Theatre News & Reviews: 2014

REVIEW: Women On The Verge Of A Nervous Breakdown, Playhouse Theatre ✭✭✭

Tamsin Greig is the lead performer here. She is perfect for the acting requirements. She has style, a sense of whimsical élan and a marvellous comic ability. She lands all the jokes and finds the true sense of despair which defines her character. But - Greig can't give full measure and depth to the tunes she is asked to sing.

REVIEW: Treasure Island, Olivier Theatre ✭✭✭

Jim is not the only character whose gender is changed, but his change is the most significant. It's not that it is a bad or fatal choice - it is, however, a fundamental one. And it puts this Treasure Island firmly in the realm of children's theatre. No bad thing.

REVIEW: Anything Goes, Crucible Theatre Then Touring ✭✭

Where there should be style, there is smut; where there should be grace, there is gurning; where there should be passion there is pointlessness. Anything Goes is not a pantomime; nor is it a Carry On Gang film. It is certainly chock-full of silliness and slightly dirty fun, but it only works with an excess of energy focussed on style, believable characters, romance and the unlikeliest of plots.

Marching On Together Kickstarter Campaign Funded

REVIEW: The Merchant Of Venice, Almeida Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

Tom Scutt's design is overwhelmingly attractive. Seductive blue and gold enhances the structures where the action occurs - a garishly compelling sense of Venice and Las Vegas: time and space are fused in the bauble land where Antonio and Shylock take their commercial risks. Greed and choice become the central focus here.

Christmas Day On Broadway

Stephen Collins Reviews The Best Of 2014

Jesus Christ Superstar 2015 Tour Tickets and Casting

Jerry Girls Coming To St James Studio

New Dates Added To Dirty Dancing Tour

Weekly Rep Returns To Theatre Royal Windsor

REVIEW: City Of Angels, Donmar Warehouse ✭✭✭✭

City of Angels has an impeccable pedigree - a book by Larry Gelbart, lyrics by David Zippel and a rich, brassy score from Cy Coleman. It provides great scope for sexy, funny, thrills and surprises. And tremendous singing.

Jersey Boys UK Tour 2015/16 Announces Further Dates

REVIEW: Golem, Young Vic Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

You could be forgiven for thinking this was a fairytale, so delicate, amusing, but full of truths, is Golem. If Tim Burton did a live-action adult pantomime, this might be it.

Dance 'Til Dawn to Tour UK In 2015

REVIEW: Into The Woods - The Movie. Released 9th January 2015

Anna Kendrick makes a marvellous Cinderella, a precise balance between fairytale character and real human. Her scenes with Blunt are wonderful and, for me anyway, Steps of the Palace is the highlight of the film. Chris Pine is terrific and happily sends himself up mercilessly, and to great comic effect, in Agony. Meryl Streep is, throughout, mesmerising.

REVIEW: Les Miserables, Queens Theatre ✭✭✭✭

If you have never seen Les Miserables, this is a good year to see it; if you have seen it, this cast provides fresh approaches and interesting nuance to scenes you think you know very well and characters you think can no longer surprise you.

Critic's Choice: The Top 10 London Plays (16 Dec)

Cats: Thoughts From A Long Time Fan

This production of Cats, certainly inspired some heated conversations over the weekend, but what it also revived in me was my love of the show itself and it’s place in awakening my love of musicals, a love that I daresay will never leave me. These long-running shows wrote new rules for musicals and continue to do so.

Critic's Choice: The Top 10 London Musicals (16th Dec)

REVIEW: Sikes And Nancy, Trafalgar Studios 2 ✭✭✭

Without doubt, Swanton has one of the most impressive and mellifluous voices of anyone under the age of 40 who has set foot on a London stage in recent years. He leaves you with an indelible Fagin, a monstrously brutal Sikes, a scared and discarded Nancy, a cautious but aristocratic Brownlow, and a ghastly, slippery and disgusting Bolter/Claypole.

Curtain Call Awards - Nominees Announced

Cheshire Group Recieve Council Grant

REVIEW: Miss Havisham's Expectations, Trafalgar Studios 2 ✭✭✭✭

Marlowe is that very rare creature - a true virtuoso. Sherlock's material is made for her and she gorges on it, finding every nuance, every temptation of interest, every cubbyhole of unexplored tension, every way possible to shine.

Kettering Group Stages 5 Productions In First Year

Damian Lewis To Star In American Buffalo - On Sale Now

REVIEW: Cats, London Palladium ✭✭✭✭

The very best aspect of this production is the power, energy and sheer musicality Graham Hurman brings to the score. The orchestra is sizzling, sparking musical energy through every bar of Lloyd-Webber's rich and diverse score. There is discipline, sensuality, a real sense of tribal connection and acrobatic excellence in the dancing here; it all feels fresh, precise and vigorous.

REVIEW: 3 Winters, Lyttleton Theatre ✭✭✭

There is a marvellous scene towards the end of Act One where Walker and Gulliford share the couch, both wanting to be there but both not knowing how to negotiate a new phase in their fractured relationship. Completely different creatures, but each needing the other to be complete. It is a joy to watch.

Cats Opens At London Palladium

Sunny Afternoon Trailer Watched By 175000 people in 24 hours

REVIEW: Hope, Jerwood Theatre Downstairs ✭✭

This is a play more polemic than personal. None of the lead characters have any warmth, at least as played here, so there is real difficulty in engaging with their entwinement in the politics and the power.

REVIEW: Noël Coward's Christmas Spirits, St James Studio ✭✭✭

Hutchinson has produced an unusual Christmas confection: part song, part recitation, part reminiscence and part cheeky indulgence. Using material ranging from Coward’s own diaries and writings, through Charles Dickens, Dylan Thomas and Ben Johnson to reportage and obscure/familiar (depending on your education) literary works and sprinkled with well known, popular songs, the result is a true alternative to the usual seasonal pantomime fare.

One Man Breaking Bad To Tour UK

Protest Play Made In Britain To Open At Red Lion Theatre

Big Sean, Mikey And Me To Play Vault Festival

Would You Like Join The Olivier Awards Panel?

Gods And Monsters World Premiere At Southwark Playhouse

Maureen Lipman Joins The Cast Of Harvey

The Last Five Years Movie Trailer Released

REVIEW: Mimetic Festival 2014, Old Vic Vaults ✭✭✭✭

The breadth of programmed material was impressive: genuinely a case of something for everyone, from light, risqué cabaret, through puppetry and physical theatre, to dark, deep explorations of key issues about humanity.

REVIEW: Cinderella And The Beanstalk, Theatre 503 ✭✭✭✭

It abounds with heart and wit, is propelled with boundless energy from the three inventive actors who devised the piece, is blessed with a surprising and clever narrative which weaves its way through aspects of pretty much every popular nursery rhyme or fairytale and is genuinely laugh-out loud funny, engaging and joyful.

Saturday Night Fever Tour 2014/15

Gypsy Starring Imedla Staunton To Transfer

Once Trailer Featuring Ronan Keating Released

Sex, Paranoia and Lots Of Chocolate Cake

Bat Boy Cast Announced

The History Boys UK Tour 2015 - Casting Announced

Into The Woods - Cinderella Featurette

Beautiful Thing Tour Cast Announced

Into The Woods New Featurette Released

Opera North's Carousel To Tour In 2015

Frantic Assembly Present Othello at Lyric Hammersmith

Idina Menzel Announces World Tour

REVIEW: Assassins, Menier Chocolate Factory ✭✭✭✭✭

What is most impressive about Lloyd's Assassins is the way it can walk the line between tragedy and farce, between opera and vaudeville, with integrity and precision. Chris Bailey's quite wonderful choreography makes you feel exuberant and queasy at the same time. More than anything else, the emphasis here is on putting the Musical into Assassins.

