition Writers often use the term ‘visceral’ metaphorically, to signify raw, instinctive emotions: but as applied to the current exhibition at the Barbican Curve, Julia Phillips’s Inside, Before They Speak, the term is used quite literally. The exhibition focuses on the Chicago-based artist’s almost obsessive interest in the body, particularly […]
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 […]
Guess How Much I Love You? at Royal Court Theatre
An unflinching navigation of family tragedy “I will arise and go now, for peace comes dropping slow,” reads the male lead to his bed-bound partner and their dying, severely disabled newborn boy. These lines sing out in Guess How Much I Love You?, Luke Norris’s new play about a couple navigating the premature loss of […]
London City Ballet Unveils 2026 Season
London City Ballet’s Mouth-Watering New Season London City Ballet is one of the best things – if not even the best thing – to have happened to British ballet in the past couple of years. No wonder we are looking forward to its new season with breathless anticipation. Quick recap: London City Ballet is […]