Review

Book: Craig Lucas Music: Daniel Messé Lyrics: Nathan Tysen & Daniel Messé Reviewer: Selwyn Knight Amélie the Musical is a sweet and quirky story of a French girl. Brought up by a distant father and neurotic mother, she is isolated from the world and retreats into her own imagination. When her mother is killed in a freak accident, Amélie leaves ...

Writer: Fernanda Mandagará Music: Joana Flor Director: Ramiro Silveira Reviewer: Margarita Shivarova An all-female cast led by Fernanda Mandagarápresents a surreal scenario where all places on Earth except for The Himalayas, The North Pole and Tropicalia Island have survived from “the mud”. A group of refugees (the audience) seek asylum on this very island and find themselves at the point ...

Writer: Anthony Horowitz Adaptor: Feargus Woods Dunlop Director: Lee Lyford Reviewer: Margarita Shivarova Based on Anthony Horowitz’s novel, this stage adaptation by New Old Friends originally produced in 2014 takes the audience on a journey of solving perhaps the toughest detective case Timothy and Nick Simple have ever come across. But don’t let this surname lead to premature conclusions about the ...

Writer: Christopher Durang Director: Lydia Parker Reviewer: Maryam Philpott A life in the theatre is full of incident; the volume of actor memoirs, plays and films dedicated to the endless backstage drama can be salaciously entertaining, but it can also be frustratingly self-indulgent. Christopher Durang’s anthology of short plays and sketches, The Actor’s Nightmare is sadly the latter, reflecting the worst excesses ...

Writer: Roderick Smith, based on Homer's Iliad Directors: Madeleine Kludje and Philip Morris Reviewer: James Garrington Homer’s Iliad is a lengthy and detailed epic poem, with a huge array of characters – Greeks, Trojans and Gods. That undoubtedly creates difficulties in translating even the essence of a part of it onto the stage. Writer Roderick Smith has had a fair ...

Designer: Fire Hazard Games Reviewer: Richard Maguire This scavenger hunt along The Embankment and within Covent Garden will certainly leave you breathless and excited. Based on Jules Verne’s thrilling novel, 80 Days: A Real World Adventure is the new interactive game devised by Fire Hazard, a company renowned for their site-specific challenges such as Citydash, a true sprint for clues ...

Writer: Willy Russell Director: Max Roberts Designer: Patrick Connellan Reviewer: Ron Simpson Educating Rita, now nearly 40 years old, is one of those plays that carries its production in its DNA. The director has few decisions about style, setting and characterization to make, only the difficult problem of how to convey warmly, convincingly and often humorously a changing relationship in ...

Writer: Fred Lawless Director: Bob Eaton Reviewer: John Roberts First produced at The Royal Court as a Christmas production, now almost a decade later the show gets a summer revival, which feels as fresh and as funny as it was when it was first performed. Needless to say this comic castaway caper features an almost face cohort in the roles ...