★★★★ A WOMAN WALKS INTO A BANK, THEATRE503 Russian tale resonates far beyond Moscow Roxy Cook's dramedy has echoes of Chekhov in its melding of comedy and tragedy We'…
★★★ PANDEMONIUM, SOHO THEATRE Armando Iannucci finds some laughs but nothing fresh If you're ready for more gags about Boris Johnson's House of Horrors administration, t…
Stephen Sondheim's fascinating 1976 show enriches aurally and, this time round, visually This is, by my reckoning at least, the third major London production over the years of Pacific Overt…
Chris Thorpe's one-man show about nuclear weapons is intelligent and humane Let's start with what we know: the climate emergency is the single most burning question facing the planet. Our li…
Unsettling investigation of patriarchal family and sexual relationships has uneven force As the audience enters, thick mist envelopes the thrust stage and jazz music fills the theatre. The s…
Terrific showcase for writer-director Kwame Owusu and his performer Kwame Owusu's 55-minute one-hander does just what it says on the tin: it features a young student who dreams he is drowni…
★★★★★ £1 THURSDAYS, FINBOROUGH THEATRE Beautifully delivered by two sensational leads Seldom does one see a writer's vision so perfectly realised on stag…
Annie Baker delivers a richly satisfying piece about hungry women A sun deck with seven pale-green padded loungers is the latest setting for the latest National Theatre premiere from Ame…
Seasonal Eng Lit mash-up returns with its festive message of forgiveness It's an elementary fact that Dickens sells at this time of year " look at all the perennial Christmas Carols sproutin…
★★★★ MACBETH, THE DEPOT War in a warehouse scores on its beautiful line readings and spectacle Touring show lands first in Liverpool with a terrifying relevance Next …
Mischief Theatre's sight gags are faultlessly timed, though the verbals need a trim Mischief Theatre set themselves a big challenge when they evolved their brand of knowing slapstick. And n…
Harriet Walter is a toweringly monstrous matriarch in Lorca's tale of cruelty and repression Rebecca Frecknall opened 2023 with a youthful, visceral, and brutal Streetcar Named Desire …
Five heroic women and two instrumentalists go Hellenic, with panache This is the show that launched a thousand puns, mostly ancient-Greek-oriented, and just as many corny rhymes, all deliver…
Roald Dahl adaptation is busy to a fault but lacks emotion The National Theatre these days seems to be going from hit-to-hit, with transfers aplenty and full houses at home. And there's eve…
Christopher Eccleston is a Scrooge for the ages Familiarity has bred something quite fantastic with the Old Vic Christmas Carol, which is back for a seventh season and merits ringing all av…
★★★ OH WHAT A LOVELY WAR, SOUTHWARK PLAYHOUSE Joan Littlewood invents devised theatre with satirical wit and righteous anger centre stage Blackeyed Theatre's touring produc…
Hattie Morahan returns to Ibsen, for another round of unhappy families Henrik Ibsen may well have wanted to shake things up, to rile against the social mores of his time. But his visionary c…
A familiar comedy provides Jeeves-and-Wooster period Christmas fun Oliver Goldsmith was a literary all-rounder - novelist, poet and playwright - remembered chiefly for one example of each di…
★★★★★ THE MONGOL KHAN, LONDON COLISEUM Cirque du Soleil meets Game of Thrones Take its limitations on trust and this Mongolian epic proves the best value in tow…
A British-Indian family celebrate their first Diwali, with mixed results "It's nothing like Christmas," Rachel (Amy-Leigh Hickman) hisses at her brother David (Kishore Walker). She's trying…
Samuel Barnett performs a sizzling monologue about sex and fatal attraction The Comedian runs, bounces even, onto the stage. The audience immediately applauds. He seizes the mic and makes se…
 Speculation and facts woven into a compelling portrait of a singular man Four centuries on from the publication of the First Folio, is there anything new to be said about William Shake…
★★★ THE TIME TRAVELLER'S WIFE, APOLLO THEATRE If Doctor Who did musical romcoms... Powerhouse performances and visual effects let down by unambitious book and lacklustre so…
★★★★★ NINETEEN GARDENS, HAMPSTEAD THEATRE DOWNSTAIRS Black comedy about transgressive love gone sour proves an accomplished English language debut for prize-win…
New comedy about toffs and tycoons is disappointingly juvenile and weak As Christmas looms, 'tis the season for comedy. And even the traditionally austere Royal Court feels obliged to join i…