Writer: Stephen Mallatratt, from the novel by Susan Hill Director: Robin Herford Reviewer: Ben Miller-Jarvest A black stage. A single candle, trembling in an actor’s hand. Screams echoed through the theatre and not all of them came from the stage. If the cold shiver down the spine isn’t a tip-off, The Woman In Black has arrived in town. Our setting ...
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Writer: Alice Childress Director: Laurence Boswell Reviewer: Claire Hayes In the aftermath of a brutal 2016 election dividing the US along racial lines, Trouble in Mind offers a particularly timely glimpse of segregation in mid-20th Century America. Laurence Boswell’s latest production for the Ustinov revives Alice Childress’ trailblazing but overlooked work, originally produced Off Broadway in 1955; a race-play-within-a-race-play. It’s ...
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Writer: Richard O’Brien Director: Christopher Luscombe Reviewer: Jess Rowe Forty-three years on from its debut performance at London’s Royal Court Theatre, The Rocky Horror Show continues to be a timeless theatrical experience for any theatre-goer. As well as recently receiving a FOX remake to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the motion picture cult classic, it is now on its 11th UK Tour ...
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Writer: John Mighton Director: Nancy Meckler Reviewer: Claire Hayes When memories fade, what is there left of us? John Mighton’s play examines issues of memory and identity; how reality blurs with age, the balance shifts and we become more diminished by what we have forgotten than defined by our recall of the past. It’s a subject matter that reflects the ...
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English Touring Theatre has announced its Spring 2017 season, which features the world première of Silver Lining, a new comedy written by comedienne and presenter Sandi Toksvig, and a tour of the critically acclaimed Olivier Award winning Shakespeare’s Globe production of Nell Gwynn, starring Laura Pitt-Pulford in the title role. It is the final season under the stewardship of Director ...
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Writer: William Shakespeare Director: Laurence Boswell Reviewer: Claire Hayes Blue-daubed fairies prance and writhe, furious lovers claw and fight under a huge forest moon as one of Shakespeare’s best-loved comedies – the one so many of us cut our teeth on at school – is given a captivatingly contemporary and imaginative treatment in this new production from the Theatre Royal ...
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Writer: Noël Coward Director: Stephen Unwin Reviewer: Kris Hallett Another night another West. The night after Timothy West climbed the mountain of Lear for the fourth time in his career, his son Sam takes up the gauntlet with his own bravura stage role as Gary Essendine in Noel Coward’s Present Laughter. It’s an old-fashioned barnstorming leading role; hardly off the ...
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Writer: W S Gilbert Composer: Arthur Sullivan Director:Sasha Regan Reviewer: Claire Hayes Sasha Regan’s all-male take on Gilbert &Sullivan’s Victorian classic H.M.S. Pinafore was originally staged at Southwark’s Union Theatre over two years ago, but feels just as pin-sharp in this 2016 tour as when it first set sail. Based below decks in a Second World War battleship, sailors lounge ...
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