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Published: 17 April 2008
Have you ever wondered how Long John Silver lost his leg? Or why he wasn’t called Short John Silver? No? Well Simon Bent wants to tell you anyway, because his… Read More
Third to open in Shakespeare’s Globe’s The Edges Of Rome season is Antony And Cleopatra, Shakespeare’s history of the political powers of Egypt and Rome and the passion between Roman… Read More
Bringing Chaucer’s epic story of pilgrims wending their way towards Canterbury to the stage is a gargantuan project, especially when you intend to use almost all of the tales. But… Read More
After last year’s two-week sell-out run at the Tricycle, it was inevitable that Robert Newman would return to the scene of his triumph with his new show, No Planet B… Read More
This production of Samuel Beckett’s play, adapted from the original television play by director Atom Egoyan, is an eerie, bizarre event which certainly does not make for an average night… Read More
By the time the visiting Bishop of Lax proclaims ‘Sergeant, arrest most of these vicars!’ there are more men of the cloth on the Duchess stage than the non-ordained. How… Read More
During the televised search for a new play to put on in the West End, the panel of the Channel 4 programme The Play’s The Thing – producer Sonia Friedman,… Read More
It has been described as Sesame Street for adults, but new musical Avenue Q is much more than that. The show, which originated off-Broadway before leaping onto the Great White… Read More
Maria Friedman is one of the world’s most renowned and versatile musical actresses, who has wowed audiences in a host of shows ranging from Oklahoma! to Chicago. She is currently… Read More
A desolate motel room: the bed is functional, but little else, the desk is cold and unloved. Through the windows, the flashing of the neon sign can be seen. This… Read More
In the programme notes to the Donmar Warehouse production of A Voyage Round My Father, 83-year-old playwright John Mortimer writes that he still refers to the standards by which his… Read More
The National’s Olivier theatre plays host to an entire shopping centre this summer as it launches David Eldridge’s new play Market Boy. Featuring a cast of 30 actors – some… Read More
Since interpretation of Hicks’s views on such subjects as the Iraq war, the state of the music industry (Dido and Coldplay are particular targets), 9/11, the presidency of George W… Read More
Sam Buntrock’s revival of Stephen Sondheim’s Sunday In The Park With George opened at the Menier Chocolate Factory last year. Following much acclaim it has transferred to the larger Wyndham’s… Read More
Daniel Evans has a voice that sounds like a warm breeze working its way idly through a grassy valley where sheep casually graze; a musical Welsh lilt to which you… Read More
Kim Cattrall is one of America’s most renowned actresses. She has won Golden Globe Awards, starred in Hollywood blockbusters and been a regular on stage in plays in virtually all… Read More
In Cheek By Jowl’s 25th year, the innovative theatre company has found a home at the Barbican, where it will present two pieces each year for the next three years,… Read More
There are some things in life you just don’t do, such as tickling an angry lion or taunting an irritable crocodile. Yet no one taught the Romans that it is… Read More
Michael Frayn’s comedy about a university reunion may have been written almost 30 years ago, but it could just as easily be set in an Oxbridge college today. The rooms… Read More
Simon Stephens won a 2006 Laurence Olivier Award for his play On The Shore Of The Wide World. Last night his new work Motortown had its premiere at the Royal… Read More
It is always an event not to be missed when seven-time Laurence Olivier Award winner Dame Judi Dench takes to the West End stage, and last night was no exception.… Read More
Footloose the film rates near the top of the list of classic teen movies; the ones where misunderstood kids move to new towns, trouble follows them, but at the end… Read More
After its initial run in Stratford as part of the Royal Shakespeare Company’s New Works season, Anthony Sher’s production of Breakfast with Mugabe now transfers to London’s Soho theatre. The… Read More
Jerry Herman is the only composer/lyricist in history to have had three musicals exceed 1,500 consecutive performances on Broadway. Mack And Mabel, a show that Herman considers a ‘favourite child’,… Read More
In a year that promises to be a boon time for fans of musical theatre, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s Evita is among the first of the eagerly awaited… Read More
