UK / WEST END THEATER REVIEWS

**** A Woman Walks into a Bank is a blazing production, rammed with pathos, humour and a fabulously comedic cat #memory #aging #socialapathy #cat #offwestend @roxyjoycook @theatre503 @NancyPoolePR...

One of the great 20th century plays staged by one of London's great 21st century directors, but the alchemy doesn't quite create theatrical gold...

Written by Mischief trio Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer and Henry Shields and directed by Adam Meggido, Peter Pan Goes Wrong brings the Cornley Polytechnic gang back to the West End, this time taking on the “traditional Christmas vignette,” definitely not a pantomime, as Director Chris Bean emphati...

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....

Batsu: it’s not subtle, it’s not for the sober and definitely isn’t suitable for children. The ballsy, boozy gameshow from across the pond invades London for some late-night improv comedy shenanigans at the new venue Underbelly Soho....

The Vinyl Countdown has a fascinating concept - Dan Lees has picked several vinyl records from a record shop and is going to recreate them for an audience in “a riotous night of musical mayhem and clowning.” If you had not read the summary of the show beforehand, you would have spent the first s...

Tom Littler’s sparkling new production of She Stoops To Conquer is a festive delight...

Revolutionising musical theatre when it first premiered in 1963, Joan Littlewood’s Oh What A Lovely War found humour in expressing its anti-war sentiments to songs popular for the period, even garnering a film adaptation directed by Richard Attenborough....

Sadler’s Wells is a busy old place, with numerous performance spaces, departments and associated initiatives. One being the very worthwhile Young Associates programme which helps “talented dance artists aged 18-24 giving them a crucial first step into their careers as choreographers”....

It just wouldn’t be the festive season without The Liverpool Everyman Rock ‘n’ Roll Pantomime - and it’s easy to see why this beloved show has audiences returning year after year....

Two very different performances, Cerberus and Goat, from Rambert, deliver a meta dance comedy exploring life, death and performance....

If you’ve ever wanted to learn how to properly deliver a funeral, look no further than “top celebrant Áine Reilly.” In Nimah Denyer: Get Blessed!, Denyer becomes Áine, presenting her course on funerals to a crowd of eager participants.  The whole show is a part of Áine’s series on “how...

If the idea of spending time with your family over the festive season is one that makes you queasy, spare a thought for the Alvings. They have enough skeletons in the closet to populate a graveyard....

I'm sure there will be more than a few sighs of relief down the corridors of the National Theatre at the deservedly raptuous reception for The Witches, the latest attempt to bring a hit show to the stage at this lucrative time of year. 'We're not women, we're hell' is not a line you would expect at...

Rhiannon Faith Company premieres Lay Down Your Burdens at the Barbican Centre, another “socially conscious” work to add to their ever-growing portfolio...

The Realness, directed by Maggie Norris, is “an urban musical” that tells the story of Jay Johnson, a man who has been released from prison. Determined to change for the better, Jay is working to try to stay straight, but soon finds himself being pulled back into the world that had sent him to p...

Wishmas: A Fantastical Christmas Adventure has opened at London’s hidden Old Bauble Factory under Waterloo Station. Audience members are invited on a tour of “a working wish factory,” joining the Wishkeepers and their friends as they work to make wishes from around the world come true....

An immense theatre production that leans as much on the Shakespearean tradition of rehashing history for modern audiences as it does on delivering spectacular staging, The Mongol Khan invades the West End’s biggest theatre with a show sure to set tongues wagging....

The Old Vic has established Matthew Warchus' version of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol as one of London's must-see festive shows. Since 2017 audiences have been welcomed with mince pies and satsumas and showered with snow and parachuting sprouts....

Based on the Ancient Greek tragedy, The Bacchae, by Euripedes, Bacchanalia, the first show from Sleepwalk Immersive, transforms CRYPT at St. Peter’s Bethnal Green into the city of Thebes, but with a psychedelic twist....

With a potent and varied score from Thomas Adès, vibrant choreography from Wayne McGregor, and intruguing design from Tacita Dean, The Dante Project captures the attention despite the assumption audiences know who's who in this revered Italian narrative poem. The Dante Project is fierce yet tender...

Birmingham Rep's The Snowman is currently playing its 26th year at The Peacock Theatre, adapted from the charming 1978 picture book by Raymond Briggs and inspired by the 1982 film. The production markedly extends the story, with significant updates and beautifully  directed by Dianne Jackson....

Flip! is a high energy satire from acclaimed writer Racheal Ofori, directed by Emily Aboud. The play is a two-hander, matched in their dynamism and skill....

Empowering musical still has work to be done, but demonstrates its potential to captivate an audience...

The unique event that is Letters Live returned to the Royal Albert Hall to celebrate its tenth anniversary on 16 November. Since December 2013, it has appeared from Wilderness Festival to a refugee camp in Calais, bringing the joy and wonder of the written word to audiences all over the world....