384 stories by "Daniel Perks"
Friday night: the happiest part of every adult’s week. "Monday it's back to grey", exclaims Shane (James Cartwright), but on Friday the week is done and the freedom of the weekend awai…
A black curtain provides the barrier between stage and audience for three works from Ballet Black, a professional company for dancers of black and Asian descent. Two works are newly commissi…
Animal behaviour has long been studied through live experiments " put a rat in a maze, apply a stimulus and see how it reacts. The Truman Show is a 1990s film whereby Jim Carrey finds himsel…
He may be one of the most well-known and celebrated playwrights in history, but William Shakespeare is not an easy man to understand. Language has moved on to such a large degree in the last…
No question about it, Angie Darcy sure can sing. As Janis Joplin in Full Tilt, she mixes rock and blues with country in a two-hour concert of fairly epic proportions. She also has a great ha…
For someone who is so used to taking off her clothes in public, this is an unusually vulnerable display from Ursula Martinez. She is well-known on the cabaret circuit and her shows leave lit…
When you're a child, there is no guilt, no shame, no pre-conceptions about how people should look or how a life should be lived. When you're a child, questions such as "what do you like abou…
Patrick Marber's three act play Dealer's Choice is in many ways a well-chosen piece for an actor's showcase. It presents the five students of Guildhall with a short production and six equ…
As the recipient of the JMK Award 2015, Liz Stevenson joins a list of 16 past winners that include Caroline Steinbeis and Polly Findlay. In Memory of James Menzies-Kitchin, who passed away i…
A disused water reservoir has been converted into a new underground opera venue in Brisbane, Australia. Spring Hill Reservoir has been re-opened by The Underground Opera Company to create a …
The origin of its name is still hotly debated by the volunteers before every show. I hear newcomers asking the more experienced stage hands about it in each room I walk through and everyone …
On the anniversary that commemorates the end of one of the deadliest conflicts in history, Staying Alive is a play that examines the effect on those left behind. It's not a play about World …
When Kenneth Branagh announced the formation of the Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company in April 2015, the West End was understandably buzzing with excitement. The last time Branagh had graced t…
Another of the 'Plays at the Garrick' series from the Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company, Harlequinade and All On Her Own are two works that truly showcase the versatility of Terence Rattigan's…
It is rumoured that the character of the Dodo in the book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is a caricature of Lewis Carroll himself, created as a consequence of Carroll's stammer and hence h…
The diversity of culture in Britain today is very different to the world that Anita & Me is set in; the 1970s Black Country was much less culturally rich than 40 years on. Meera Syal's s…
The title of this particular showcase sounds like a mantra that many creative visionaries have pledged to live their lives by. As Britain's oldest dance company, it is not out of place in de…
With so many potential topics for theatre to explore, there really is carte blanche nowadays for a writer to paint the canvas of their work. So many plays look to tackle deeper intellectual …
Despite the seeming obsession the British public has with animals, I personally have never been a fan. Yet nowadays a modern British high street seems incomplete without the image of a coiff…
As one of the world's most well-known operas, it is strange to think that Carmen was so underappreciated in its day; Bizet sadly passed away before witnessing the true magnitude of his most …
"I kicked a fucking pram", declares Jude (Sarah Mayhew) at the start of the anger management class. Straight to the point, it explains exactly why she is there in the first place and gives P…
Joanne is the central character in this production and yet she is never seen on stage. She doesn't speak and the audience don’t see what she looks like. She is a spectre within the pla…
Velvet Trumpet brought its fifth edition of Soggy Brass to Southwark Playhouse to showcase potential new talent in comedy writing. Six writers presented their comedic talents on the stage in…
One hundred years on from the start of World War One, Michael Nunn and William Trevitt (co-founders and Artistic Directors of BalletBoyz) collaborated with contemporary choreographer Iván…
I once visited a pub in Nottingham that claimed to be the oldest in England; my flatmate took me there when she was studying in the city. It dated back to 1437 and served a good cider if I r…