It takes a special kind of guy to invent sweets that play tunes, raise two children, be at ease dancing with a bamboo cane and fly a car with a… Read More
Summer has come to Regent’s Park’s Open Air theatre in more ways than one this year. Joining the season of long days and exposed flesh is actress Summer Strallen who,… Read More
Tom Conti is starring in Jeffrey Bernard Is Unwell at the Garrick until 2 September. He talks to Laura North about cigarettes, alcohol and falling asleep. The date for my… Read More
He’s enjoyed a long career as a company actor, with frequent appearances for the National Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company, but now Philip York has taken the plunge and… Read More
Antony Costa has already lived a hell of a life. For five years he was one quarter of Blue, one of the world’s most lauded and applauded pop acts. He… Read More
The Royal Shakespeare Company’s production of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible now transfers to London’s Gielgud theatre after a successful run in Stratford. Written in response to the McCarthy communist hunts… Read More
Carmel Morgan’s list of television writing credits includes Shameless, Reintarnation, Brookside and Coronation Street, and now she has turned her talent for sharp observations of British society to theatre. Her… Read More
The 2,348-seat Apollo Victoria has long been home to some of the West End’s most famous musicals. Now, sandwiched between Saturday Night Fever and the Broadway transfer of Wicked, which… Read More
It’s been a while since the Trafalgar Studios hosted an English translation of a French comedy. The last, when the theatre was still the Whitehall, was the hugely successful, long-running… Read More
Ken Kesey’s novel about life in a psychiatric institution in 1960s America has been adapted for the stage by Dale Wasserman, and had a sell-out run at the Gielgud theatre… Read More
With an early career that included selling toys at Selfridges and washing up at the Dorchester, I guess you could say that veteran actor Denis Quilley has worked in all… Read More
Reece Shearsmith takes a very different view of himself to much of the entertainment world. As a member of The League Of Gentlemen he created one of the most lauded… Read More
After a troublesome start, with previews being cancelled due to Judi Dench being ill, Hay Fever finally kicked off at the Theatre Royal Haymarket. For Belinda Lang, playing Myra Arundel… Read More
The career of Cheryl Baker has been nothing if not varied. Starting as a session singer, Baker found fame as one quarter of British 80s popsters Bucks Fizz, who collected… Read More
Due to popular demand, Tamara Harvey and Terry Johnson’s production of Dale Wasserman’s One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest is back in the West End for a limited run until… Read More
Behind the stage of the Trafalgar Studio 1 is a corridor-like space packed with chairs, props and a couple of radiators; a scene reminiscent of a church jumble sale or… Read More
My Name Is Rachel Corrie is the one-woman play based on the real-life writings of a young American peace activist who lost her life in Gaza. A sell-out success during… Read More
In the Deep South of America, 15-year-old Swallow finds a man hidden and bleeding in her father’s barn. When she asks who he is, his first reaction is to exclaim… Read More
My Name Is Rachel Corrie, which sold out runs at both Royal Court theatres, was due to transfer to the New York Theatre Workshop this spring. Following discussions about the… Read More
Alan Bennett’s play about a traitor in exile is set entirely in a house in the middle of a forest. As Timothy West’s Hilary points out, it could be almost… Read More
It’s an odd experience to come in from the snow, only to find that it is snowing inside, but this is the experience shared by last night’s audience at the… Read More
The RSC brings its second annual season of new work to London from Stratford, showcasing five British and American playwrights who focus on international themes. Debbie Tucker Green kicks off… Read More
Mary Poppins has been a sell-out success since it opened in London two years ago, bringing the characters of PL Travers to life on stage. Nearly as famous as the… Read More
The stars were out in force for the world premiere of the new musical Sinatra At The London Palladium. The black tie and the red carpet seemed entirely appropriate given… Read More
A burnt out barn complete with animal skull looming over the fireplace, a circular saw blade sitting in the grate and its own personal mad moorland hobo with a hatred… Read More
