Malorie Blackman's novel was written for young adults, and this production is likely to hold considerable appeal for that demographic. The extended parable of racial injustice, woven together with a story of forbidden teenage love, would no doubt strike a chord with younger audiences. However, for older viewers, the message can feel somewhat overstated, and the love story, at times, predictable. The initial impact of reversing racial dynamics – placing Black characters, the Crosses, in a position of power over the white underclass, the Noughts – is powerful and thought-provoking. Yet, this inversion quickly loses its novelty, and the central characters, Callum and Sephy, reminiscent of Romeo and Juliet, risk feeling one-dimensional. This is undoubtedly strong, teachable material, and it’s easy to see why it remains a staple of school curricula. On stage, however, the simplicity of the plot and reliance on stock characters might be better suited to the format of a musical. With the ...

The new Emerald Theatre is a well-appointed venue that is a welcome addition to the London cabaret scene. Unfortunately, its first show, Diamonds and Dust , is a rather lacklustre offering despite some quite spectacular costuming. The main drawback of this show is the script, which simply isn't very interesting. Faye Tozer portrays, and narrates the story of, Miss Kitty LeRoy who is a gold-digging diva in the Wild West. She is a much-married card shark, and her journey is told through a series of poker hands. The humour that is the hallmark of most drag shows is notably absent here, and Tozer's attempts to solicit applause and laughter fall completely flat. Among the lip-syncing of various pop songs and lots of laboured hoofing, the first act of this cabaret show has a brief acrobatic performance which is followed up in the second act by an aerial strap display by Lady Lydia and Zoë Marshall which is the showstopper of this whole experience. The main focus of the cabaret, howev...

The 1979 album of The Who which went on to become a film and a musical, now returns as a ballet. Using Rachel Fuller's classical scoring, this version of Pete Townshend's story of Jimmy, the working class lad whose dismal home life and dead-end job lead him to embrace the Mod ethos of the '60s may be the most successful version yet. In this ballet adaptation of the time-honoured story of rival clans and frustrated love, which echoes Romeo and Juliet, and which is played out against the background of the conflict between the Mods vs Rockers, the style of the era is beautifully invoked but the symbolic depth of Jimmy's conflict is also brilliantly emphasised. The four aspects of his "quadrophenia" (The Tough Guy, The Lunatic, The Romantic, and The Hypocrite) are explicitly shown and explored, and they are directly contrasted to the external influences on his life as expressed by his father, Ace Face, his love interest, and his rocker friend. The real depths of J...

In 1963, Anselm Kiefer traced the steps of Vincent Van Gogh through the Netherlands, Belgium and France. This exhibition is the product of Kiefer's lifelong fascination with Van Gogh and presents some of the works inspired by his travels and by the compositions of his mentor. The interesting handout which accompanies the exhibition provides excerpts from Kiefer's diaries about his journey and offers a thought-provoking insight into his youthful engagement with Van Gogh's work. That preoccupation was not confined to his youth, however. It was to be ongoing, and even Kiefer's most recent output references Van Gogh. The first and third galleries of the exhibition focus on Kiefer's own monumental works which address subjects inspired by Van Gogh, while the second gallery contains smaller pieces and sketches which are fascinating to compare with Van Gogh's treatment of similar scenes. Indeed, for us, this was perhaps the most intriguing of the three galleries where w...

Lynn Nottage's play follows the fortunes of a young black seamstress in 1905 New York. Esther makes undergarments for the wealthy, and the central metaphor of the play is that just as her corsets control and distort women's figures to meet the dictates of fashion, all of the characters in the story find their lives defined and limited by race, gender, class and religion. From the wealthy Mrs Van Buren who must play her part in society while privately enduring a loveless marriage, to the cloth merchant, Mr Marks, whose religion does not allow him to be touched by a woman who is not in his family and which would never sanction a relationship with a black woman, everyone in Esther's world is trapped. However, it is through love and marriage that Esther hopes she will find freedom and escape from the restrictions of her situation. Although Esther's friends, the landlady Mrs Dickson and the prostitute, Mayme, counsel a life based on compromise, Esther hopes that her romantic...

