Although Monet would eventually become one of the most beloved artists of all time, his work was initially derided by the artistic establishment. When he attempted, alongside Renoir and Degas, to exhibit through official channels such as the Paris Salon, run by the Académie des Beaux-Arts , his paintings were repeatedly rejected. In response, these artists participated in the Salon des Refusés of 1863, an exhibition that helped bring attention to what would become Impressionism. A Mirrored Monet presents a musical retelling of the painter’s life, exploring the interplay between his personal experiences and his artistic commitment. At its heart is Monet’s profound love for his first wife, Camille, who served as both muse and model. The production uses the familiar device of an older Monet, convincingly played by Jeff Shankley, reflecting on the actions of his younger self. Through this lens, he recalls with regret how his obsessive dedication to art led him to neglect his wife and fami...

In July 1955, Ruth Ellis became the last woman to be hanged in Britain. Despite serious concerns about her mental state and the abuse she had endured, the nightclub hostess was convicted of murdering her lover, David Blakely. The government refused to stay her execution. Her death is widely regarded as a watershed moment in shifting public opinion against capital punishment. Ruth The Musical frames her story in retrospect, as Ellis revisits her life in conversation with the man who will ultimately act as her executioner. Bibi Simpson brings a raw, brittle intensity to the imprisoned Ruth, while Hannah Taylor’s portrayal of her younger self captures both vulnerability and reckless longing. Connor Payne is chillingly effective as David, exuding the careless cruelty of a cad accustomed to having his own way. John Faal impresses both dramatically and vocally as Ruth’s hapless admirer, Desmond. The production gestures towards weighty themes such as class, gender, and the morality of capita...

The first performance of Maxim Gorky’s Summerfolk took place in 1904, on the eve of the Russo-Japanese War and the turbulent events of Bloody Sunday, when, in January 1905, Russian troops fired on peaceful protesters. Perhaps foreshadowing these events, the play presents a seemingly blissful world in which Russia’s small middle class retreat to summer chalets, passing their days in idle gossip, romantic entanglements and domestic squabbles. While the characters, unlike the audience, are largely oblivious to the gathering political and social storm, Varvara, the wife of the lawyer Sergei Bassov, and her brother, Vlass, are beginning to question the purpose of their cosseted existence. Nevertheless, for most of the summer folk, the absorbing realities of business, family life and flirtation provide more than enough occupation. This National Theatre production vividly captures that rarefied, artificial milieu, with a typically imaginative set design and resplendent costumes. The impressi...

Vincent van Gogh spent two distinct periods in London. He stayed for two years from 1873 to 1875 before returning briefly in 1876. During his first stay he lodged with Ursula Loyer and fell in love with her daughter, Eugénie, who rejected him. Nicholas Wright’s play Vincent in Brixton reimagines this episode, deepening it into a more intricate emotional entanglement for the young art dealer’s assistant who would later become one of the most celebrated artists of all time. The play presents Van Gogh as a blunt, almost gauche young man with a striking lack of social restraint. His speech is impulsive, unguarded, and at times painfully direct, yet this very openness lends him a disarming vulnerability. Wright uses this quality to explore the tension between naivety and perception, suggesting that the same emotional candour that isolates Vincent also sharpens his artistic vision. The result is a thoughtful meditation on the inner forces that would come to define both his work and his stru...

This latest offering from the English National Ballet presents two works loosely connected by the theme of body and soul. The first, by the renowned choreographer Crystal Pite, is titled Body and Soul (Part 1). Set to a French text that largely describes the dancers’ movements, it unfolds across eight brief scenes. The piece is at its most evocative when Pite deploys a large group of dancers, creating exquisite passages such as the mirroring of the rhythmic surge of waves against the shore. However, the work lacks the narrative richness found in some of Pite’s finest creations, such as Revisor and Assembly Hall . While there are undeniably striking moments and some fine pas de deux , the production also fails to attain the level of her more abstract achievements, such as Figures in Extinction . Even so, encountering Pite’s choreography remains a consistently rewarding experience. The second piece, Proper Conduct , is a new work by Kameron N. Saunders. Divided into three parts, it unf...