Railway Children Cast Includes Jeremy Swift and Caroline Harker

REVIEW: Times Square Angel, Union Theatre ✭✭✭

It's a simple enough formula, but with Times Square Angel is doesn't quite work. Described as a "hard-boiled Christmas fantasy" you can't help but get the feeling that many of the cast are performing in a different show altogether.

Is Strictly Ballroom West End Bound?

Kerry Ellis, Louise Dearman And Ben Forster Unite For New Musical Album

A Fresh Take On A Christmas Carol

Preview Tracks From Women On The Verge Released

Ronan Keating Joins The Cast Of Once

Three Men In A Boat To Set Sail Again

REVIEW: Room On The Broom, Lyric Theatre ✭✭✭✭

Marching On Together Launches Kickstarter Campaign

Tommy Steele To Star In Glenn Miller Story

Dame Diana Rigg Reads Capote's A Christmas Memory

Casting Announced for Oklahoma! 2015 Tour

Tom Conti To Tour With Twelve Angry Men

Hamsptead Theatre Annouces Start Of 2015 Season

REVIEW: Twelfth Night, Richmond Theatre ✭✭✭

The alternative title to Twelfth Night is What You Will, and, more than anything else, that seems Munby's inspiration here. He has, with real determination, found a new way to approach the text; deliberately emphasised different aspects of the story to fundamentally change the experience.

A Musical Love Story - Stuart Matthew Price's 'Before After.'

Welcome to Apartment 40C - Behind The Scenes Video

First look at Katie Brayben As Carole King In Beautiful

Acclaimed Director Mike Nichols Dies Aged 83

Meet the 39th Billy

Nominate Your Favourite West End Play & Musical

Webb, Thorpe and Ryan Join Jeeves and Wooster Tour

Shakespeare In Love - Flash Sale

Cast Announced For The Grand Tour

REVIEW: Accolade, St James Theatre ✭✭✭✭

McIntyre directs with careful, thorough assuredness, avoiding the easy trap of treating the material like the melodrama it could so easily become, preferring instead to focus on true and believable characterisation and detailed, intimate, and utterly believable situations and exchanges.

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels UK Tour

REVIEW: Behind The Beautiful Forevers, Olivier Theatre ✭✭✭✭

What Hare has created here is a marvel: a tale of hope, horror and truth on an enormous scale, but rooted firmly in the characters and personalities of a particular culture, a particular place. It is, in every way, epic and at its most epic when looking into the minds of the central characters as they contemplate their existence which is a reflection of all of ours.

Evening Standard Awards: Thoughts on the Shortlist

REVIEW: Cans, Theatre 503 ✭✭✭

In five snapshots, we see Jen, as masterfully portrayed by Jennifer Clement, slowly come of age through this discovery and Uncle Len, perfectly embodied by Graham O’Mara, as he fumbles to reboot his own life, now that his protective big brother has killed himself amid sex abuse charges and his estate dries up.

REVIEW: The Witch Of Edmonton, Swan Theatre ✭✭✭✭

A beautiful, sometimes shocking, sometimes haunting, production of an intricate and detailed dissection of human frailty and weakness. Doran lavishes great care and attention on the task of illuminating the text, telling the story in an engrossing way. Niki Turner's spare, but stunningly effective design, aids immeasurably.

REVIEW: Love's Labour Lost, Royal Shakespeare Company ✭✭✭✭

The production is blessed with good acting, impeccable timing and a sense of style, mischief and swagger which accentuates its high points. Pretty much everyone is trying to best everyone else with an armoury of quips, quibbles and quizzical asides and, happily, Luscombe seeks to make the most of this.

14 Nov - Critics Choice - Top 10 West End Musicals

14 Nov - Critics Choice: Top 10 West End Plays

REVIEW: The Rivals, Arcola Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

Constant eruptions of anger, sexual frustration, discrimination of town against country and English against Irish, and hostilities of son against father, servant against master and mistress run as a guiding set of threads through every scene; and assorted categories of gendered vanity, both misogynist and misanthropic, provide the root of much of the humour, some of it still unsettlingly cruel and mocking

Louie Spence Joins The Producers Tour

West End Transfer For Young Vic's View From The Bridge

Netflix To Adapt The Audience Into TV Series

Godspell In Concert To Tour In 2015

REVIEW: White Christmas, Dominion Theatre ✭✭✭✭

This is a true song and dance show. It's raison d'être is to afford an opportunity for spectacular routines and fabulous singing. Here that task is given a real boost by Musical Director Andrew Corcoran. The sound is lush, full and very welcome.

First Look At Ronan Keating In Once

REVIEW: Girlfriends, Union Theatre ✭✭✭✭

This is the strongest of the three Goodall offerings the Union has produced this year. Tapner's musical direction, an excellent cast led by Catherine Mort, and a vibrant, tuneful and polyphonic score combine to produce a real theatrical treat.

REVIEW: 2071, Jerwood Theatre Downstairs ✭

Billed and promoted as "a play exploring the future of life on earth and climate change", 2071 may be many things, but a play it is not. Nothing theatrical happens. There is no engagement between stage and audience.

REVIEW: Wildefire, Hampstead Theatre ✭✭

Director Maria Aberg certainly confronts the challenges Wildefire offers head on. There is some starkly realistic violence - the murder of Spence and it's aftermath is especially powerful. Scenes of chaos, rioting and domestic violence are loud, confronting and seared with pain. Indeed, this is almost certainly a better production than the play deserves.

REVIEW: Made In Dagenham, Adelphi Theatre ✭✭✭✭

When Made In Dagenham is focussed on the fairy tale, it is completely engaging, very funny, heart-warming and genuinely affecting. And intrinsically British. It runs the whole spectrum from cute giggle to silent, handkerchief-drenching tears; a musical roller-coaster with more highs than lows.

REVIEW: Side Show, St James Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

On any rational view of it, this is not a revival but a complete re-imagining of the original work. It is not an attempt to recapture the magic of a first run or to cash in on an established success. It is a completely new creation, in terms of content, style and tone, and unlike its predecessor, it's purpose is clear, focussed and spectacularly realised.

Philip Quast Joins Sweeney Todd Cast

The Railway Children Trailer Released

REVIEW: 'Tis Pity She's A Whore, Sam Wannamaker Theatre ✭✭✭✭

If incest between siblings remains one of the great taboos (and the success of Games of Thrones may suggest otherwise) then, in this production, Longhurst runs with the view that Ford sought to make no moral judgments: Annabella and Giovanni are the tragic figures, consumed by the judgments of people concerned with self-interest and personal wealth than what is right or true.

REVIEW: The Last Ship, Neil Simon Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

If you are the kind of theatre-goer who believes that the musical theatre is capable of anything in the right hands; if you like difficult themes and complex characters; if you enjoy songs which illuminate the personalities, relationships and feelings of the characters singing them; if you appreciate inventive staging, a score that has a muscular, cohesive wholeness; then The Last Ship is a real Broadway treat in totally unexpected form.

Made In Dagenham New Trailer Released

REVIEW: John, Lyttleton Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

It's confronting from start to finish; challenging and disturbing in many ways. But, ultimately, as we hear John settle into a calm, perhaps contented sleep, we see that despite the horrors and setbacks and challenges of his life, John refuses to quit. He embraces the possibilities life offers and he will survive. Love and life, not death.

New Into The Woods Trailer Released

REVIEW: Hedwig And The Angry Inch (Michael C Hall), Belasco Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

It's a much more masculine turn than Harris gave; yet, simultaneously, it is a performance charged with grim sexual power, with alarming, overbearing femininity and with a tangible sense of real loss and sacrifice. Hedwig's pain is expertly unravelled, layer by layer.

