All stories by Michael Billington on BroadwayStars

Thursday, June 28, 2012

Kiss Me Kate " review by Michael Billington

Chichester Festival TheatreCole Porter's cosmopolitan chic essentially belonged to the 1930s, but he enjoyed a late, great hit in 1948 with this backstage story: one that shows the battling …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:25PM[SHARE]
Wednesday, June 27, 2012

Loserville " review by Michael Billington

West Yorkshire Playhouse, LeedsI have moaned constantly about the dearth of new musicals but this theatre has certainly done its bit, with shows ranging from Spend Spend Spend! to The Go-Bet…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:53PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Fear " theatre review by Michael Billington

Bush Theatre, London"What is robbing a bank compared to founding a bank?" asks Brecht in The Threepenny Opera. That idea pervades Dominic Savage's sharp, short theatrical debut. But, althoug…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:00PM[SHARE]
Monday, June 25, 2012

The Drawer Boy " review by Michael Billington

Finborough, LondonForty years ago, a Toronto company created a devised play by sending a group of actors to live and work on farms in Ontario. That experience, a landmark in Canadian theatre…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:22PM[SHARE]
Sunday, June 24, 2012

Druid Murphy " review by Michael Billington

Hampstead, LondonSurvivors of Gatz will not shrink at the idea of a nine-hour day spent watching three plays by the great Irish dramatist, Tom Murphy. Garry Hynes, who directs them for Galwa…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:00PM[SHARE]
Friday, June 22, 2012

The Prophet - review by Michael Billington

Gate, LondonFive years ago Hassan Abdulrazzak caused quite a stir with a debut play, Baghdad Wedding, about life among London's Iraqi exiles. Now at long last comes a second play, The Prophe…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:04PM[SHARE]
Wednesday, June 20, 2012

The Last of the Haussmans " review by Michael Billington

Lyttelton, LondonPlays about the legacy of the 1960s are becoming increasingly common. After Mike Bartlett's Love, Love, Love and Alexi Kaye Campbell's Apologia, we now have this debut from …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:21PM[SHARE]
Sunday, June 17, 2012

Minsk 2011: A Reply to Kathy Acker " review by Michael Billington

Young Vic, LondonAt the curtain call for this show from Belarus Free theatre, a protester shouted that it was "a political provocation". He went on, before clumping noisily out, to declare t…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:04PM[SHARE]
Thursday, June 14, 2012

Gatz " review by Michael Billington

Noel Coward theatre, LondonI have spent much of my life attacking adaptations. But the glory of this show, created and performed by New York's Elevator Repair Service, is that it is no cut-a…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:00AM[SHARE]
Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Torch Song Trilogy " review by Michael Billington

Menier Chocolate Factory, London Harvey Fierstein's award-winning trilogy has its place in Broadway history, in that in 1982 it showed a gay hero's quest for love and family could achieve po…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:34PM[SHARE]
Monday, June 11, 2012

The Witness " review by Michael Billington

Royal Court, LondonVivienne Franzmann scored a deserved success with Mogadishu, which examined self-destructive white liberal guilt in a school setting. Her new play extends the theme to att…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:12PM[SHARE]

James Corden's Tony award is deserved recognition for fine-tuned farce by Michael Billington

It is Corden's ability to react in the moment while sticking to the comic structure that makes this an award-worthy performanceHaving lost out in the British theatrical awards to the Franken…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:22AM[SHARE]
Friday, June 8, 2012

The Physicists " review by Michael Billington

Donmar Warehouse, LondonThe social responsibility of the scientist was a hot topic when the Swiss dramatist Friedrich Dürrenmatt wrote this play in 1961: this, after all, was a period when …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:37AM[SHARE]
Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Julius Caesar " review by Michael Billington

Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-AvonThis, of all Shakespeare's plays, badly needs a shot in the arm " and it receives a powerful one in this production by Gregory Doran, the RSC's …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:13PM[SHARE]
Monday, June 4, 2012

The Bacchae/Blood Wedding " review by Michael Billington

Various venues, NorthamptonCivilised order confronts unbridled anarchy in Northampton this summer, where Laurie Sansom has had the imaginative idea of staging a trilogy dubbed Festival of Ch…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:25AM[SHARE]
Sunday, June 3, 2012

Playwright Athol Fugard: a man of obstinacy and courage by Michael Billington

A new documentary charts the struggle of Afrikaans playwright Athol Fugard against the violence of apartheid. Michael Billington admires his spiritI have always had slightly mixed feelings a…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:45PM[SHARE]

