Review: TALKING HANDS, StreamingDecember 12, 2022Actions can speak louder than words - a proverb that's especially relevant with the new release of Deafinitely Theatre's final two films of its Talking Hands series.
Review: HEAR MYSELF THINK Podcast, Series 2November 18, 2022During lockdown, Hear Myself Think's mini audio-theatre podcasts exploring mental health offered solace to listeners in more than 25 countries. Coming from diverse perspectives, they're aimed at communities less likely to get support for mental health issues.
Review: DIDO AND AENEAS, Theatre Royal BathOctober 21, 2022It's a double first at Theatre Royal Bath with Henry Purcell's Dido and Aeneas. Regarded as England's first opera when initially performed around 1688, it's also the first opera to be performed in the intimate Ustinov Studio.
Review: THE WELLSPRING. Salisbury PlayhouseOctober 13, 2022The Wellspring is a new father and son two-hander by award-winning playwright Barney Norris (Visitors, Eventide, Nightfall) and novelist (Five Rivers Met on a Wooded Plain, Undercurrent); and his father - pianist, composer and broadcaster David Owen Norris.
Review: SPIKE, Salisbury PlayhouseOctober 5, 2022In a fabulously fast-paced and funny tribute to Spike Milligan, writers Ian Hislop and Nick Newman affectionately convey how the extraordinary Anglo-Irishman creates The Goon Show.
Review: WHEN DARKNESS FALLS, Salisbury PlayhouseSeptember 28, 2022A debate about folklore versus fact, and whether history is just 'a collection of lies we've decided upon'. Are ghost stories a projection of our fears? Who do you believe in the end?
Review: HORSE-PLAY at Riverside StudiosSeptember 2, 2022What did our critic think of HORSE-PLAY at Riverside Studios? Well, you could stick to bland Date Night ideas, like going to the cinema or a gastropub meal for two. Or you could be more daring, like Tom and Tim. After a decade of marriage, the married gay couple decide to spend an evening with a hunky male escort in a sex dungeon. What could possibly go wrong?
Review: INTO THE WOODS, Theatre Royal BathAugust 26, 2022A terrifically trippy child's world on speed in a Victorian toy theatre within a theatre, conjured up by inventive 81-year-old Gilliam, and his co-director and choreographer, Leah Hausman.
Review: PHAEDRA/MINOTAUR, Theatre Royal BathAugust 18, 2022They say good things come in small packages. This adage certainly applies to Theatre Royal Bath’s larger-than-life double bill of Benjamin Britten’s Phaedra and newly commissioned ballet, Minotaur, in the diminutive Ustinov Studio.
Review: MARGOT LA ROUGE/LE VILLI at Opera Holland ParkJuly 22, 2022What did our critic think of MARGOT LA ROUGE/LE VILLI at Opera Holland Park? You have to applaud Opera Holland Park for not only focusing on money-spinning blockbusters, but for giving rarely performed works an airing. In a double bill of short operas (think bite-sized short story rather than weighty novel), audiences can explore two lesser-known works directed by Martin Lloyd-Evans: Frederick Delius's Margot La Rouge and Giacomo Puccini's Le Villi.
Review: THE TEMPEST, Theatre Royal BathJuly 8, 2022What can be better than watching The Tempest on the night when Prime Minister Boris Johnson's spell was finally broken? Surely, it's a good time to reflect on the play's exploration of power, illusion, loss, revenge and redemption.
BWW Review: THE LEMON TABLE, Salisbury PlayhouseOctober 23, 2021When Booker Prize-winner Julian Barnes saw The Lemon Table early in its world premiere run, he gave his seal of approval to the adaptation of his short stories. A fine accolade for adaptor and star Ian McDiarmid, best known for his role as Emperor Palpatine in the Star Wars films, Olivier and Tony award-winning performances, and 12 years as the Almeida Theatre’s artistic director.
BWW Review: THE DRESSER, Theatre Royal BathSeptember 16, 2021Theatre Royal Bath is the ideal venue for Olivier Award-winning Sir Ronald Harwood’s play about a touring rep company set in “a theatre in the English provinces”, according to the programme notes. You can’t get more English than Bath, with its honey-tinged Georgian terraces and nods to Jane Austen’s bonneted Regency times.