HOTSPUR /PIERROT LUNAIRE Arcola, E8 by Libby Purves and Friends

GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI MARVELS AT THE OPERATIC POTENTIAL OF SIGNDANCE The double bill of Gillian Whitehead's Hotspur with Schoenberg's great Modernist Pierrot Lunaire is the first o…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 8:23pm on August 29, 2019[SHARE]

EDITH IN THE BEGINNING Sutton Hoo by Libby Purves and Friends

A STRANGE RESURRECTION, BETWEEN WARS       A red sun was setting beyond the trees as we gathered around a square, isolated house in the golden-hour splendour.    Here the land…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 7:42am on August 27, 2019[SHARE]

AURORA Arcola, E8 by Libby Purves and Friends

GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI FINDS DIMNESS RATHER THAN DAWN AT GRIMEBORN If Aylin Bozok is directing anything at Grimeborn, I always try to go. I've been absolutely blown away by her past…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 8:05am on August 25, 2019[SHARE]

ORIGAMI SOUNDSCAPES /THE CRANE Arcola, E8 by Libby Purves and Friends

GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI FINDS NOT MUCH UNFOLDING AT GRIMEBORN I have to admit " I'm a sucker for a bit of rarefied Japanese elegance on stage in almost any context: the very mention …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 4:10am on August 24, 2019[SHARE]

THE WEATHERMAN Park Theatre by Libby Purves and Friends

GUEST REVIEWER  BEN DOWELL SEES A GOOD SUBJECT NOT QUITE GETTING THERE…   The trafficking of human beings " 7,000 identified in the UK in 2018 " is a disgusting blight on our country…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 12:05pm on August 22, 2019[SHARE]

8 HOTELS Minerva, Chichester by Libby Purves and Friends

A GRIPPING PIECE OF HISTORY              In 1944  the adventurous British director Peggy Webster cast the first black Othello in the USA,  where for a white woman …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 11:34am on August 21, 2019[SHARE]

COUNT ORY Arcola, E8 by Libby Purves and Friends

GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI GETS INTO THE BLITZ SPIRIT WITH OPERA ALEGRIA AT GRIMEBORN Rossini's Le Comte Ory is a flirtatious farce in which a naughty young Count drives everyone …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 1:37am on August 15, 2019[SHARE]

GO BANG YOUR TAMBOURINE Finborough, SE10 by Libby Purves and Friends

A YOUTHFUL HALLELUJAH          ANother fascinating London premiere for Two's Company and the Finborough,  buried for nearly half a century after one brief 1970 tour .  Å

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 7:52am on August 9, 2019[SHARE]

DIE FLEDERMAUS Arcola, E8 by Libby Purves and Friends

GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI GOES BATS FOR BASELESS FABRIC'S SOCIAL MEDIA TAKE ON STRAUSS "I'm not saying I'm Batman. I'm just saying nobody has ever seen me and Batman in a room together…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 3:36am on August 8, 2019[SHARE]

DAS RHEINGOLD Arcola, E8 by Libby Purves and Friends

GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI CAN'T GET ENOUGH OF GRIMEBORN'S GLITTERING TREASURE The Ring Cycle is opera's biggest box set: a sixteen-hour binge of dwarves, nymphs, dragons, gods, heroes …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 9:18pm on August 3, 2019[SHARE]

ROMEO AND JULIET           Jimmy's Farm, Wherstead Suffolk by Libby Purves and Friends

   ROCK 'N ROLL N' ROMEO        Deep under the trees, beyond Jimmy's meerkat and camel enclosures lies a 1960's beach: shelter, deckchairs and lounging teens,  Mods and …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 9:00am on August 3, 2019[SHARE]

MISS HAVISHAM'S WEDDING NIGHT /12 POEMS OF EMILY DICKINSON Arcola, E8 by Libby Purves and Friends

GUEST REVIEWER CHARLOTTE VALORI GOES MAD FOR AMERICAN MONODRAMA A pairing of two American music dramas promised plenty of angsty feminist fun for a Friday night at Grimeborn; and I admit, in…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 8:39pm on August 2, 2019[SHARE]