Hamlet " review by Michael Billington

Shakespeare's Globe, LondonThe final visiting production in the invigorating Globe to Globe season is a much-travelled Hamlet, dating back to 1997, from Lithuania's Meno Fortas com…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:45PM[SHARE]
Thursday, May 31, 2012

Antigone " review by Michael Billington

Olivier, LondonWe are at the hub of a modern seat of power. As we hear the whirring sound of a helicopter overhead, frantic desk-wallahs pass urgent messages ever higher up the chain of comm…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:02PM[SHARE]
Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Ragtime " review by Michael Billington

Open Air theatre, Regent's Park, LondonThis musical had the misfortune to receive its British premiere on the night in 2003 when America invaded Iraq. Now revived by Timothy Sheader, it…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:08PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Y for Young Writers by Michael Billington

It's never been a better time to be a young playwright " but are we missing out on older voices?It's a great time to be a young dramatist. Theatres are hungry for your work. The media love t…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:06AM[SHARE]
Monday, May 28, 2012

Antony and Cleopatra " review by Michael Billington

Shakespeare's Globe, LondonOne important aspect of the Globe to Globe season is its appeal to expatriate communities. On a hot Saturday afternoon the Globe was packed with Turks, young and o…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:08PM[SHARE]

Events While Guarding the Bofors Gun " review by Michael Billington

Finborough, LondonIt is 10 years since the playwright John McGrath died; 46 since this play was last seen in London. Both the man and his work are honoured in this superb revival by Robert H…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:08AM[SHARE]
Sunday, May 27, 2012

Michael Billington on the link between cricket and the theatre by Michael Billington

You could easily make up a men's 11 of playwrights passionate about the game and directors, too, are often cricket nuts " so what's the appeal?With the summer game getting into its…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:31PM[SHARE]
Friday, May 25, 2012

Absurd Person Singular, 40 years on by Michael Billington

Alan Ayckbourn, a playwright with a remarkable ability to take the national temperature, is reviving his landmark 1972 play to mark its 40th anniversary"It is difficult to find a bright mome…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:55PM[SHARE]

Children's Children " review by Michael Billington

Almeida, London I find myself wondering what Matthew Dunster's new play is really about. Is it a satire on the perils of TV fame, a study of the fragility of friendship, or a didactic warnin…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:20AM[SHARE]
Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Posh " review by Michael Billington

Duke of York's, LondonWith even a Tory attacking the "arrogant, posh boys" who run her party, now seems a good time to revive Laura Wade's 2010 play.It has undergone a good deal of revision …

SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:01PM[SHARE]
Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Chariots of Fire " review by Michael Billington

Hampstead theatre, London"Will it run?" people asked when they first heard that the celebrated 1981 movie was to be adapted for the stage. That question seems to have been answered by the ne…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:58PM[SHARE]

X is for xenophobia by Michael Billington

For decades, Britain ignored European, African and Asian theatre. But do we now have an uncritical acceptance of anything foreign?Do we in Britain suffer from theatrical xenophobia? I used t…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:27AM[SHARE]
Monday, May 21, 2012

Arnold Wesker: food for thought by Michael Billington

As playwright Arnold Wesker turns 80, he talks about his early successes, his later battles " and the day he tried to flog his entire oeuvre for £10,000'I don't feel I'm known as a playwr…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 02:30PM[SHARE]
Friday, May 18, 2012

A Marvellous Year for Plums " review by Michael Billington

Chichester festival theatreHugh Whitemore has written a play about something that sounds eerily familiar: a legally dubious British invasion of a Middle Eastern country run by a militaristic…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:16AM[SHARE]
Thursday, May 17, 2012

The Sunshine Boys " review by Michael Billington

Savoy, LondonAmerica's Danny DeVito and Britain's Richard Griffiths join forces in this joyous revival of Neil Simon's 1972 comedy about a pair of superannuated vaudevillians. But what makes…

SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:02PM[SHARE]

All that Chat

2025-2026 BROADWAY SEASON
Jun 12, 2025: Call Me Izzy - Studio 54
Sep 16, 2025: Art - Music Box Theatre
Oct 08, 2025: Beetlejuice - Palace Theatre
Nov 13, 2025: Oedipus - Studio 54
Nov 16, 2025: Chess - Imperial Theatre
Mar 23, 2026: Giant - Music Box Theatre
Apr 06, 2026: Becky Shaw - Hayes Theater
Apr 16, 2026: Proof - Booth Theatre
Apr 26, 2026: Drama Desk Cut-Off