Friday, December 14, 2018
Thrilling revival of Danai Gurira's 2012 play about Chistianity and imperialismWow! First, the Black Panther team took cinema by storm; now, they have conquered theatre as well. Or, at …
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:32PM[SHARE]Thursday, December 13, 2018
Mark Ravenhill's comeback play is a brilliant account of the abuse of powerPlaywright Mark Ravenhill, who shot to fame in 1996 with his in-yer-face shocker Shopping and Fucking, has bee…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:18PM[SHARE]Wednesday, December 5, 2018
Short new play from actor Ellie Kendrick is full of ferocity, but lacks originalityActor Ellie Kendrick is a familiar face on television, but it's only as a writer that she reveals the depth…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 06:12PM[SHARE]Friday, November 9, 2018
Girls just wanna have fun in the sun - smart, funny but slender debut playBecause of the #MeToo movement, and the revival of feminist protest, the theme of sisterhood now has a much stronger…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 06:33PM[SHARE]Tuesday, November 6, 2018
Imaginative adaptation of Zadie Smith's 2000 classic let down by unnecessary musicYou can see why artistic director Indhu Rubasingham chose to stage this version of Zadie Smith's classi…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 08:18PM[SHARE]Thursday, November 1, 2018
New epic compares the experience of black people in the US and the UKTwo countries; two histories. Being black in the US; being black in the UK. Compare and contrast. Which is exactly what d…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:32PM[SHARE]Wednesday, October 24, 2018
Martin McDonagh's latest is poorly written and lacking in imagination It's all in the title, isn't it? Martin McDonagh's surreal new play comes with a warning that not only screams its …
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 05:54PM[SHARE]Wednesday, October 17, 2018
Nina Raine's follow-up to her very big hit Consent is often funny but rarely deepIn 2017, playwright Nina Raine's Consent, an excellent National Theatre play about lawyers and rape vict…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 06:48PM[SHARE]Tuesday, October 9, 2018
David Hare's latest is set in an alternative reality that is more 2008 than 2018Whatever you might think about Brexit, the dreaded B word, the current climate certainly seems to be reinvigor…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:18PM[SHARE]Saturday, October 6, 2018
Victorian pugilistic drama: thoroughly heartfelt, highly original and completely timelyThere are not that many plays about sport, but, whether you gamble on results or not, you can bet that …
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 05:04AM[SHARE]Tuesday, October 2, 2018
Cold War surveillance drama is interesting, but can't quite conceal its ageWe do love our spy stories, don't we? The idea of betrayal, both political and personal, seems to be a strong …
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 08:04PM[SHARE]Tuesday, September 25, 2018
Semi-autobiographical coming of age story jumps to the sounds of grimeThere was once a time when grime music was very angry, and very threatening, but that seems a long time ago now. Today, …
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 06:32PM[SHARE]Friday, September 14, 2018
Deeply felt show about love, marriage and migration doesn't quite work Director Madani Younis, who since 2011 has transformed the Bush Theatre in West London into one of London's most outsta…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 02:18PM[SHARE]Wednesday, September 12, 2018
Overwhelmingly powerful new play about motherhood and psychological collapse Blackout. Dark, the colour of childhood fear. Black, the colour of despair. Black. No light visible; no colours t…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:04PM[SHARE]Monday, September 10, 2018
The old Tricycle Theatre is transformed with a name change and a great opening playHoly shit! After being closed for two long years, the old and battered Tricycle Theatre in Kilburn has been…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:04PM[SHARE]Thursday, August 9, 2018
Anti-naturalistic revival of Brian Friel's elegiac tribute to the Catholic nobility is oddly unemotionalChekhovian is a rather over-used word when it comes to describing some of the lat…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:04PM[SHARE]Tuesday, August 7, 2018
New monologue about drug dealing on the Dark Web is well written if a bit slightThe Dark Web has an intriguing sound about it. Like something out of JRR Tolkein or JK Rowling, it suggests a …
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 05:32PM[SHARE]Thursday, July 19, 2018
Alan Bennett's black comedy is a howl against the privatization of deathThe NHS is us. For decades our national identity has been bandaged together with the idea, and reality, of a heal…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:04PM[SHARE]Friday, July 13, 2018
Female friendship comedy drama is occasionally bright, but lacks plot and depth Britain is rightly proud of its record on multiculturalism, but whenever cross-cultural couples are shown on f…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 06:42PM[SHARE]Wednesday, July 4, 2018
The RSC's adaptation of Robert Harris's Cicero books reaches the West EndHistory repeats itself. This much we know. In the 1980s, under a Tory government obsessed with cuts, the big new thin…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:48PM[SHARE]Thursday, June 28, 2018
Huge new play about the fertility industry is rather crudely conceived We are now pretty familiar with the idea that human reproduction (making babies) has been turned into big business, and…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 06:48PM[SHARE]Wednesday, June 27, 2018
Smart and powerful new play about fear, terror and prejudice runs out of steamIt's the stuff of nightmares. There's a massive explosion, the sound of smashing glass, falling debris and polic…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 08:32PM[SHARE]Monday, June 11, 2018
New comedy about a celebrity chef sometimes sizzles, but leaves a bad taste Forget about dark alleys, deserted parks and slippery slopes: the most dangerous place in the world is likely to b…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:32PM[SHARE]Tuesday, June 5, 2018
Sympathetic new play about a migrant's death is well staged, but imperfectly writtenRegular air travel is a hassle. All that queuing, all that security, all those hot halls, and then th…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 08:04PM[SHARE]Friday, June 1, 2018
Frantic Assembly's take on the crisis of masculinity is theatrically exciting but banalMasculinity, whether toxic or in crisis (but never ever problem-free), is a hardy perennial subject for…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:42PM[SHARE]Tuesday, May 8, 2018
Sad and intimate play about rural life gets a bit lost in this large theatrePlaywright Barney Norris is as prolific as he is talented. Barely out of his twenties, he has written a series of …
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 05:42PM[SHARE]Wednesday, May 2, 2018
Joe 'Sunny Afternoon' Penhall's triumphant new play about the music industry really rocksPlaywright Joe Penhall and the music biz? Well, they have history. When he was writing the book for S…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 06:54PM[SHARE]Monday, April 30, 2018
New comedy about a West-Indian wake is lively, but a bit undercookedThe good news about so-called black drama on British stages is that it has broken out of its gangland violence ghetto and …
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 06:42PM[SHARE]Thursday, April 26, 2018
Energetic revival of Rodney Ackland's best play exposes many of its faults Rodney Ackland must be the most well-known forgotten man in postwar British theatre. His legend goes like this: Abs…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 02:54AM[SHARE]Wednesday, April 25, 2018
New two-hander about sex is wise and funny, but fails to achieve a climax Playwright Anthony Neilson has always been fascinated by sex. I mean, who isn't? But he has made it a central part o…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 07:18PM[SHARE]Saturday, April 14, 2018
New sci-fi drama about suburban perfection lacks the necessary human touch There's a whole universe which British theatre has yet to explore properly " it's called the sci-fi imagination. Al…
SOURCE: The Arts Desk at 06:59PM[SHARE]Loading more stories…