It is seems to be the season for shows about comedy double acts. First we got Steptoe And Son in Murder At Oil Drum Lane; now we have arguably Britain’s… Read More
Following A Midsummer Night’s Dream, cavorting in the forest continues at the Novello theatre with As You Like It, the last of the four comedies presented by the Royal Shakespeare… Read More
How would people react if the Son of God returned to the world now, revealing himself as a guerrilla in a revolutionary war? This is a question, whether Miller meant… Read More
Sir Ian McKellen is back in the West End hot on the heels of receiving the Special Award at this year’s Laurence Olivier Awards last Sunday. In Mark Ravenhill’s new… Read More
Ah, the month of March; in any normal country it would be the time of year when spring is in the air. In London, though, everything is still decidedly wintry,… Read More
Over the last few years, Kris Marshall has become one of the most recognised faces on the British screen. A stint in the hugely popular BBC sitcom My Family was… Read More
The role of Hamlet’s mother Queen Gertrude is not the happiest of parts, but the woman who is occupying it at the New Ambassadors theatre is one very happy lady,… Read More
Last year was probably one of the finest in the life of young playwright Laura Wade; she achieved something many more experienced playwrights rarely do by having two new plays… Read More
Nancy Carroll is starring alongside Charlotte Rampling and Antony Calf in Martin Crimp’s acclaimed new version of Marivaux’s The False Servant at the National Theatre. Laura North met her to… Read More
The dirty old man and his long-tortured son are back, but this time on the stage. During the 1960s and 1970s, sitcom Steptoe And Son was one of the UK’s… Read More
David Troughton looks like a Shakespearean lead, which is a good thing, because he is one. Nestling somewhere in between craggy and handsome, with a not insignificant dollop of rugged… Read More
You’ve seen the posters on the tube and maybe heard a thing or two about mess, waterproof ponchos and (horrors!) audience participation. But the quirky New York import Blue Man… Read More
With two plays in the West End this spring (The Old Country opens in March), English Touring Theatre is on a roll. Director Stephen Unwin, former recipient of the Shakespeare’s… Read More
Diana Rigg, Martin Jarvis and Natascha McElhone are currently treading the boards at Wyndham’s theatre in a marital drama by Australian playwright Joanna Murray-Smith, directed by David Grindley. Caroline Bishop… Read More
The third instalment in the RSC’s Comedies season, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, opened last night at the Novello. Shakespeare’s much-loved tale of fairies cavorting in the woods, love spells and… Read More
Greg Hicks is widely regarded as one of the finest stage actors of his generation. The classical theatre regular, who was last seen in London playing Coriolanus at the Old… Read More
Philip Massinger’s Believe What You Will was originally written about Sebastian, King of Portugal. When the censor decreed the subject too sensitive to be broached, Massinger shifted the setting and… Read More
Tonight the National Theatre plays host once again to Arthur Miller’s powerful drama All My Sons, a drama which caused a great stir when it originally opened just two years… Read More
Edward Albee’s play has had several incarnations since it was first a Broadway hit in 1962. The married couple around which the plot centres has created some weighty pairings through… Read More
It is nine years since Ian Richardson last set foot on a West End stage. Perhaps best known for his portrayal of the Machiavellian Francis Urquhart in the TV drama… Read More
Begoateed, whimsical, and able to read you as easily as the top row of letters on an optician's test board, Derren Brown is one of the cult faces of 21st… Read More
Losing Louis, currently playing at the Trafalgar, is a comedy about family, secrets and relationships. Set at the funeral of the eponymous Louis, a family is brought together in grief… Read More
Quirkily svelte with a hint of her Papa around the eyes, Lucy Briers has performed just about everywhere during the course of her career with the notable exception of the… Read More
The cultural significance of The Soldier’s Tale, currently playing at the Old Vic, cannot be overestimated. It is the first European-Iraqi collaboration of its kind; a coming together of two… Read More
For the last 25 years, Circus Oz have been carrying (and, if the start of their show is anything to go by, probably burning) the flag for contemporary circus in… Read More