Florence Foster Jenkins remains an extraordinary subject for drama, a figure both absurd and oddly admirable: a wealthy socialite who pursued operatic glory with unwavering conviction, but who possessed a voice that was frequently off-key and strained at the top. Her legend rests not only on that mismatch between ambition and ability, but also on her kindness and generosity, which complicate any easy attempt to turn her into a mere figure of ridicule. This production, however, leans too heavily towards the superficial. If the issue for Jenkins was that her performance did not rise to the material, the issue for Glorious!  is that the material does not rise to the level of the performance. Wendi Peters delivers a committed and energetically comic portrayal, but the script gives her limited scope to explore the contradictions that make Jenkins interesting. The arias are amusingly rendered and skilfully judged, yet they are asked to carry a play that too often settles for repetition r...

Imagine the headline, "Cure for Cancer Found." If only it were that simple.... Playwright Aaron Loeb invites us to imagine a world in which such a miraculous medical breakthrough takes place while he exposes the tangled, often troubling web of commerce, science, and ethics that shapes how innovations actually reach the public. The piece carries an almost allegorical force, and its three central figures embody the triad of competing interests that inform late capitalism. Willa, a gifted doctor, has developed a genetic diagnostic tool capable of detecting and potentially eradicating disease. At first she seems motivated by intellectual curiosity and the exhilaration of discovery, yet her personal ambitions gradually appear more opaque and troubling. Paul, an older venture capitalist, has built a company that seeks profit while professing a commitment to social good. However, he sees no real moral issue in using the new discovery to create designer babies. His business partner M...

Sam Morrison’s stand-up comedy show Sugar Daddy hilariously points out some of the foibles and absurdities of the gay community. It also tackles more serious issues such as the culture's intolerances, particularly when he reflects on his own attraction to older men with bellies. Beneath these sharp observations, however, the true centre of the monologue is Morrison's grappling with the loss of his partner during the Covid-19 pandemic. The show runs for only sixty minutes, yet Morrison traces his relationship with Jonathan from their first awkward meeting in Provincetown to the final leave-taking in hospital and the amusingly complicated scattering of the ashes. Along the way, the audience shares a remarkable emotional roller coaster. There are tender moments recalling time spent with Jonathan on a rooftop, weirdly funny episodes such as when Morrison is attacked by seagulls, and painfully vivid recollections of the speech delivered at Jonathan’s deathbed. The humour is dark an...

In 2011, Ryan Craig wrote a play about the first Gaza war of 2009. The work carries an even deeper resonance in today’s fraught political climate. David Rosenberg once ran a successful Jewish catering business, but he has fallen on hard times after a rumour spread through the neighbourhood that his food caused a woman’s death by food poisoning. His wife Lesley believes they should leave the area that has now turned its back on them, but David is determined to restore his reputation. The fact that their son died defending Israel is seen as a way of re-establishing the family’s standing among those around them. Yet their daughter’s involvement in an inquiry that may bring charges against the Jewish state for its conduct during the 2009 Gaza war threatens this fragile hope of acceptance. The family’s predicament becomes a microcosm of a larger dilemma. At what point do the rewards of belonging to a family, a community, or a nation demand a loyalty that endangers personal integrity, and ho...

When a young actor is engaged to impersonate a ghost strolling around the grounds of a stately home, he is told that he has been hired to amuse the owner’s nieces. It soon becomes clear, however, that nothing is quite what it first appears. Tim Foley’s supernatural tale is full of twists, and this confident production delivers them with flair. Sound and projection are used imaginatively to generate the expected shivers, while Neil Bettle’s design makes striking use of the space, conjuring an atmosphere thick with suggestion. Paragon House is full of secrets, and the staging beautifully establishes its engaging sense of haunted mystery. The piece unfolds essentially as a short story recounted by its protagonist, and the burden of drawing the audience in rests almost entirely on a single performer. George Naylor plays Joe, an aspiring writer/actor hired to circle the grounds of the grand house whose doors remain firmly closed to him. Naylor’s performance is articulate and strongly projec...