Eireann, by dance company A Taste of Ireland, is the brainchild of director and producer Brent Pace and partner Ceili Moore, and comes to London as a taut, slick production, heavy with Riverdance vibes. It’s a two-hour festival of Irish dancing and singing, rooted in folk music and traditions, picking out scenes from Irish heritage and history. And the performers
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There’s a very good reason to go and see Clive at the Arcola in Dalston, and it’s called Paul Keating. The two-time Olivier Award nominee holds the floor here in a 65-minute monologue with a bucket-load of charisma, mesmerizingly watchable as he flits about the stage as Thomas, twitching with nervous energy. Thomas lives alone in a starkly white flat,
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This is theatrical perfection. A piece of genuinely pure stagecraft, presented to us stripped back to its barest bones. The stage is an unpainted chipboard box. The only props: ten identical green plastic chairs. A superlative ensemble cast, skilfully assembled with all the talent and balance of a championship-winning sports team, takes on a tight, imaginative, free-flowing script and transports us into a comical,
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If you’re a Whovian (the official term for an absolutely massive Doctor Who fan) – and I’m absolutely one of these, by the way – you know you’re going to be in for a treat when one of the first things you see on a heavily graffitied wall just inside the venue is the spine-tingling phrase ‘Bad Wolf’. If you’re
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Bobbie, a professionally successful, serially single New Yorker is turning 35. As her closest, married friends gather at her apartment for a party, she begins to question whether she really does have it all. Company is back in the West End. Only this time, it’s back with a twist. Nearly 50 years after its Broadway debut, Stephen Sondheim’s 1970 introspective meditation
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An Honourable Man If you are a writer of political dramas, you can do one of two things. You can take a broad-brush approach, eschewing detail and making grand points about totalitarianism or dictatorship or whatever, without bothering much about details of parliamentary procedure or campaign finances. The idea is that the terrible things that unfold in the drama could
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Killer Joe at Trafalgar Studios Review of Killer Joe by guest blogger Daniel Bennett Set in a trailer park in Dallas, Texas, a young drug dealer, Chris, finds himself owing too much money to the wrong guys. In a bid to avoid his fate, he conspires with his father and hires the eponymous assassin, Joe – a cop who moonlights
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Translations – National Theatre By Brian Friel (Review by guest blogger Daniel Bennett) ‘What happens when a land is robbed of its language?’ This is the question National Theatre runs alongside its promotional material for the renowned Irish playwright Brian Friel’s Translations. It’s a fair question, but it is deceptively simple. It suggests the play deals with a single theme;
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Tartuffe at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket. Guest reviewer Daniel Bennett attended the press night for Tartuffe, the latest play to hit the Theatre Royal Haymarket’s stage: Tartuffe is the latest revival to be fashionably inspired by a desire to make a statement about Trump’s America. Others of this ilk include the subtle commentaries on the current western political landscape offered
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