James Dreyfus To Star In New Production Of Harvey

Rehearsal Photos: Irving Berlin's White Christmas

Jason Donovan To Star In King's Speech 2015 Tour

Pippin To Close On Broadway

REVIEW: It's Only A Play, Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre ✭✭✭

The night belongs to Nathan Lane who is hilariously vicious as James Wicker, an actor who turned down the lead role in the play written by his best friend because he thought it was a dud. He drops comic gems and malicious slurs with relish; a human laughter grenade launcher.

Kristen Scott Thomas Plays Queen In Audience Revival

Bat Boy The Musical Revived At Southwark Playhouse

Lenny Henry Joins Company For The Listening Space

REVIEW: Grand Guignol, Southwark Playhouse ✭✭✭

There may be plenty of blood, guts and severed body parts but there is little reason to faint as audience members regularly did at the original Grand-Guignol. It is a darkly entertaining show, with the campness and broad comedy reminding us that the horror is just for fun.

Cast Announced For The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe at Rose Theatre

Paines Plough's Every Brilliant Thing Transfers To New York

Bend It Like Beckham The Musical Announced

Ian McDiarmid To Play Shylock At Almeida

REVIEW: On The Town, Lyric Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

The dancing has a style, a language of its own and, certainly as choreographed by Bergasse, is more articulate than pages of dialogue. The steps are tricky, pulsing with purpose and bursting with energy and style. Very balletic, but with that jazzy Broadway edge which is just thrilling to watch especially where, as here, the cast is perfectly drilled, perfectly in sync and perfectly dazzling.

Side Show Revival Starts Broadway Previews

REVIEW: You Can't Take It With You, Longacre Theatre ✭✭✭✭

There are forced laughs, natural laughs, gentle laughs, belly laughs and many, many smiles over the course of the production. By the final Act, however, you realise that Ellis had a clear purpose from the very start; a magic trick he pulls off with finesse.

Richard Armitage In The Crucible Hits Cinemas

The Cat In The Hat Returns This Christmas

REVIEW: The Wild Duck, Barbican Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

It is, in every way, a complete theatrical triumph; a marvellous reimagining of Ibsen, set firmly in an Australian idiom, resonating with thrilling power, and chilling, insightful imagination. If you have but a passing interest in theatre, do yourself a favour and see it immediately. It will be a long time before you see something quite like this again, if ever.

REVIEW: Neville's Island, Duke Of York's Theatre ✭

The prospect of discovering what the blood was about, where Angus' wife was, what Roy's secret was and how the four get along was not sufficiently compelling to require attendance for the second Act. The titular Island may be an unknown quantity but it is not a place where laughter abides.

REVIEW: James III - The True Miror, National Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

Sansom imbues this play with a reckless, frenetic energy, a listlessness that reflects the monarch's temperament and a sexy, splendid pulse that tantalises and intrigues. The story telling is very clear, very theatrical, but the sense of real history is strong.

REVIEW: James I: The Key Will Keep The Lock, National Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

Spare, visceral and gripping, this is an extraordinarily wonderful production of an important and difficult new play, which shines a light onto forgotten events and examines them in an entirely satisfying theatrical way. It leaves you desperate to see what happens next.

REVIEW: James II - Day Of the Innocents, National Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

The script and treatment of the material in the writing of this play is so different than the first, that one could be forgiven for thinking that a different writer was responsible. Munro flexes her considerable literary prowess to tell the tale of James II in a fresh and invigorating way. And Laurie Sansom's fabulous production runs with that.

REVIEW: The Scottsboro Boys, Garrick Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

The Scottsboro Boys relies on the skills of its acting company, giving them chairs and tambourines and a few costumes, as their only tools and the show becomes all the more powerful as a result. This is an unbeatable, incredible ensemble of performers who manage to inject incredible humour into a story that by its very nature inspires indignation.

REVIEW: The Cherry Orchard, Young Vic ✭✭✭✭

Set firmly in the present, this version lacks languid notions about the past, does not spend too much time on the intricacies of character and prefers shock and blatant slapstick to more gentle ways of making points. There is little sense of old versus new Russia, little sense of the changing of traditions and times and less complexity about everything. But it is radiantly bleak, full of brittle, awful people leading duplicitous and untruthful lives. In that way, it is a compelling re-imagining of Chekhov’s masterpiece.

Jason Manford To Headline The Producers UK Tour

Into The Woods - New Trailer Released

Matilda Heads Down Under

REVIEW: Memphis, Shaftesbury Theatre ✭✭✭✭

As Calhoun, Killian Donnelly is a revelation...His mania, energy and sheer talent explodes off the stage driven by some of the finest rock vocals that I have ever heard in musical theatre.

REVIEW: Speed-The-Plow, Playhouse Theatre ✭✭

It's a mystery why Lindsay Lohan chose this play as her world stage debut. Perhaps she knew she would be the best thing about it? That would seem the only rational explanation. Especially as she was correct.

REVIEW: Our Town, Almeida Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

This is a phenomenally effective and ambitious revival of a masterpiece. It restores one’s faith in the power and magic of theatre and shows, in a very clear way, how casting actors who can act is the key to successful theatre. It makes your heart and spirit soar, although you may shed some tears along the way. Powerful. Engrossing. Unforgettable. An Our Town for our time.

Listen To Preview Tracks From The Sunny Afternoon Cast Album

Joey And Michael Morpurgo Walk Amongst The Poppies

REVIEW: Jacques Brel Is Alive And Well And Living In Paris, Charing Cross Theatre ✭✭

The best aspect of this production is the musicianship on display from the gifted Dean Austin and the four members of his band who, with piano, accordion, guitar, bass and percussion, create the gorgeous soundscape for Brel’s work. Austin sings as well, and each time he does a sense of truth and a stylish understanding of the fabric of the music accentuates whatever is occurring, makes it better, more delicious.

Our Critics Choice - The Top 10 West End Plays

REVIEW: This Is My Family, Lyceum Sheffield ✭✭✭

This Is My Family is unlikely to win a Tony award for Best New Musical, but it is an engaging and very happy musical theatre experience. It's new, British theatre writing, experimental and interesting. Well worth a few hours of anyone's time.

Our Critics Choice: The 10 Best West End Musicals

Dame Maggie Recieves Royal Honour

Great Savings On West End Theatre

Full Casting Announced For Beautiful - The Carole King Musical

REVIEW: Electra, Old Vic Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

If the rest of Kevin Spacey's final season at The Old Vic is as remarkable as this Electra, it will be a crowning achievement.

Mrs Henderson Presents (The Musical) To Premiere In Bath

Cast announced for The Sound Of Music at The Curve

St James Theatre Announces New Season

Alex Gaumond Becomes A Scoundrel This November

Alexandra Burke To Star In Bodyguard Tour

The Nether Transfers To The Duke Of Yorks In January 2015

Memphis The Musical - First Look Photos

REVIEW: Here Lies Love, Dorfman Theatre At The National ✭✭✭✭✭

Timbers has put together an extraordinary piece of theatre, which is as innovative and thought-provoking as it is beautiful and joyous. It is no exaggeration to say that I have never seen anything like it. Glorious stuff with high bopping potential.

Paul Kerryson Recieves Outstanding Contribution Award

Cirque Du Soleil Kooza Trailer Released

Michael McIntyre Walks Off Stage - What Constitutes Bad Audience Behaviour?

REVIEW: Gypsy, Chichester Festival Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

Imelda Staunton simply transforms every notion you ever had about Momma Rose with her extraordinary, incredibly detailed and vitally intense portrayal.

REVIEW: The Importance Of Being Earnest, Union Theatre ✭✭

They obviously enjoy working together and their unabashed and unrestrained attempts to fulfil Bessell's vision are full of vim and vigour.

