Three Sisters, Vaudeville Theatre - ★★★★ - Until June 29, 2019


This is the gold standard for the production of Chekhov. Lev Dodin completely captures the playwright's spirit in this rich and complex rendering. Life is eventful but is it meaningful? This is the question haunting the characters from the play's opening on Irina's name day, the anniversary of the death of the sisters' father, until the day the army leaves the town. Time passes, but does it progress? The moving performances of Irina Tychinina, Elizaveta Boyarskaya and Ekaterina Tarasova were stunning, but the whole ensemble was perfectly cast. The fact that the play is in Russian might be intimidating, but it shouldn't be. We accept the use of subtitles in the cinema and the opera, and they can also work in the theatre. This is an opportunity to hear the sonorous tones of Chekhov's Russian resonate the solemn existential questions of his work. It is a chance to hear Chekhov in the language he intended to be heard in.

 Reviewed by J.C.

 Our Score:  ☆☆☆☆ 

WHEN, WHERE, GETTING THERE:
Tue - Sat: 7:15 pm, Sun: 2:15 pm
Vaudeville Theatre
Nearest tube: Charing Cross
https://www.nimaxtheatres.com/shows/three-sisters/
Map & Location: 404 Strand, Charing Cross, London WC2R 0NH, UK

Most Popular

Good Grief ★★★★★ Platform Presents and Finite Films | Feb 15 - Apr 15, 2021

Image
Just when lockdown may have made us resigned to an intellectual diet of television, featuring the improbable acted by the unbelievable, along comes this wonderful little play by Lorien Haynes. A thoughtful meditation on loss and relationships, Good Grief is beautifully crafted and brilliantly performed. Adam (Nikesh Patel) has lost his partner and Cat (Sian Clifford) has lost her best friend. Their shared exploration of the mourning experience is charged with some very sharp banter and some very poignant moments. There's a lot of humour here and a great chemistry between Patel and Clifford. They move naturally and sensitively through a gamut of emotions while coming to terms with the new parameters of their relationship. The play explores how grief, like love, comes in many forms and how both are subject to personal and social boundaries. Director, Natalie Abrahami cleverly uses the black and white scene-change sequences to deconstruct the illusions and conventions of theatre whil
Full Details »

All On Her Own ★★★★★ MZG Theatre Productions (online) | February 16-21, 2021

Image
Terence Rattigan's thirty minute monologue, All On Her Own , was written for radio and here, in Alastair Knights' immaculately filmed production, becomes a superb vehicle for award-winning Janie Dee. Rosemary is the rather posh widow of a Huddersfield building contractor, Gregory, and after rather too much whisky, she imagines trying to communicate with him. Effortlessly, Dee draws us into their milieu which would seem, to the outside world, to contain a perfect marriage, but the veneer is very thin. One could imagine a relationship akin to that in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Rattigan was for many years derided, but thankfully his writing is at last back in fashion. His language here is spare yet it takes us on an emotional roller coaster as Rosemary downs more and more alcohol. Beautifully lit and stylishly set, we get a strong impression of the Hampstead these characters inhabit – dinner-party discussions on the merits of Kafka and educating children at Eton. Norther
Full Details »

Sir John Soane's Museum: Guided Tour ★★★★★ FREE

Image
This is one of our favourite museums in London. The quirky and crammed home of John Soane, architect of the Bank of England. It has some wonderful treasures, including Hogarth's "The Election" and "The Rake's Progress." The sarcophagus of Seti I is in the basement along with the parlour of his imaginary friend, Brother John. Don't miss the opening of the display walls in the gallery now done on the hour and half hour. Also, try to be there for the free Private Apartments tour, limited to 8 people and requiring  sign up on site. Reviewed by J.C.  Our Score:    ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆   WHEN, WHERE, GETTING THERE: Wed - Sun: 10 am - 5 pm (l ast entry at 4:30 pm) Closed: Dec 24, 25, 26, 31 & Jan 1 Private Apartments Tours: 1:15 pm & 2:00 pm Sir John Soane's museum, Lincoln's Inn Fields Nearest tube: Holborn https://www.soane.org
Full Details »

Grimm Tales for Fragile Times and Broken People ★★★★★ Creation Theatre (online) | Until March 13, 2021

Image
Creation Theatre's Grimm Tales for Fragile Times and Broken People is by turns eerily beautiful, terrifying, or just creepy. Mashing together several tales gathered by the Brothers Grimm, director Gari Jones and the actors Kofi Dennis, Dharmesh Patel, Natasha Rickman, Graeme Rose and Annabelle Terry take us on an incredibly surreal journey through the gruesome world the Grimms created. With violence and cruelty throughout, this is most certainly not a show for young children; it does, however, display all the amazing invention this company is renowned for. Living as we do in the lonely isolation of lockdown, tales of loss and death seem unlikely topics for entertainment but the treatment here is so mesmerising that we are drawn into this bizarre world and wait aghast for the next horrific piece of the action. Probably the best known story is Hansel and Gretel , and when we finally meet the witch in her Gingerbread House she is a wonderfully frightening monster hiding behind diapha
Full Details »

The Sorcerer's Apprentice ★★★★ Southwark Playhouse (online) | Until March 14, 2021