Two men fall in love in the period of racial violence in America which saw the emergence of the Black Lives Matter movement. However, the fact that they are an interracial couple puts their search for personal happiness in a political context that is difficult to ignore. While the white member of the couple is a serious political activist, his black partner is a playwright who prioritises his art and teaching career. It is a sweet and simple love story that gains most of its depth from being placed against a backdrop of the tumult that typifies the outside world. In fact, its theme is universal. How do we balance the struggle and sacrifices involved in finding one's personal place of happiness while simultaneously responding to our responsibility to be part of a society and to fight against injustice? Unfortunately, neither the playwright, Harrison David Rivers, nor the director, Billy Porter, seem to entirely trust their material. Rivers, uses the popular, but increasingly overwor...

Less often produced than Eugene O'Neill's masterpiece, Long Day's Journey into Night , A Moon for the Misbegotten was written after that piece, although it was published and staged first. It also happens after the incidents of the former, although there is some overlap and inconsistency in the occurrence of events. In Long Day's Journey into Night , Jamie tells his father about the confrontation between Hogan and his rich neighbour over the pigs wallowing in the millionaire's ice pond, but this event only happens later in A Moon for the Misbegotten which happens chronologically afterwards. While O'Neill clearly did not intend for these plays to be considered strictly as sequels, they do deal with the same themes of existential angst, guilt and forgiveness, and the complex nature of lust and love. These are epic concerns, and it becomes no easy task to stage O'Neill's works for a contemporary audience who are accustomed to what passes for realism in bot...

Disney fans will be delighted. The latest in the company's series of animated films to be translated to the stage is now in London. And, everything they want and expect to see is here. There are some extraordinary special effects, a plethora of silly gags and a simplistic plot in which, unsurprisingly, good triumphs over evil. Plus, our hero learns some life lessons. Every box in the money-making formula is neatly ticked and all the usual suspects are present! In this story the feisty female character, a relatively new addition to the recipe, makes her requisite appearance as Meg played by Mae Ann Jorolan. She is joined by Trevor Dion Nicholas who acts as the silly sidekick, Phil, mentor to young Hercules (Luke Brady).The over-the top villain, outrageously overplayed by Stephen Carlile, is Hades, and in his nefarious scheming, he is abetted by his two comic henchmen, Bob and Charles (Craig Gallivan and Lee Zarrett). In addition to this set of the standard personae, we also have a ...

It's summertime and the season of fringe theatre is upon us. One-person shows, performers with niche talents and curious experimentation are among the hallmarks of this annual experience, and Showmanism certainly meets the above criteria. Created by and starring Dickie Beau whose gift is a formidable ability to lip-sync and some skill at mime, this production is a collage of various interesting commentaries about the theatre and theatrical production. The various snippets are neatly patched together, but their relevance to each other is left for the audience to determine. They run from the challenging and academic to the silly and anecdotal, and they certainly provide a quirky pastiche of commentary about the art of performance. From the acoustics of the Ancient Greek amphitheatres, to feminist questions about drag, to a reminiscence about a visit to Oberammergau, there are lots of interesting insights here, and an enormous amount of material is covered. To the proceedings, Dickie...

Iman Qureshi's delightful tale of a group of six women who come together to form a choir has much to recommend it. It is full of humour, and its political heart is in the right place. The characters are nicely drawn, and it is easy to identify both with them and with their plights: Lori's issue is that she is not out to her church-going family; Ana is determined to be politically correct at all costs, but she is also consumed by jealousy and fearful that Lori might leave her; Dina is from an Arab culture which wouldn't accept her orientation and she has an emotionally abusive husband; Fi is a wheelchair user who is going through a divorce and who has some questionable views about who should actually be part of the sisterhood; Bridget is a trans woman looking for love and acceptance; and, Ellie is a promiscuous non-binary individual who is exploring their identity. This group of songsters is presided over by Connie, the OWL (Old Wise Lesbian) who proves to be the work's ...