Sinatra Is Back At The Palladium

REVIEW: East Is East, Trafalgar Studios ✭✭✭✭

East is East isn’t the searing feast of theatricality you might expect from Lloyd, but the hallmarks and flourishes of his Trafalgar Transformed season are plentiful. The worn, retro couches on set – contaminated by years of family life – inhabit the Khan home like relics, and designer Richard Howell’s lighting subtly divides the cramped and chaotic home allowing for intimate conversations to be drawn into focus.

Rondo Theatre Present Real Inpsector Hound/Open Couple Double Bill

National Theatre Live Encore Screenings of Frankenstein

Don't Miss The Altar Boyz

Bugsy Malone to reopen Lyric Hammersmith

Disney releases The Lion King for Schools

Georgia Stitt And Friends At The Garrick

Is Sleepless In Seattle The Musical West End Bound?

Epsom Light Opera Company present Lend Me A Tenor - The Musical.

The Lion King Celebrates 15th Birthday in West End

Attic Theatre Postpopnes Show Due To Theatre Renovation

London fringe venue closes after first production.

REVIEW: Urinetown, Apollo Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

REVIEW: Damn Yankees, Landor Theatre ✭✭✭

Like the Union Theatre, the Landor continues to bring new or largely overlooked musicals to London as well as encouraging and developing the skills of freshly graduated musical theatre talent. If you don’t know Damn Yankees, or even if you do, pop into the Landor to catch this – there is a lot to admire.

Irving Berlin's White Christmas Full Cast Announced

REVIEW: Taken At Midnight, Minerva Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

This is a terrific piece of new writing; spare, engaging, brimming with interest and history. It does what all great plays about actual historical events do: takes you to the time and lets you experience that time through the souls of the characters who propel the narrative, but in a way that is modern, fresh and zinging with power.

New Play About Diana Comes To Charing Cross Theatre

REVIEW: Altar Boyz, Greenwich Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

This is high octane entertainment, a 90 minute rollercoaster of silliness with heart, amazing talent and enough boy-band clichés to put Take That, Westlife and every other boy-band for that matter to shame.

Once Posts March Closing Notice and Announces European Tour

Neville's Island Trailer Released

Summerseat Players Tops Box Office Sales Poll

REVIEW: Love Story, Union Theatre ✭✭✭

Victoria Sierra as Jenny Cavilleri and David Albury as Oliver Barratt IV, as the young student couple share the warmth and passion of youth, determined to make their place in the world, despite family misgivings. There is real chemistry in their performances, allowing the audience to buy into their relationship.

Urinetown Holds Charity Gala for Water.org

REVIEW: Teh Internet Is Serious Business, Royal Court ✭✭

Many of the actors are very good, but it is not that easy to identify them. Unusually for the Royal Court, no text of the script (complete with full biographies of the cast) was available by way of a programme. "The play is still being written" was the explanation.

West End Long Runners - October 2014 Update

Aaron Tveit Joins The Cast Of Assasins At The Menier

Miss Saigon 25th Anniversary Video Released

The Railway Children Returns This Christmas

Wolf Hall To Open On Broadway This Spring

Katie Brayben Cast as Carole King in Beautiful

REVIEW: Evita, Dominion Theatre ✭

For my part, it is the worst production of a musical I have ever seen on a West End stage. It makes one pine for Too Close Too The Sun.

REVIEW: Ballyturk, National Theatre ✭✭✭✭

This is a wild, original and unexpected evening of theatrical extremism. You do not need to be able to work out what Walsh’s point is to have a wonderful time; indeed, trying to do that may hamper your enjoyment.

REVIEW: As You Like It, Southwark Playhouse ✭✭✭

So, it’s a review of two halves for 'As You Like It' - a play that pendulums from bland to bold and bleak to bright - but is absolutely worth seeing, for, if anything, ten beautiful performances and a delectable Shakespearean escape from London’s gloomy September.

Damn Yankees Comes To The Landor Theatre

REVIEW: The Wolf From The Door, Royal Court Jerwood Theatre ✭✭✭✭

It’s an evocative, alarming and thought-provoking piece of political theatre. Wild, bizarre, absurd and delightful - well worth seeing.

Urinetown - Rehearsal Sneak Peek

Sweeney In A Pie Shop Cast Announced

Sunny Afternoon Extends Booking Period To 31 January 2015

Emma Thompson and Bryn Terfel to Bring Sweeney Todd To ENO in 2015

New Stage Thriller From Woman In Black Author Announced

Edinburgh Fringe Hit The Curing Room Transfers to London's Pleasance

The Full Monty Kicks Off UK Tour

New Urinetown Trailer Released

Bonnie Langford and Gary Wilmot Join Dirty Rotten Scoundrels Cast Tonight

Tickets On Sale Today for Beautiful The Musical

REVIEW: Annie Get Your Gun, New Wimbledon Theatre. ✭

At interval, a local Wimbledon woman, clutching her near comatose husband, as they fled to the the streets said: "It's shit. He can't act or sing and there is no point looking at him anymore. She's good but it is not enough. Not for £30. This is nothing like show business".

REVIEW: Breeders, St James Theatre ✭✭

It is blessed with four genuinely good performers who elevate the entire proceedings way above the level the writing achieves.

INTERVIEW: Richard Marsh - Author and Actor

Love Story at The Union Theatre

REVIEW: Breeders, St James Theatre ✭✭✭✭

Breeders is a humorous take on a complicated and oft-times deeply emotional subject but one that should be on your must see list.

Interview: Vicky Graham on Breeders at the St James Theatre

REVIEW: Fully Committed, Menier Chocolate Factory ✭✭✭

Bishop is immensely charming, with a great comic sense and the ability to twist and turn on a needlepoint. He has a great singing voice to boot and the capacity to mimic expertly: his Michael Caine is astonishingly good.

Great Britain Trailer Released

First Look At Last Five Years The Movie

REVIEW: The Dreaming, Union Theatre ✭✭✭

It is a mystery why the National did not exploit it rather than pour millions into the waste of time that was The Light Princess. If this got the care and lavish attention Matilda did, it would be a world-wide hit.

Pre-Order The Miss Saigon 2014 Cast Album

Wicked Extends Its Booking Period

REVIEW: The Return Of The Soldier, Jermyn Street Theatre ✭✭✭✭

If you want an exquisite, beautifully conceived piece of musical theatre which successfully evokes a particular historical period, tells a fabulous story full of twists and surprises, and which contains some achingly ethereal and enjoyable music, then go see The Return Of The Soldier while you can.

Helen Baxendale Returns To The Stage In New Play The Distance

Casting Announced For Warde St at Park Theatre

Ben Forster to appear in Evita as Magaldi

La Soiree Returns To London's Southbank

INTERVIEW: Tim Driesen on the UK Tour of Jersey Boys

REVIEW: Little Revolution, Almeida Theatre ✭✭

The trouble is that it has no really coherent purpose, no through line and very little heart. Snatches of conversations out of context build a general picture of confusion, miscommunication, distrust and misunderstanding, but there is nothing insightful here.

Shrek UK Tour Trailer Released

Anything Goes National Tour Announced

OPINION: Do We Need More Dogfights?

Cast Announced for David Hare's The Vertical Hour at The Park Theatre

Jamie Lloyd Exits Back To The Future Musical

The West End Goes Ice Bucket Mad

Meet The Altar Boyz

Jamie Lloyd To Direct Assassins at the Menier Chocolate Factory

Meet The Cast Of Twickeham's Sweeney Todd

Marry Me A Little Returns To St James Theatre Studio for One Week Only

Composer and Lyricist Sandy Wilson Passes Away Aged 90

Simon Lipkin leads cast of As You Like It at Southwark Playhouse

REVIEW: Antony and Cleopatra, Shakespeares Globe ✭✭✭

Eve Best might not be the greatest actress to have played Cleopatra, or the one with the greatest voice. But she created an indelible, voraciously sexual, politically infantile Queen of Egypt which will haunt the memory for years to come.

