Author: The Reviews Hub - London

Writer: William Shakespeare  Director: Nicolás Perez Costa  Nicolás Perez Costa’s brooding, atmospheric, highly stylised ensemble production of Richard III arrives in London after a commercially and critically acclaimed Spanish-language production in Madrid. The transition to English with an international cast is not entirely successful – much of the poetry and psychological nuance in Shakespeare’s dialogue is lost to thickly accented performances and the unrelenting physicality of the production. Still, Perez Costa makes for a memorably villainous Richard, and the 90-minute adaptation evokes a hauntingly dystopian, visually impressive milieu in which power politics are played out through writhing bodies, percussive rhythms, and no small amount of violence.  Perez Costa takes Queen Margaret’s (Juliet Prew) venomous description of Richard as “hell’s black intelligencer” as a blueprint for the character’s stage presence: quite literally a…

Writer and Director: Shashwat Srivastava Two 17-year-old boys seek refuge in a warehouse in Delhi after killing a gang member. While they wait until things have calmed down, they decide to create content for their social media. Isn’t that what Gen Z do? However, despite the promising start, Shashwat Srivastava’s play soon resembles a showreel. The two actors bounce onto the stage as they run in unison from the crime scene to the warehouse. Aryaman Krishna Aggarwal and Vrishab Wig are very good dancers, and Vishakha Chakravarty’s tight comic choreography is reminiscent of old Hollywood musicals. It’s an electric start,…

Writer: William Shakespeare Director: Mark Collier As You Like It is the perfect play for a warm summer’s evening. Since most of the action takes place in the Forest of Arden, outdoors makes perfect sense. And the Royal Hospital Chelsea’s stable courtyard, spacious but enclosed, is an ideal venue. It is, however, right under the Heathrow flightpath. Full marks to the cast, working without mics, for remaining audible against almost continual low-flying aircraft noise. It must be very hard work, but their energy never dips. Lucy Green’s simple set provides a tent-like screen through and around which the four performers…

Writer: Raphael Phillips Director: Mojola Akinyemi Mojola Akinyemi directs Monkeyface at Riverside Studios, with writer Raphael Phillips starring in this critically acclaimed solo performance. Monkeyface is poignant and emotional, but at times feels like it fails to reach its own potential. The play begins with Pink Pantheress blaring as Phillips enters the stage. Monkeyface is based on Phillips’ own life, as he navigates university and student halls in London. Phillips, who went to Central Saint Martins before dropping out, describes through the play the sense of isolation felt at university and the difficulty with belonging. This sense of Other is…

Writer: Katie Đỗ  Director: Jennifer Tang A few times in Katie Đỗ’s new play love you long time (already), the characters mention that their lives are like those lived in a soap opera. But unfortunately, this self-referential nod does nothing to mitigate the fact that this play is a soap opera, replete with extramarital affairs and even a doctor in a white coat with a stethoscope draped around his neck. If you like 20th-century soap operas, this may be no issue. However, love you long time (already) begins promisingly with Mai meeting her husband in the afterlife, where she is…

Songs of the Bulbul – Sadler’s Wells East, London Choreographer: Rani Khanam In 1899, Paul Laurence Dunbar, the son of formerly enslaved parents, published a poem called *Sympathy*, and its final line, “I know why the caged bird sings”, became one of the most resonant images in American literature; resonant enough that 70 years later Maya Angelou borrowed it for the title of her first book. But the image is older than either of them. In Persian Sufi tradition, the bulbul, the nightingale, has sung of captivity and yearning for centuries, its song directed always towards the rose, its longing…

Lyrics: Tim Rice Music: Andrew Lloyd Webber Director: Timothy Sheader 10 years after it first packed the pews at Regent’s Park – and by way of the Barbican in 2019 and a socially distanced resurrection in the summer of 2020 – Timothy Sheader’s Olivier-winning Jesus Christ Superstar arrives at the Palladium on something nearer its fourth coming than its second. Indoors, it has lost the sky but kept the sweat. Sheader sends his cast screaming past the stalls in the opening number, and the congregation is converted: disciples within minutes, Judases by the interval. The betrayal is made easier by…

Opening on 11 July at the Menier Chocolate Factory, the musical by Academy Award, Golden Globe and Grammy-winner Mark Sonnenblick will star Ben Platt (Dear Evan Hansen) in his debut London theatre performance. Set in New York in 1965, Midnight at the Never Get tells the love story between two men, Trevor and Arthur. It is directed by David Cromer. Runs from 11 July to 12 September 2026