Perhaps more performance art than play, 4.48 Psychosis only attempts to do one thing. It seeks to create for the audience the experience of psychosis, and it manages to do so with a terrifying veracity. The audience is immersed in the anger, despair and desperation of individuals who are on the verge of taking their own lives as they can find no relief from their pain in either doctors or drugs. It is a gruelling 70 minutes of theatre, and when one of the characters says she feels as if she is being manipulated, the audience can probably wholeheartedly identify with that feeling. And, that may be an issue for this experience; for with the sense of emotional manipulation, comes withdrawal and distancing. Based on some of the darkly humorous comments we overheard as we left the theatre, this reaction may have been the case for several audience members. The sheer intensity of work had probably forced them out of the moment, and may ultimately have defeated the writer's purpose of eng...

The show that was nominated for more Tony awards than any other has now arrived in London! Nominated for thirteen awards and winning five, this musical set in 1976-1977, is a deep look at a rock band's creation of their latest album. It is a fascinating insight into the music industry and into the collaborative creative process. Five members of a band, plus two engineers, struggle to produce a new album, and as they do so, the individual personalities and relationships that exist disintegrate and are reconstructed. In fact, the process of artistic invention, and re-invention, that results in the album mirrors what the band members themselves go through. This unnamed British-American rock band is composed of the driven, perfectionist Peter, his insecure vocalist, songwriter partner, Diana, the drug-addled bass player, Reg, his long-suffering spouse the keyboardist, Holly, and the apparent adult in the room, the band's drummer, Simon. This quintet is supported by two goofy, but o...

The first summer exhibition at the Royal Academy was in 1769. For 257 years this annual show has been delighting, disconcerting and defying art lovers. The theme of this year's exhibition is "Dialogues," and it continues in the show's time-honoured tradition. There is something here for everyone, and probably the odd thing for no one. The Co-ordinator for this year's exhibition, Farshid Moussavi and her team have assembled an extraordinarily eclectic group of works and have done a superb job of reflecting the exhibition's theme. For the first time architectural works have been spread throughout the various galleries and that integration sets up a conversation with the other pieces that is quite fascinating. The dialogue is present in many forms, however: from the whimsical such as Adam Dant's Capital City - A Cat-ographic View of London (992) and Chris Orr's The Old Mill by the Stream (1008) to the confounding like John Humphreys' Lulu in the Sky...

Both these exhibitions provide fascinating retrospectives on the work of two roughly contemporary artists who have often been under-appreciated. Edward Burra was born in 1905 and died in 1976, while Ithell Colquhoun was born in 1906 and died in 1988. Both were influenced by the surrealist movement, but while Colquhoun's work is replete with symbolism reflecting her occult and spiritual interests, Burra's oeuvre is more grounded in time and place. From his early works which were depictions of the life of the demimonde in the cafés and cabarets of France, through his celebration of America's Harlem Renaissance, to the artist's final works which suggest his despair regarding the industrial despoilment of the English countryside, there is a detached, sardonic side to Burra's work that stands in contrast to Colquhoun's spiritual earnestness. Although the Spanish Civil War and World War II profoundly affected Burra and his output, bringing a dark, almost cynical, tone...

Inspired by the novels of Patrick Hamilton, Matthew Bourne and New Adventures have added another crown jewel to the company's repertoire. This dance narrative set in the streets of Soho and centring around the denizens of a local pub, The Midnight Bell, is wonderfully evocative and beautifully executed. Bourne's ability to delineate character through the smallest of gestures is once again demonstrated, and the cast who comprise the regulars at The Midnight Bell all take on unique personalities which we instantly recognise and can identify with. Set in the 1930s, this is an artfully atmospheric piece conjuring up foggy streets and smoke-filled rooms populated with lost souls who are looking for love: the lonely spinster and the con man exquisitely danced by Michela Meazza and Glenn Graham; the chorus boy and the stranger portrayed by Liam Mower and Andrew Monaghan whose superb pas de deux explore a forbidden passion; the romantic pub employee and the worldly-wise prostitute ...