Miss Saigon 25th Anniversary Gala Sells Out

REVIEW: Guys and Dolls, Chichester Festival Theatre ✭✭✭✭

Whatever people may say, Guys and Dolls is not foolproof. It can be done very badly. This is not one of those occasions...You would be silly to miss seeing their wonderful, world class performances.

REVIEW: Anything Goes, Cadogan Hall ✭✭

As a whole experience, this was the equivalent of the local school end-of-year concert. If you were friendly and forgiving, you could have a good time. If you were expecting a professional concert of Cole Porter music, you were mostly disappointed and likely to be fleeing home at interval.

REVIEW: Lady Celeste: A Star Is Reborn, Camden Fringe at the Phoenix Artist Club ✭✭✭

Get in at the ground level - see Lady Celeste now before she is propelled into the stratosphere. It's always good to say "I was there when it started". And make no mistake - Lady Celeste will take off. She is a true theatrical treat. Beautiful, sublime and dripping in style.

REVIEW: My Night With Reg, Donmar Warehouse ✭✭✭✭✭

It’s poetic and achingly sad in some moments, stupidly silly in others. But it has a resonant and vibrant pulse which throbs louder and truer now than it did when the play first premiered.

REVIEW: Go!, Camden Fringe at The Phoenix Artist Club ✭✭✭

This is the kind of production which would be a cause célèbre at Edinburgh. It's not perfect, but it is performed and directed with passion, skill and true commitment. Go see a star in the making in a musical in the making - that's what Fringe Festivals are for after all.

REVIEW: The White Devil, RSC, Swan Theatre ✭

It's like watching a censored propaganda film: you have a clear idea what to expect, but it is presented in a way which dumbfounds those expectations.

REVIEW: Two Gentlemen Of Verona, RSC, Royal Shakespeare Theatre ✭✭✭✭

It's wonderful seeing a little play, virtually unknown, on the main stage at Stratford. An auspicious debut for Godwin and another good sign about Gregory Doran's stewardship of the RSC.

REVIEW: Epstein, Leicester Square Theatre ✭✭✭✭

As Brian Epstein, Andrew Lancel turns out a stunning portrayal of a complex man who is as strong and charismatic as he is emotionally frail and weak. It’s an incredible performance that commands the stage with his battered arrogance.

REVIEW: Richard III, Trafalgar Studios ✭✭✭✭

Shakespeare's vision and insight into the psychology of schizophrenic megalomania was never more potent than it is in Richard III. Jamie Lloyd's production demonstrates that with clarity and feeling.

REVIEW: Medea, National Theatre ✭✭✭✭

McCrory achieves that almost impossible feat - she makes you understand, care for and empathise with Medea's situation. You feel her pain and fear and disgust and rage as surely as you feel your own heart beat faster as the horror unfolds.

REVIEW: Marry Me A Little, St James Theatre ✭✭✭✭

This is engaging musical theatre at its most optimistic: marrying talented singers with clever lyrics and tunes to create a wholly new experience. Bravo to all involved. If you like musical theatre - go!

REVIEW: The Nether, Royal Court Theatre ✭✭✭

At ninety minutes, it's worthwhile time in the theatre. But better casting would have resulted in an experience that might have matched Es Devlin's extraordinary set.

REVIEW: Great Britain, Lyttleton Theatre ✭✭

Because there is no coherent overall style, the audience is left uncertain what it is watching and why. It's a pity, really, because there are so many good actors here - the cast is enormous - and marshalled in the one direction the results might have been very different.

REVIEW: Forbidden Broadway, Menier Chocolate Factory ✭✭✭

This is a very good time at the theatre - but it does partly depend upon an intimate knowledge of Musicals of recent years and the stars who made them popular - which is no bad thing.

Teaser trailer for Into The Woods Movie Released

A Beginner's Guide To Dogfight The Musical

REVIEW: Wolf Hall / Bring Up The Bodies, Aldwych Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

In most respects, it is better and more vibrant, more deftly detailed, than it was in Stratford Upon Avon. It's an unrivalled spectacle of theatrical ingenuity. Go. Just go.

REVIEW: Dessa Rose, Trafalgar Studios ✭✭✭✭

This is a terrifically mature presentation of a difficult, but eminently attractive, and entertaining, piece of musical theatre. It is Keates' best work to date and in Erivo he has a star of true power who delivers the goods in every way.

Bakersfield Mist Announces Early Closure

John Kander receives National Medal Of Arts

Forbidden Broadway announces West End Transfer

Rabbit Hole Postpones West End Run

New trailer for The Crucible with Richard Armitage released.

REVIEW: Miss Julie, Minerva Theatre ✭✭

Somewhat incredulously, the companion piece in this double bill, Black Comedy, an entertainment written purely for pleasure, really tells us more about sexual politics in the modern world than this take on Strindberg, whose own views have long been filed in the Male Supremacist file.

REVIEW: Black Comedy, Minerva Theatre, Chichester ✭✭✭✭

It's a smorgasbord of pratfalls and physical comedy...And a lot of it is genuinely funny, rip-roaring in fact.

REVIEW: Fathers and Sons, Donmar Warehouse ✭✭✭

There used to be a TV soap called Sons and Daughters and this production of Fathers and Sons felt more like some historical episodes of that series than a thoughtful adaptation of Turgenev.

REVIEW: Amadeus, Chichester Festival Theatre ✭✭✭

The production has much to recommend it. It's never dull, it's beautiful to look at and watch and the writing has not lost any of its joy

REVIEW: Perserverance Drive, Bush Theatre ✭✭✭

Nothing much that happens is surprising or even that interesting, except that this is an entirely black Church family. And, in that one way, it sparkles with a freshness, an intriguing quality which commands attention.

An amazing acappella medley for Wicked fans

Craige Els is Matilda's new Trunchbull

John Godber's April in Paris starts National Tour tonight!

REVIEW: Julius Caesar, Globe Theatre ✭✭✭

This is not a production where you sit and watch and the outcome is determined for you; no, it's a production where your mood and the mood of those around you is a palpable part of the experience, and which hones and persuades you to certain points of view.

The Bodyguard announces tour of UK and Ireland

Spamalot announces 2015 UK Tour

REVIEW: Pacific Overtures, Union Theatre ✭✭✭✭

This is as good a production of Pacific Overtures as anyone is likely to see. It's well cast, mostly well sung, beautifully, almost hypnotically, staged, full of drama and intrigue

REVIEW: The Importance Of Being Earnest, Harold Pinter Theatre (0 Stars)

Lucy Bailey has presided over a fraud - this is not Wilde's play and it doesn't pretend to be when you are in your expensive seat. But to lure you to pay for the ticket, it masquerades as Wilde's wonderfully witty and practically perfect play.

REVIEW: Intimate Apparel, Park Theatre ✭✭✭✭

This is a play that is both functional and delicate, necessary and yet slightly exotic, lovingly crafted and sumptuous to experience. And like all gorgeous intimate apparel, it ought to be seen.

First look production footage from Shakespeare In Love

REVIEW: Annie Get Your Gun, Churchill Theatre ✭✭✭✭

This is first-rate family entertainment. This Annie is a great night in the theatre and comes highly recommended.

Ghost stories extends to Jan 2015

Almeida announces casting for Little Revolution

The Almeida Theatre has today announced casting for the world premiere of Alecky Blythe’s new play Little Revolution inspired by the 2011 London riots, directed by Joe Hill-Gibbins.

