UK REGIONAL THEATER REVIEWS

Gary Naylor sees an extraordinary production of Stephen Sondheim's extraordinary musical, one embedded in a Pie Shop... and in its local community....

Gary Naylor sees a musical performed with great commitment and skill let down by a plodding book and a half-hearted introduction of the question of morality in wartime....

This Is My Family broke all sales records at the Sheffield Crucible last year and due to this success has been sent on the road to visit several venues across the country. Tim Firth, writer of Calendar Girls, has turned his hand to this musical comedy and having his name attached to the production i...

Gary Naylor sees a well-crafted, old-fashioned murder mystery, the comic touches of which cannot quite compensate for the hideous characters portrayed....

I remember studying Abigail's Party in school and watching the 1977 television Play For Today version, based on the original Hampstead Theatre production. The dialogue is colloquial and there is nothing complex about the content. It is a situational drama crammed full of every day occurrences, stres...

If you are a fan of ska music, there is much to like about the Belgrade Theatre's production of Three Minute Heroes. Dubbed as the 2 Tone Musical, the production follows fictional characters trying to make it in the music industry. With the band consisting of a diverse group of young people, 2 Tone ...

Gary Naylor sees a classic of the English Stage delivered with verve and wit - he just hopes that the cast were enjoying it as much as they appeared to do!...

Gary Naylor sees a slice of early twentieth century life in which not quite enough happens, but in an interesting and innovative way, beautifully acted and intelligently staged....

Tim Firth's award-winning musical plays in the newly refurbished Lyceum Theatre...

Dreamboats and Petticoats has done the UK tour rounds on several occasions as well as having a very successful West End run. There has also been a massive franchise of CDs that have been released which have acted as another good marketing tool. Because of all this, Bill Kenwright along with his crea...

Gary Naylor enjoys a wonderful life-affirming show that paints a grim picture of London yet leaves you with a spring in your step, the world a whole lot brighter for the experience. Musical theatre at its best....

Gary Naylor sees another wonderful version of a most famous opera done in a way that is accessible for all yet pleases the aficionados too. A fine swansong to a venue that has provided a home for OperaUpClose for four years....

Gary Naylor sees a version of one of Shakespeare's more difficult plays set in the violent world of London's East End of the 1960s, but one with plenty of laughs too....

Gary Naylor sees the first ever drama production to be hosted by the Saatchi Gallery, Proud Haddock's smart Julius Caesar, set in the present day - and powerfully so....

Gary Naylor sees two beautifully written, splendidly acted timeless plays that say as much about England today as they did in the 1980s. Funny, clever and relevant - what more can one ask?...

The English Touring Theatre/Sheffield Theatres co-production is a vibrant take on Shakespeare's classic romcom....

Dirty Dancing is iconic. An immeasurable amount of people have seen the 1987 film and adapting it for a stage show was a very clever move by the producers. The last time I saw this production was at Birmingham Hippodrome in 2012 so I was interested to see it again in a different venue. This is its s...

Gary Naylor sees a play that remains as relevant today as on its Broadway premiere seven years ago: one that scores high on talk but, inevitably, low on solutions....

Gary Naylor enjoys a stage adaptation of a Radio 4 sitcom set in an old record shop in Handsworth, Birmingham, populated by a family falling out and making up the way families do....

For three nights only, a new piece of musical theatre enjoyed its second outing at the Waterloo East Theatre - Out of the Lens, starring Guy Woolf and Andrew Walker....

Gary Naylor sees a remarkable production of a classic musical, one that brings the audience right into Sweeney's shop for a shave almost too close for comfort....

Gary Naylor sees a company brimming with talent and anger deliver a crushing critique of capitalism through dynamic, demanding drama - and plenty of well-placed sweary bits....

Gary Naylor sees a show that makes up for its lack of any real story with energy, spectacle and a real connection with an audience who went off into the London night dreaming of Rio....

Propaganda Swing is a co-production between the Belgrade Theatre and Nottingham Playhouse Theatre Company and is written by Peter Arnott. The writing is based upon a true story at the commencement of World War II in Berlin. Billy Constant, an American CBS journalist, narrates the proceedings and is ...

Gary Naylor sees a twentieth anniversary production of a play that caused outrage in the mid-90s but feels overly familiar and overtaken by events in the mid-teens....