SHACKLETON'S CARPENTER Jermyn St, SW1 by Libby Purves and Friends

HEROIC ENDURANCE            In the background a lecture in the old Home Service style, decorous and passionless,  finishes relating the story of Sir Ernest Shackleton's …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 5:03am on August 1, 2019[SHARE]

OKLAHOMA                   Chichester Festival Theatre by Libby Purves and Friends

COWBOYS WITHOUT INDIANS         I suppose it's perverse to start at the end, but of all the aspects of Jeremy Sams' handsome production of the Rodgers & Hammerstein crowd-ple…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 11:34am on July 23, 2019[SHARE]

THE NIGHT OF THE IGUANA       Noel Coward, WC2 by Libby Purves and Friends

FALLEN ANGELS ENDURING THE STORM         You can feel the heat in Rae Smith's design,  Mexican sun on the rock overhead, and the corrugated iron roofs of the rundown hot…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 5:30am on July 17, 2019[SHARE]

   JOSEPH AND THE AMAZING TECHNICOLOUR DREAMCOAT                London Palladium W1 by Libby Purves and Friends

  IT'S BACK,  YOUNGER THAN EVER…     We love a starry debut, especially on opening night in a huge theatre:   a 21-year-old not yet through drama school making a stonking…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 10:31am on July 12, 2019[SHARE]

MEASURE FOR MEASURE Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford upon Avon by Libby Purves and Friends

DEVOTION , DISGUISE,  DECADENCE     What a strange and stirring play this is!    Set in convent, court and condemned-cell,  it is spiked with moral ambiguities and fuelled …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 1:03pm on July 5, 2019[SHARE]

THE END OF HISTORY Royal Court SW1 by Libby Purves and Friends

BLAIR TO BREXIT " A FAMILY TALE         Jack Thorne and director John Tiffany,  are the Harry Potter team.  They know how not to bore.   But they've been here before …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 5:29am on July 4, 2019[SHARE]

NOISES OFF Lyric, Hammersmith by Libby Purves and Friends

FARCE AS LIFE, LIFE AS FARCE, FRAYN AGAIN TRIUMPHANS        It felt like a pilgrimage,  homage to pay.   37 years ago Michael Frayn's greatest of comedies, a wicked love-so…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 6:01am on July 3, 2019[SHARE]

PRESENT LAUGHTER Old Vic SE1 by Libby Purves and Friends

COMEDY SHADING TO MELANCHOLY: WHAT'S TO COME IS STILL UNSURE…     First of all  let's say that  Andrew Scott is a marvel, a 21st century Ur-Coward hero,  who manages to do i…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 6:06pm on June 30, 2019[SHARE]

AFTER DARK " A DRAMA OF LONDON LIFE Finborough, SW10 by Libby Purves and Friends

A SHILLING SHOCKER IS A JOY FOREVER     To come clean:  one reason I dashed to catch this fresh back from holiday is  not only that the Finborough is always interesting,   but…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 3:40am on June 29, 2019[SHARE]

THE HUNT Almeida, N1 by Libby Purves and Friends

GUEST CRITIC BEN DOWELL SHIVERS " ADMIRINGLY " AT A TROUBLED TALE   In this hypersensitive age of MeToo accusations, anxieties about online pornography and even deeper-seated disquiet abo…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 9:58am on June 27, 2019[SHARE]

THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY    Jermyn St Theatre WC2 by Libby Purves and Friends

RANCID LILIES, GORGEOUS WORDS       All the little Jermyn needs to complete this reimagination of Wildean epigrammatic decadence is to scent the auditorium overwhelmingly with lilie…

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 8:02am on June 13, 2019[SHARE]

A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM Bridge, SE1 by Libby Purves and Friends

FLYING,   FUNNY,  FABULOUS     This is a dream of a Dream.  One expected fun from the  combination of Nicholas Hytner,  a roiling mass of promenaders in the pit  and …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 4:38pm on June 11, 2019[SHARE]

THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON " a note Southwark, SE1 by Libby Purves and Friends

A NOTE ON A TREAT,  MOUSELESS BUT MELLOW    The film based on Scott Fitzgerald's story of a life lived backwards, born old and ending in babyhood,  was pretty awful.  So I …

SOURCE: theatrecat.com at 3:44am on June 2, 2019[SHARE]