Skylight Recoups Investment in Five Weeks

Elaine Stritch passes away at 89

New Miss Saigon Trailer Released

REVIEW: Fathers and Sons, Donmar Warehouse ✭✭✭✭

With a striking wood-plank set by Rob Howell and brooding music by Alex Baranowski, this is a sharp and compelling production about families and the need for love.

Jersey Boys - UK and Irish Tour Cast Announced

REVIEW: Kristin Chenoweth, Royal Albert Hall ✭✭✭✭✭

From the cries of "We love you" from the audience, the feeling was clearly reciprocated.

Jenna Russell and Jonathan Slinger headline Apollo transfer for Urinetown

REVIEW: Titus Andronicus, Globe Theatre ✭✭✭✭

Its great stuff and easily the best production Bailey has helmed. No wonder it had a return season. It’s a great production of a Shakespeare text that is not well known but if done like this often enough ought be one of the most popular.

REVIEW: Mr Burns, Almeida Theatre ✭✭✭

The performances are uniformly terrific. Especially excellent were the wonderful Wunmi Mosaku, Jenna Russell, Justine Mitchell and Michael Shaeffer – and Demetri Goritas’ precise breakdown in Act Two is harrowing, almost unfeasibly precise.

REVIEW: Shakespeare In Love, Noel Coward Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

It is difficult to recall, at least over the course of the last seven years, a commercial production of a new play which has opened directly in the West End and which is as funny, dramatic, enthralling and educational.

Shakespeare in Love - First Look Photos

Cats comes to the London Palladium for Christmas

REVIEW: Carousel, Arcola Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

I would see it again and again if I could. It's an amazing achievement on a tiny budget; with proper support it could run for ages. It's better than many West End productions of musicals which do.

Phone hacking play gets West End transfer

REVIEW: The Crucible, Old Vic Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

Farber makes no mistakes in casting, design, pace, tone or intensity, with the result that the play throbs with vitality, is both visceral and sensuous and, even if you know the plot, plays out like the frightening psycho-drama thriller it is.

Urinetown Transfers to West End in September

The Book Of Mormon meets South Park in this witty animation.

Review: Valley Of Astonishment, Young Vic ✭✭✭✭

A truly delightful, engaging and joyous piece, chock full of important subjects and thoughts.

REVIEW: The Colby Sisters, Tricycle Theatre ✭✭

There is an abundance of shrill shouting, tiresome arguing and pedestrian staging. It's like watching Revenge but without the irony. Or the humour. Or the style.

REVIEW: Bakersfield Mist, Duchess Theatre ✭✭✭

There is, perhaps, 40 minutes of good material here, material which ungarnished with irrelevancy may have made for an interesting theatrical experience.

REVIEW: Adler and Gibb, Royal Court

It was all that I could do to keep conscious for most of the First Act. The loud snoring of a fellow patron assisted more in that feat than the script, concept or performances.

REVIEW: Wonderland, Hampstead Theatre ✭✭

This is a lacklustre effort in every way – about as far from the triumph that was his Chariots of Fire staging as can be imagined. It’s unceasingly uninventive and desperately dull. And the cast shout endlessly.

Further Casting of Electra Announced

The Print Room Moves To Notting Hill

REVIEW: The Pajama Game, Shaftesbury Theatre ✭✭✭✭

It's a great night out; pure entertainment. And with this cast, works far better than the same production did in Chichester last season.

City Of Angels sells out first ticket release

The production of City Of Angels being staged by The Donmar Warehouse has posted SOLD OUT notices for the entire run on the day the show went on sale to the public.

Sweeney Todd Launches New Twickenham Venue

REVIEW: Skylight, Wyndhams Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

This is the kind of first class work for which the West End is famous. Luminous, enthralling and unforgettable.

REVIEW: Incognito, Bush Theatre ✭✭✭

There is a great deal to like in this production. Payne's writing is intriguing and the pace never really flags. It is a good play, just not a brilliant one.

Made In Dagenham - Further Casting Announced

REVIEW: The Life Of The Party, Menier Chocolate Factory ✭✭✭✭

It is difficult to imagine that patrons of this show would not want to see and hear more of Lippa's work, especially the works showcased here.

If/Then Cast Album Has Show Stopping Chart Debut

Tony Awards 2014 - Nominees and Winners

REVIEW: Clarence Darrow, Old Vic Theatre ✭✭✭

Spacey does not play one character; he is Darrow and he observes Darrow. He works within the confines of the stage and smashes the fourth wall.

Rodgers & Hammerstein's Carousel: From 1945 to 2014 in a single hit

REVIEW: Miss Saigon, Prince Edward Theatre ✭✭✭✭

If anything, this production of Miss Saigon re-establishes Cameron Mackintosh as the greatest producer of musicals ever. He understands his audience, and as a producer and theatre owner, he delivers!

REVIEW: Fings Aint What They Used T'Be, Theatre Royal Straford East ✭✭✭✭

Hands has produced a wonderful, joyful and quite triumphant revival of a piece that is often overlooked and discarded as “old-fashioned”. The life, beauty and pure pleasure that pulses from the stage deserves a long, long run.

REVIEW: The Testament Of Mary ✭

This time, once again, Deborah Warner missed the point and all but destroyed everything of value about the theatrical experience.

REVIEW: The Silver Tassie, National Theatre ✭✭✭✭

There is not a person to fault in the cast or ensemble. Davies whips the material into as good a shape as it is ever likely to have. The sense of it, the glistening highlights of pain it produces, will linger long.

REVIEW: King Charles III, Almeida Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

This is theatrical alchemy of the rarest kind. It will affect each person who sees it differently, for it is everything and nothing all at once.

REVIEW: Blithe Spirit, Gielgud Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

Michael Blakemore is a genius. His cast is perfect. This is likely to be the smooth, delicious comedy revival of the year, if not the decade.

REVIEW: Sunny Afternoon, Hampstead Theatre ✭✭✭

There is a lot to like in Sunny Afternoon and overall the experience is more than satisfactory. It is great fun. Well worth seeing and hard not to enjoy.

REVIEW: Birdland, Royal Court Theatre ✭✭✭✭

There is a simply amazing moment when the set literally starts to crack up or, depending on how you look at it, begins to drown – just as the central character, Andrew Scott’s troubled rock supremo, Paul, finds his personal world crumbling around him, finds himself drowning in a sea of excess, selfishness and solitude.

REVIEW: Handbagged, Vaudeville Theatre ✭✭

Handbagged promises much and delivers very little. It's vaguely interesting and occasionally genuinely involving

REVIEW: Henry IV Part One, RSC ✭✭✭

Perhaps it was just that Richard II promised so much, but this Henry IV Part One did not make one long for Part Two.

REVIEW: A View From The Bridge, Young Vic Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

It really is shatteringly good in every way. And the final blood-soaked vignette is both poetic and horrific

REVIEW: Once We Lived Here, Kings Head Theatre ✭✭✭✭

It's a joy to see and hear creative Australian voices, onstage and off, in London. This show is worth a full scale production, properly funded and promoted. It's a true pity its short season has now concluded.

REVIEW: Mothers and Sons, Golden Theatre ✭✭✭

Mothers and Sons is worth seeing, because it will provoke questions and discussion; not because it is a great play.

REVIEW: Hedwig And The Angry Inch, Belasco Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

This is spellbinding, miraculous work. Broadway really is on fire this season - and Neil Patrick Harris is in a Firestarter league all of his own. Completely unmissable.

REVIEW: Act One, Vivian Beaumont Theatre ✭✭✭✭

Tears flow as easily as laughs are generated. This is truly wonderful theatre. Everyone should see it.

