The Unreturning at Theatre Royal Stratford East Frantic Assembly’s production of Anna Jordan’s fearless play lives up to its name in The Unreturning. What’s it like to dream of home, a return to familiarity and domesticity…community, family, friends? To long for comforts and details vivid in memory, realer-than-real? And then how is it to arrive, […]
The Stranglers’ Back on the Tracks Tour 2019
Calling all punks…. The Stranglers take me right back to my heyday and they still hold a special in my heart, especially as at the time of their success I was living near their home town Guildford where I also saw them perform live. I was a proper fan…with proper punk credentials. During the late […]
Pinter 5 at the Harold Pinter Theatre
Pinter Wonderland… Pinter at the Pinter is a unique theatrical event, presenting together – for the first time ever – all his 20 one-act plays. Harold Pinter is vintage; an evergreen, 20th Century classic. Born in Hackney, London, in 1930, he lived with Antonia Fraser from 1975 until his death on Christmas Eve 2008. He […]
The Nutcracker at the Royal Albert Hall
Birmingham Royal Ballet Brings a Christmas Fairytale to Life: The Nutcracker has been with me almost all my life. Before I’d ever seen a ballet, I was given two picture books by my aunt. Coppelia and The Nutcracker were wrapped and put under the tree for an excited five-year-old girl to open on Christmas Day. […]
In the Round – The Roundhouse Presents…
January 2019 Preview – In the Round: January kicks off with In the Round at Camden’s Roundhouse. The Roundhouse is already a favourite of the team for its relatively intimate size and unique shape leading to great views of the stage. In the Round is an annual series of intimate performances where the venue is […]
Caroline, or Change at London’s Playhouse Theatre
Caroline, or Change comes to London’s West End… Tony Kushner and Jeanine Tesori’s 2003 musical has been on my must-see list for some time. Michael Longhurst’s production started life at Hampstead Theatre, moving to Chichester and now making a very welcome transfer to the Playhouse in London’s West End. This wonderfully original and quirky production takes […]
Circus 1903 at the Royal Festival Hall
The Golden Age of Circus: Contemporary Circus is all the rage lately; Barnum & Bailey’s film ‘The Greatest Showman’ is an international hit, and the rise once again of circus arts is very apparent. Over the past few years, I have found myself thrilling to a whole new the world of entertainment – one which […]
That Night Follows Day at the Southbank Centre
That Night Follows Day – a production by Tim Etchells & Forced Entertainment A Family Affair… Christmastime – perhaps more than any other time – evokes a sentimentalised childhood, a familial idyll that bears poignant relation to the complex, ambivalent truths of actual experience. What better time to see this touching theatre production of ‘That […]
The Merry Wives of Windsor – RSC
RSC at the Barbican – The Merry Wives of Windsor: The Merry Wives of Windsor is one of Shakespeare’s less frequently performed comedies and was my first viewing of this play. But even if I had seen it before, I would not have been prepared for the RSC’s wonderfully uplifting and hilarious production, directed by […]
Aladdin at the Hackney Empire – Review
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 […]