Stephen Lawrence News

ACTORS TOURING COMPANY has announced the departure of its joint CEO and Executive Director Andrew Smaje after 8 years co-leading the organisation, the last six years alongside Artistic Director and joint CEO Matthew Xia. 

Thanks to some nifty “mixed reality” technology from Tin Drum, Oscar-winning composer Ryuichi Sakamoto is brought back to some semblance of life in Kagami.

What a year! I pulled out my notebook over a hundred times and came away, more often not, with a happy heart. Below is a condensed list of the very best - and worst - that I saw.

From two associate directors of Punchdrunk, One Night, Long Ago is an evocative walk through a mind palace which reveals more and more as the journey continues. With an audience of only 15 for each show in the venue used for Swamp Motel’s immersive show Saint Jude earlier this year, it’s a setting which builds in intimacy right from the off.

The VR-enabled Within Touching Distance is a profound work which digs deep into the psychology behind the most underrated sense. A word of warning: this show isn’t for the self-centred or the hard of feeling; those with the emotional awareness of an Ikea wardrobe will find little of value here. 

Birds do it. Bees do it. Even educated fleas do it. Let’s do it, let’s partake in Binaural Dinner Date, a highly personal experience which uses audio technology and biting wit to lay bare our own fundamental thoughts about love, connection and partnership.

Within Touching Distance combines an immersive VR and spatialised binaural audio-world with a live, intimate one-on-one performance, in which a caring choreography of touch is received from the performer and synchronised with the VR experience.

The nights are getting shorter, the swimming trunks are being packed away and you probably have bought some new pens and pencils. September is here and promises some amazing theatre to come. Check out our top ten recommendations for theatre in London this month.

A spectacular fusion of dance and architecture RESURGAM will take place on the façade of St Paul’s Cathedral, London’s best known landmark. BANDALOOP, the Californian based company known for its innovation in vertical performance, have been granted rare access to St Paul’s to create a site-responsive piece, fusing intricate mid-air choreography with rock climbing techniques and original music.

Greenwich+Docklands International Festival (GDIF) today launches its full programme, showcasing world-class theatre, art installations, spectacle and dance in locations across London. More than 35 events, including two world premieres and 14 UK premieres, are inspired by the theme Acts of Hope, inviting Londoners to come together for uplifting moments of shared wonder and connection. 

ACTORS TOURING COMPANY (ATC), the UK’s leading producer of international plays, today announce an ambitious season of work for 2023 that responds to a single artistic provocation: ‘Can we transform the painful legacies of history into a future of hope and possibility?’

The Architect is an immersive theatrical journey through time and a city conceived by Mojisola Adebayo, Roy Williams and Matthew Xia, and created with a collective of leading Black artists including Bola Agbaje, Dexter Flanders, Vanessa Macauley and XANA. 

On Friday 17 March, the Olivier Awards 2023 with Mastercard hosted their Nominees’ Celebration, in partnership with Cunard at The Londoner hotel, the world's first super boutique hotel in the heart of London's theatre district. Notable nominees such as Rose Ayling-Ellis, Beverley Knight, Rob Madge, Rafe Spall and Giles Terera were in attendance, among many of the other nominated theatre makers. Check out the photos here!

The Olivier Awards with Mastercard 2023 have formally announced the recipients for this year's Industry Recognition Award. The event is organised annually by the Society of London Theatre to recognise excellence in professional theatre.

Check out photos for Grenfell: System Failure, which will tour to three West London venues: The Playground Theatre (18 February – 25 February), The Tabernacle (27 February – 12 March) and Marylebone Theatre (14 March – 26 March).

Actor, producer, screenwriter and comedy legend, Steve Coogan will interview beloved children's author and screenwriter Frank Cottrell Boyce at Shakespeare North Playhouse on Saturday the 4th of February for 'An Evening with Frank Cottrell Boyce'.

Grenfell: System Failure asks further vital questions raised at the Grenfell Tower Inquiry since the critically acclaimed 2021 play Grenfell: Value Engineering, which was in The Telegraph's 100 best cultural events of 2021, and the Observer's top 10 productions of 2021.

Grenfell: System Failure asks those further vital questions raised at the Grenfell Tower Inquiry since the critically acclaimed 2021 play Grenfell: Value Engineering.

The Southbank Centre has today revealed its Autumn/Winter 2022/23 classical music programme – the first edition under the curatorship of Head of Classical Music Toks Dada since arriving at the Southbank Centre.

The Charlotte Symphony will make its debut at the Sandra Levine Theatre in the Sarah Belk Gambrell Center for the Arts and Civic Engagement at Queens University of Charlotte with a program showcasing the unique healing power of music on Sunday, April 3, 2022, at 3:00 p.m.