Tom Teodorczuk

From a brother-in-law determined to get his hands on the deceased's Rolex watch to a loud, tactless uncle, Fish In the Dark swims in clichés. Until a preposterous second act subplot involving the maid's son, Diego, and Gloria, the comedy stays true to life without ever saying anything significant about life. There are a few choice Larry David-isms sprinkled into the play...But it's hard to avoid the conclusion that if Fish In the Dark had been penned by a first-time 'civilian' playwright...it would have been fortunate to receive a reading. The unknown writer would be told his characters are depthless stereotypes...and that his eye for detail...is firmly shut. Director Anna D Shapiro stages proceedings in a lively fashion...David projects his voice too moderately and adopts a wry, detached presence that would make sense if the material were more sophisticated. Yet credit must go to most of the 18-strong cast who infuse the play with a madcap spirit that makes the performance zip along faster than it would otherwise do.

Unlike John Hurt in Lynch's film, Merrick on stage is not overloaded with make-up or prosthetics. Deploying impressive physical dexterity, Cooper contorts his face and body to convey his character's disfigurement. Merrick is rescued from being a touring freak show object in Belgium by Sir Frederick Treves, a surgeon at the London Hospital, who makes it his mission to understand him. Alessandro Nivola brilliantly portrays Treves as a creature of the establishment, ultimately more insecure than his impaired pupil.

Contrasting the messy way in which art imitates life in The Real Thing, this play always seems to enjoy a charmed life when revived. Perhaps it's because Stoppard at his most relatable and quotable ('If Beethoven had been killed in a plane crash at twenty-two, the history of music would have been very different,' Henry muses. 'As would the history of aviation.') A terrific cast led by McGregor has triumphed with it yet again.

Of Mice and Men is an excellent Broadway revival fuelled by Franco who offers a welcome illustration of what can happen when a star sheds his other more modern personas and takes to the stage to simply act.

Machinal is a good play that has been greatly staged in New York by a director and leading lady both new to Broadway. Machinal hasn't been seen on Broadway for 86 years but on this evidence it will take considerably less time for Hall and Turner to be invited back here.

Although this production never catches its breath to reveal the slow-burning ashes of the past that the play usually makes vivid, knockout performances from both Craig and Weisz render it a Betrayal on fire. Nichols's crude and chaotic depiction of the love triangle is powerfully compelling theatre - enhanced, one feels, by the real-life frisson supplied by the onstage sparring of Weisz and Craig...the juxtaposition of Pinter's starkly precise dialogue with such a frenzied production reinforces the emotional violence and dishonesty suffered by all three protagonists. It would be a shame if this fine production didn't come home to London where the play first began.