Could this be a new genre? Comedic, acrobatic burlesque? GODZ , which is presented by Apollo, Dionysos, Cupid and Hercules, delivers some inane comedy, some impressive acrobatics and some inoffensive nudity. It is all good fun, even if it doesn't make much sense. Why the four Greek gods? Who knows? With a meagre narrative and minimal characterisation, that is never quite clear, and it probably doesn't matter. On the plot side of things however, we thought the distinction between the Greek Hades and the Christian Hell which is amusingly introduced could have been exploited for a lot more humour. The heart of the show is really the acrobatics, and what the four performers do with chairs, aerial straps and a ladder is quite breathtaking. They had the audience on the edge of their seats with their wonderful shenanigans. However, the point of the sequence with the whip and candles was simply unclear, and the yo-yoing bit which demonstrates some awesome prowess left us briefly wonder...

When Sam Crow's mother is ill, she is constantly positive. She is always looking forward to things being better. It is an optimism that the young Sam adopts, but when his mother dies, it leaves him uncertain about how to adjust to that situation. Then, he remembers the tale his mother used to tell him about the island of Pangea, a wonderful mythical place; he thinks about that land and wonders if the means of sorting out his complex emotions about her loss might be found there. King of Pangea is a slight fable about loss and reconciliation to the reality of death, but it never really works. The rather forced metaphor about finding the final piece of the puzzle and the journey to the fabled land all fall rather flat. A major issue is that this doesn't seem like a fully thought-out fantasy place, and the whole sequence about the magic coins fails to resonate. Luring an audience into an imaginative construct is never an easy task, and in this case, Pangea simply doesn't engag...

This premiere of Danny James King's play has much to recommend it. There are some nicely drawn characters and some very strong performances. The show is dominated, however, by Diveen Henry's portrayal of the indomitable Miss Myrtle. Playing the judgemental, sharp-tongued matriarch, Henry reigns over the stage in the same way that Myrtle strives to control her world, her garden, and all the people who enter her life. From Myrtle's late husband, Melrose, to her grandson, Rudy, and including their drunken neighbour, Eddie, Miss Myrtle sets a standard of behaviour that is very high, and often unattainable. She is both a force of nature and a force to be reckoned with. King's portrait of her is a delight, but there is so much more we would like to know about her. We never really get to the heart of what makes this fascinating character the way she is. Instead, we are given lots of other narrative threads, several of which are never fully developed. What is the mystery behind...

In 2012, Sarah Ruhl met Max Ritvo. He was a senior in her playwriting class, and she immediately recognised his talent for writing. Over the following years, they began a correspondence which covered many topics from poetry to Max's ongoing battle with cancer. Letters From Max was developed from that ongoing dialogue and movingly chronicles their shared love of life and literature. It is a deeply affecting experience that is beautifully captured in the performances of Sirine Saba as the putative mentor, Sarah, and Eric Sirakian, as the irrepressible pupil, Max. These roles are far from fixed, however, and as Sarah opines in the play, she learns as much from Max as he does from her as they both experience his coming to grips with his mortality. It is fascinating to watch these two intelligent and articulate individuals struggle with questions of art and death, and both Saba and Sirakian put in beautifully subtle and cerebral performances. If there is any fault to find in this lovel...

This gentle fable about a child who is mourning the loss of his father won three prizes at Japan's Yomiuri Theatre Awards in 2024. For that original production, Michinari Ozawa not only wrote, directed and did the set design, but he also starred in the show. It is quite an extraordinary achievement. Our Cosmic Dust tells the story of a young boy, Shotaro, who is equally precocious. When he questions his mother as to what has happened to his late father, she says he has become a star. This causes Shotaro to withdraw and become silent, as he ponders the meaning of her explanation. He then sets out on a quest which not only interrogates the notion of an afterlife, but also questions the very place of humanity in the universe. These metaphysical and cosmological themes are beautifully expounded in the story, with Shotaro being represented by a puppet operated against a stunning set which makes use of some delightful LED display imagery. Indeed, this is a show that has an extraordinary...