Image
"There's magic in the air" as Goethe's fable of The Sorcerer's Apprentice gets a contemporary reading in this clever new musical from the team of Richard Hough and Ben Morales Frost. The story deals with the rocky relationship between the sorcerer and his rebellious daughter while also treating the darker issue of our current climate crisis. Can magic and science work together to defeat human greed, or will all be swept away by the forces of a natural world that humans have abused? Despite the big issues being dealt with here, the story remains charming and simple. Kudos to Mary Moore who, in her first major role, brings an engaging joy and rebelliousness to her character, Eva Gottel. Moore has a lovely voice and she creates a credible teenager, both cocky and needy. She is ably supported by a generally strong cast. David Thaxton is suitably serious and sympathetic as her sorcerer father and Dawn Hope is terrific as Lamia Lydekker, the evil factory owner. Howev
Full Details »

Romeo & Juliet ★★★★ Metcalfe Gordon Productions (online) | Until February 27, 2021

Image
Creativity and imagination have really come to the fore during this pandemic which has allowed Nick Evans and his team to produce this fascinatingly clever version of Romeo & Juliet . One would never guess that none of the performers were actually on stage together. Beginning in a theatre auditorium, the ingenious production designs by Jamie Osborne give us a series of realistic locations climaxing in an extremely beautiful crypt. Standing head and shoulders over the show is Sam Tutty's Romeo. Initially smitten with fair Rosaline, our hero's fickle eye soon migrates to Emily Redpath's pretty Juliet, and Tutty doesn't put a foot wrong as the young lover. He speaks the lines immaculately and his stillness often helps build the tension. This is definitely an outstanding performance of a role which can be difficult to pull off. Lucy Tregear's sympathetic Nurse and Helen Anker's Capulet together with Vinta Morgan's Friar Laurence bring gravitas to the smaller
Full Details »

Barnes' People ★★★★ Original Theatre Company and Perfectly Normal Productions (online) | Feb 18 - Jul 31, 2021

Image
Barnes' People comprises four monologues written by Peter Barnes for BBC Radio 3 during the 1980s and they have varied success here in filmed performances. Matthew Kelly, in "Losing Myself", has the difficult task of realistically creating an ageing Harley Street doctor conversing with his deceased friend; his lines seem more suited to the printed page than being spoken. Additionally, it seems rushed with complex issues trivialised. Jemma Redgrave is totally believable as Rosa, a doctor beating her head against the brick wall of bureaucracy. She feels she has lost her anger and thinks her individuality has dissipated over the years. There is a welcome lack of sentimentality as she tries to cope with her own problems and those of elderly patients as she ponders 'Is there life before death?' In "Billy and Me" Jon Culshaw plays a ventriloquist who converses with his family of dummies. Here we are considering the nature of schizophrenia as the ventriloquist
Full Details »

Typical ★★★★ Soho Theatre and Nouveau Riche (online) | From February 24, 2021

Image
Ryan Calais Cameron's Typical is a searing indictment of systemic racism in British society and the police force in particular. Although the real Christopher Alder, whose story is told here, died some twenty years ago, one is made to fear that little has significantly changed in the interim. The issues here are not unfamiliar but they are expressed with great poignancy. Director Anastasia Osei-Kuffour's visually spare but gripping production introduces us to a happy-go-lucky protagonist whom we follow on his final day prior to his death in police custody. Yet before the situation becomes tragic, Cameron's lyrical language is not irredeemably bleak. In amusing moments Alder ponders why “noses run and feet smell.” Still, around the jokey, charismatic man at the start, who admits that “words have a way with him rather than him having a way with words” the tension grows. Things begin to go awry after he flirts with a girl and gets attacked by some louts. Moving to hospital the
Full Details »

Moment of Grace, The Actors Centre (online) - ★★★★ - Until August 9, 2020

Image
At the heart of this hybrid between theatre and film is the visit of Diana, Princess of Wales to an AIDS ward in 1987. The action is seen through the eyes of three characters superbly performed by Luke Dayhill, Lucy Walker-Evans and Andrew Paul. Dayhill is outstanding as the articulate patient, Andrew, movingly awaiting death. He worries about being outed on television and says "Doing this isn't easy." At times, sharing the challenges of these characters isn't easy either. Patients and nurses alike have to get through with a mixture of humour and hope; their experience is described as "clinics and crematoriums." Walker-Evans superbly portrays the young nurse, Jude, terrified to come into work each day while wondering which of her patients has died during the night. Paul, as firefighter Donnie, has a difficult task – embodying The Sun reader, wrapped in misconceptions, who finds that his gay son, a nurse on the AIDS ward, is HIV positive. Author Bren Gosl
Full Details »

Martha, Josie and the Chinese Elvis, Park Theatre - ★★★★★ - Until January 4, 2020

Image
The title says it all. You know you're in for a lot of fun and this play lives up to its billing. What do you give to your dominatrix when she turns forty? It's a question we've all asked ourselves, and what we get here is an amusing and provocative answer. This is a piece that looks at and laughs at role playing, how it can liberate us and how it can trap us. Everyone from Chinese Elvis to dominatrix, Josie, has an alter ego that either supports them or constrains them. Coming to terms with the authentic self and enjoying the possibility of playing with the notion of other selves is both the challenge and the solution. This is a very funny play with a lot of heart and wisdom that is beautifully performed by a cast which never misses a beat. Sioned Jones is quite wonderful as the obsessive compulsive cleaner who grows into a new persona and Andrew P. Stephen is delightful as the dry cleaner who accepts his complexity. Kellie Batchelor is completely believable as the age
Full Details »

The City Life Magazine | Reviews & Ratings