REVIEW: If/Then, Richard Rodgers Theatre ✭✭✭✭

It may be that I spent almost two-thirds of the piece in tears: because it was true, honest and full of real conundrums, real passions, real tensions and achingly real disappointments and tribulations. It really is astonishingly truthful.

REVIEW: Cabaret, Studio 54 ✭✭✭✭✭

This is, by far, the best version of Cabaret I have ever seen. Do anything to see it.

REVIEW: Lady Day At Emerson Bar and Grill, Circle In The Square ✭✭✭✭✭

At its centre, at the height of her considerable powers, Audra McDonald is blazing with talent and genius. Totally unmissable.

REVIEW: Les Miserables, Imperial Theatre ✭✭

Reimagining great productions is de rigour on the great musical stages of the world. Sometimes, the reimagining can surpass the original vision. This is not such a case.

REVIEW: Disney's Aladdin, New Amsterdam Theatre ✭✭✭

Reading this back, it seems all over the place. Fitting perhaps, because that is precisely now the show itself feels. Not quite one thing (a knowing self-parody) or another (a pantomime) but definitely not what was expected - an old-fashioned, but new, musical comedy.

REVIEW: Casa Valentina, Samuel J Friedman Theatre ✭✭✭✭

The play is beautifully written for the most part, although it does seem a trifle long. There are many excellent one-liners, but there is also a sense of bonhomie which pervades the writing and which is crucial to the play's success.

REVIEW: The Realistic Joneses, Lyceum Theatre ✭✭✭✭

As ensemble playing goes, it is hard to fault. Four crisp, clean and focused portrayals of perfectly ordinary life turned sour, relationships riven with pain and care.

REVIEW: Bullets Over Broadway, St James Theatre ✭✭✭

Bullets Over Broadway provides a visual feast, some delicious light comedy and terrific turns from the main stars. It's a joyous, bubbly, refreshing night of theatrical fun. There is a lot to love here.

REVIEW: Of Mice And Men, Longacre Theatre ✭✭✭✭

The tragic ending of the play was as ghastly and overwhelming as Steinbeck intended, while at the same time being the ultimate expression of love and acceptance. Powerful theatre in every way.

REVIEW: Violet, American Airlines Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

A perfect gem of a musical, hewn from truth and pain and polished by creatives and artists with magnificent skill. Unforgettable. Do anything to see it.

REVIEW: Rocky, Wintergarden Theatre ✭✭✭

This is more spectacle than musical theatre; more play with music than musical; more staged film than musical theatre. But it has a lot of heart and some very winning performances.

REVIEW: Dinner With Friends, Laura Pels Theatre ✭✭

This may be one of those plays that really works when stupendous actors perform it. But where, as here, the cast are skilled actors but not more than that, it lacks engagement, and, critically, empathy.

REVIEW: Raisin In The Sun, Ethel Barrymore Theatre ✭✭✭✭

A gifted cast makes a tremendously important play vibrate and shudder with joy, horror and the brutality of everyday life. It's terrific stuff.

REVIEW: The Most Happy Fella, New York City Centre ✭✭✭✭✭

Perfectly cast, directed, performed, sung and danced, this production will go down in history. It is now the new bench-mark for concert performances of great musicals.

REVIEW: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Savoy Theatre ✭✭✭✭

This is a musical farce. No question. And a very funny one. But it has a conceptual twist: the fourth wall is broken allowing asides to or with the audience or conductor, or wry, deftly done onstage business.

REVIEW: Let The Right One In, Apollo Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

It is difficult to see how this production could be better. Scary, imaginative and practically perfect in every way. A modern fable not to be missed.

REVIEW: Thérèse Raquin, Finborough Theatre ✭✭✭✭

Nona Shepphard’s achievement here is really quite astonishing: this is a sensational premiere of a new work. Why it is not playing at the National is one of life’s mysteries.

REVIEW: 1984, Almeida Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

This really is first-rate modern theatre: challenging, entertaining and questioning. Rupert Goold's vision for the Almeida is electrifying.

REVIEW: Visitors, Arcola Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

This is an extraordinary play performed and directed with consummate skill and incredible insight. It should transfer to the West End and be seen by anyone who has a family.

REVIEW: Another Country, Trafalgar Studios ✭✭✭✭✭

Herrin completely understands that and his production is in terrific synchronicity with Mitchell's vision. A glorious revival of an under-rated masterpiece.

REVIEW: Two Into One, Menier Chocolate Factory ✭✭✭✭

This is funnier than anything that has played in the West End since One Man Two Guvnors first transferred. Old fashioned English farce done with style and charm and great skill, full of laughs and unexpected delight.

REVIEW: We Are Proud To Present, Bush Theatre ✭✭✭

As you enter the auditorium through the rehearsal room, you can almost smell the unwashed theatre students who have earnestly, yet slightly rabidly, put together this piece of protest performance art.

REVIEW: Do I Hear A Waltz?, Park Theatre ✭

This revival is notable for one thing: it does raise, but not answer, this question - is Do I Hear A Waltz? capable of successful revival?

REVIEW: Other Desert Cities, Old Vic Theatre ✭✭

The Old Vic is back in In-The-Round mode and so there is a greater intimacy with the playing. This proves fatal with this cast; the distance of a proscenium might have assisted Cusack and Egan, but as it is, their every move is closely exposed.

REVIEW: Good People, Hampstead Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

A great play, well directed and perfectly played. Unmissable.

REVIEW: The Two Worlds Of Charlie F, Richmond Theatre ✭✭✭✭

People often ask me why I go to see so much theatre, as if it were a sign of madness. Perhaps it is, but the answer is simple: because every now and then you encounter something like this new play, which demonstrates the value, power and relevance of theatre and expands your understanding of the world.

REVIEW: Fatal Attraction, Theatre Royal Haymarket (0 Stars)

No one sitting around us seemed to be having a good time and there was much disgruntlement at interval.

Review: The One, Soho Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

REVIEW: The Act, Trafalgar Studios ✭✭✭✭✭

This is a powerful piece of theatre, a meditation on the state of the homosexual in the UK in the last 50 or so years. But it is wrapped up and delivered like a perfectly prepared confection, such is Baldwin's sheer skill and dazzling ability.

REVIEW: Being Shakespeare, Harold Pinter Theatre ✭✭✭✭

REVIEW: Knight Of The Burning Pestle, Sam Wannamaker Playhouse ✭✭✭✭

It is startling to realise this play was written seven years after Hamlet. It feels as fresh as a daisy. If you value the warmth that humour and truth provide, rush to see this. It's a winner.

REVIEW: Urinetown, St James Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

Really, this production cements Lloyd's reputation as a dynamic and thrilling young director. His vision here is glorious and he sees to it that it is properly and apparently effortlessly executed. This could easily be the best New Musical of 2014. It will certainly take some topping.

REVIEW: Ellen Terry with Eileen Atkins, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse ✭✭✭✭✭

An unmissable night with one of the world's greatest living stage actresses.

REVIEW: Candide, Menier Chocolate Factory, ✭✭✭✭✭

This genius production ought not be missed. Sell body parts to see it and to revel in its ecstasy

REVIEW: Blurred Lines, The Shed Theatre at The National ✭✭✭✭✭

Blurred Lines is one of the best things to play at the National Theatre in the last six years. It is a significant and provocative work of great sweep and scope.

REVIEW: Before the Night is Through, The Landor Theatre ✭✭✭

Despite the first Act moving somewhat slowly, Act Two is when the musical really takes off with added cheekiness, inuendo and ridiculously outrageous farce, prompting much uncontrolled laughter from the audience. As a headlining show in the From Page to Stage series, Before the Night is Through is a delightfully jolly jaunt and proof that British musical theatre is alive and well.

