599 stories by "Clare Brennan"
Theatre Royal, YorkWriter Susan Watkins's debut drama about the second world war pilots who became the "guinea pigs" for innovative plastic surgeon Archibald McIndoe delivers a great story i…
Curve, LeicesterLast week, speaking on Front Row on Radio 4, the director of the National theatre, Nicholas Hytner, called on our government to reinstate the money it has cut from the b…
Royal Lyceum, Edinburgh; then touringMichel Tremblay's 1968 play is set in a working-class district of Montreal and written in the local French-Canadian dialect (called joual). Translated in…
Royal Exchange, ManchesterA 1977 BBC Play of the Month production first made me love William Wycherley's wickedly satirical comedy, written 15 years after Charles II returned from France in …
Old Vic, BristolThis glorious Georgian theatre celebrates its phoenix-like resurrection from potential dereliction with a rumbustious production of John O'Keeffe's 1791 comedy about the prot…
Theatre on the Fly, Festival theatre, ChichesterIn an interview last year, award-winning playwright Penelope Skinner (Eigengrau, The Village Bike) said her next work would be "set in a motor…
Museum Gardens, YorkThe gothic arched windows of St Mary's Abbey point to no roof but the sky. Like the Mystery plays, the abbey was suppressed during the Reformation of the 16th centur…
Courtyard, Stratford-upon-AvonPart of the World Shakespeare festival, Iqbal Khan's production is set in a contemporary Delhi that probably bears as much relation to that city as did the Mess…
Stephen Joseph, ScarboroughFor his 76th play, Alan Ayckbourn transports his audience to a decades-distant future where children are rare, centenarians are common and time-travel is possible.…
Theatre Royal, BathFollowing February's much-praised production of Goldsmith's 1773 She Stoops to Conquer at the National Theatre in London, Jamie Lloyd directs another classic 18th-century …
Theatre on the Fly, Festival theatre, ChichesterWhen a grown man appeared on our TV screens in 1979, striding across a grassy field dressed in children's clothes, it was surprising. When the…
West Yorkshire Playhouse, LeedsThis is a musical of two halves: one major, the other minor. The first half is rocking, rollicking, poster-bright, high-energy fun. The goodies are good, the b…
Number One First Street, ManchesterManchester's Library Theatre Company lost its old home two years ago. Its new space is not yet ready. In the meantime, it must find places to perform. Some…
Tramway, GlasgowHundreds cheered and many stood to applaud National Theatre of Scotland's pre-press night performance. Six people walked out before the interval-less production reached its c…
Dukes, LancasterFour hundred years ago this August, 10 men and women were hanged on Lancaster Moor, the culmination of one of England's biggest witch trials. Twenty had been accused (16…
Royal & Derngate, NorthamptonMemories of last year's riots are fresh. Jubilee celebrations have begun. Olympic torchbearers draw nearer to London. The time is right to run a set of play…
Crucible, SheffieldHarold Pinter's 1978 play is both deeply personal and disquietingly universal. Its ostensible subject matter is the staple of bourgeois drama: publisher Robert (Colin Tier…
Patti Pavilion, SwanseaThere's a lovely reading on YouTube of Dylan Thomas's short story Just Like Little Dogs. The text unfurls on the screen as the voice of " I think " Anthony Hopkins spe…
Hull Truck, HullIn Ivan Viripaev's play, four performers in their 30s take turns to narrate the stories of two elderly and long-married couples. They begin at the ends of the lives and shutt…
Royal Shakespeare theatre, Stratford-upon-AvonBefore the house lights went down, two men climbed on to the stage and began to sing. Their voices wavered, harmony faltered; they exited audito…
Royal Lyceum, EdinburghDC Jackson's comic drama of sexual and financial shenanigans among Edinburgh's banking elite relies heavily on its two sources: Beaumarchais's 1784 comedy The Marriage…
The Curve, LeicesterAs the brass and percussion strike the opening bars, period posters, their colours bleached to shades of grey, descend from the flies. The most prominent pictures a happy…
Crucible, Sheffield"This is not art, it's mathematics!" complains Simon Wilson's exasperated architect in Michael Frayn's Benefactors, as he struggles to square daylight regulations with the…
Men still dominate the big jobs in performing arts. And I have noticed, shockingly, that female theatre students are still prone to cede to male classmates. But is change finally coming?In h…
Liverpool PlayhouseIn a week when leading playwrights accused the subsidised theatres of preferring familiar fare to challenging work, Gemma Bodinetz, artistic director of the Liverpool Play…