REVIEW: Donkeys Years, Rose Theatre Kingston ✭✭✭

Frayn is a genius and a clever wordsmith to boot. He orchestrates the silliness here with a precision that is formidable and even now, almost forty years on, some of his traps are so well laid that they prove genuinely surprising when sprung.

REVIEW: The Only Way Is Downton, Trafalgar Studios ✭✭✭✭✭

Kempner is the real deal in every way - his timing is impeccable, his sense of comedy immaculate, his ability to impersonate or portray the essence of the work of others inspired and unflinching, his diction and vocal dexterity extraordinarily impressive. Add his matinee idol looks and you have - unquestionably - a star.

REVIEW: Strangers On A Train, Gielgud Theatre ✭✭✭

It is incredibly well worth seeing. It's not a play for everyone, but if you get on Goodchild's train, and ride with it, there is plenty to enjoy and savour.

REVIEW: Fortune's Fool, Old Vic Theatre ✭✭

The trouble is that none of it is co-ordinated or controlled or channelled in a particular direction, with the result that nothing comes of anything.

REVIEW: The World Goes Round, Union Theatre ✭✭

In a week when the "other" (Sondheim) revue, Putting It Together, closed at the St James' Theatre after a terrific run, this childish and facile production pales into insignificance.

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance hits the stage.

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance explodes on to the stage at the Park Theatre this year.

The City Stops at Islington - With Iris

Joseph to be an animated film thanks to Elton John's Rocket Pictures

It was announced today that Elton John's Rocket Pictures has acquired the rights to Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat, which it intends to produce as an animated film.

Images - Andrew Lloyd Webber's Stephen Ward

Production images from Andrew Lloyd Webber's Stephen Ward currently playing at the Aldwych Theatre.

Robert Webb to play Wooster

Following a successful initial season, hit comedy Jeeves and Wooster in Perfect Nonsense has now extended it's run at the Duke Of York's Theatre until 20 September 2014 starring Robert Webb.

Back To The Future Musical Announced

Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale are working with Universal Stage Productions (Wicked and Billy Elliot), London-based producer Colin Ingram (Ghost – The Musical) and Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment to develop a stage musical version of their film Back to the Future.

Mayhem Musical Theatre Company premiere The Addams Family in the UK

Following the rights release late last year by Theatrical Rights Worldwide, it was announced today that Mayhem Musical Theatre Company will present the UK premiere of The Addams Family - the musical.

Wincester amateur theatre launches playwrighting competition

Amateur theatre group, Chesil Theatre is once again inviting playwrights to submit scripts for its 10x10 Playwriting Competition.

Interview: The Heritage Arts Company Directors - Tim and Mat

Over 200 talented performers and artists applied for VAULT, a festival running over six weeks. The interest in working for the company has enabled a strong programme of events.

Feature: The Future Of Theatre Criticism

Arts desks across all major publications seem to be cutting back on their critics. In an information saturated world, who do you trust? What is the future of theatre criticism?

Hairspray now available for UK amateurs

Josef Weinberger has announced that rights for smash hit musical Hairspray are now available to amateur groups throughout the UK.

Interview: Made in China Company Directors Tim and Jessica

What makes theatre company Made in China so special? Their razor sharp comedy Gym Party is currently on tour.

REVIEW: Ciphers, Bush Theatre ✭✭

It is difficult to believe that anyone would programme this play and even more difficult to believe that there are not better plays which deserve productions decades before this one.

REVIEW: Putting It Together, St James Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

This Putting It Together deserves to transfer into a central West End theatre and play to packed houses seeking pure, joyful entertainment.

REVIEW: Happy Days, Young Vic Theatre ✭✭✭✭

Happy Days is not a happy play. It is Beckett at his most confronting, most understandable, relentlessly surreal and disturbing. Essentially a monologue, it is an endurance test for both actress and audience.

Critics Circle Theatre Awards turn 25 as Chimerica prevails.

The Critics’ Circle Theatre Awards 2013 took place on Tuesday 28 January 2014, at the Prince of Wales Theatre, celebrating the 25th anniversary of these unique awards

Joseph to hit the silver screen

Jersey Boys to tour UK for the first time.

The Tony, Olivier and Grammy Award-winning Best Musical Jersey Boys, which has been delighting audiences in London for six years, will be touring the United Kingdom for the first time from September 2014.

REVIEW: The Pass, Royal Court Theatre ✭✭✭

Tovey gives a first rate performance. He attacks the part with every fibre of his being and gives the dialogue more joy and menace than it deserves. Even he, however, struggles to make the peculiar second Act interesting and plausible.

Sex and the City star Kristen Davis to make West End debut in Fatal Attraction

Cameron Mackintosh becomes first British producer inducted into the Theatre Hall of Fame

Cameron Mackintosh was inducted into the Theatre Hall of Fame in a ceremony at New York's Gerhswin Theatre on January 27, 2014

Sneak Peek: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels heads to the West End

Rehearsals for the musical were recently opened up to the media and BritishTheatre.com were invited to take a look. Robert Lindsay said he wished that more shows would open their rehearsal room doors to the media.

Cast announced for I Can't Sing - the X Factor musical

Bunny boiling is back in fashion as Fatal Attraction hits the stage.

Bunny boiling, psychotic lovers and thrills aplenty when the stage adaptation of the film Fatal Attraction arrives in the West End early next year for a limited season.

Review: Happy Days, Churchill Theatre, Bromley ✭✭✭

A wave of nostalgia engulfed the Churchill Theatre Bromley last night, when the UK tour of Happy Days - a new musical kicked of its UK tour, some 40 years after the series was first broadcast.

Review: Stephen Ward, Aldwych Theatre ✭✭

It’s a story that offered so much but as a show Stephen Ward returns so little.

REVIEW: The Duchess Of Malfi, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse ✭✭✭✭✭

This is the start of a whole new range of possibilities for the Globe complex - and a really entertaining and desirable one.

REVIEW: King Lear, National Theatre ✭✭✭✭

There has not, since 2007, been a National Theatre production of a Shakespearean play anything like as engaging, thrilling and involving as the Sam Mendes helmed revival of King Lear now playing in the Olivier Theatre.

REVIEW: The Bridges Of Madison County, Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

First and foremost though, it is a human tragedy - and the acting, staging, book, music and orchestrations all combine to produce an intensely affecting and sublimely entertaining night at the theatre.

REVIEW: The Glass Menagerie, Booth Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

Sell limbs, organs, children, gold, whatever - but see this production if you value great dramatic theatrical work. It's a once in a lifetime reimagining of a classic piece of theatrical writing.

REVIEW: Machinal, American Airlines Theatre ✭✭✭

The audience was not fooled either; their tepid applause was a damning indictment of the alleged star turn. And the production company plants calling out "Brava" made no impression; the packed audience would not rise to its feet or even sustain applause for a second curtain call.

REVIEW: Pippin, Music Box Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

Utterly completely glorious - funny and intensely sexual in style. This is a Pippin for all seasons. Miss it not!

REVIEW: Buyer And Cellar, Barrow Street Theatre ✭✭✭✭

It's a delicious and satisfying theatrical experience in every way. Urie is nothing short of remarkable.

REVIEW: Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies, RSC ✭✭✭✭✭

It is as near perfect a piece of dramatic theatre as one is ever likely to see. What Herrin and his team have achieved here is utterly, unquestionably remarkable. It is good old-fashioned entertaining theatre, built solidly with fine acting and a tremendous narrative. There are no "concepts" here - just a desire to tell a marvellous theatrical tale.

REVIEW: Coriolanus, Donmar Warehouse ✭✭✭

As Act One trundles along, there is absolutely no sense that anyone on stage has any idea what they are doing or why.

INTERVIEW: Alexandra Spencer-Jones, Artistic Director