“It's delightful, it's delicious, it's de-lovely.” High Society is a dazzling, effervescent summer entertainment, brimming with glamour, wit and charm. Buoyed by Cole Porter's sublime score and a frothy romantic comedy plot adapted from The Philadelphia Story , this is a production that asks nothing of its audience except that they surrender to its considerable pleasures. Sit back and enjoy the glorious music, slick choreography and a steady stream of sparkling comic moments. There may be faint echoes of A Midsummer Night's Dream in its tangle of misplaced affections, but analysing this theatrical soufflé would rather miss the point. Its purpose is simple: to delight. We know from the outset that socialite Tracy Lord, played with engaging assurance by understudy Isabel Snaas on this occasion, will ultimately reunite with her reformed ex-husband Dexter Haven, portrayed with effortless sophistication by Julian Ovenden. Nor does the plot leave much doubt that Freddie...

This superb exhibition traces the career of the innovative and irascible James McNeill Whistler, introducing visitors to one of the most original artistic minds of the nineteenth century. His personal history was as distinctive as his art. Born in America, raised partly in Russia, trained in Paris, and settled in Britain, he was a cosmopolitan figure whose experiences informed a career that defied easy categorisation. The presentation succeeds in bringing to life both the man and his work. Visitors encounter the romantic figure of the artist in bohemian Paris, the combative personality who pursued a celebrated libel case against the critic John Ruskin, and the often difficult individual whose relationships with patrons such as Frederick Leyland and contemporaries were frequently marked by conflict. Yet it avoids reducing Whistler to his controversies. Instead, it reveals that beneath the volatile temperament lay a serious, intellectually engaged artist whose commitment to aesthetic inn...

Inspired by a real historical incident, the new musical Redcliffe tackles an issue that remains relevant today: the criminalisation of consensual homosexual relationships, which still exists in many countries. Between 1752 and 1753, William Critchard and Richard Arnold were accused of sodomy, an offence punishable by death in Britain at the time. Their story survives through contemporary newspaper accounts and a rare witness statement uncovered in the Bristol archives in 2023. In bringing this material to the stage, Jordan Luke Gage, who wrote the book, music and lyrics, takes considerable liberties with the historical record. Arnold was a publican in his sixties and Critchard a twenty-four-year-old footman when the two men were observed together in a private room at a Bristol alehouse. Dramatic licence is not in itself a problem, but while the details have been reshaped, the characters at the centre of the story never become fully realised individuals. The principal weakness of Redcl...

Originally produced on Broadway in 1945 and arriving in London three years later, Dark of the Moon has now been revived as a musical, featuring songs by Lindy Robbins, Dave Bassett and Steve Robson. The story revisits the well-worn territory of star-crossed lovers. Barbara Allen, a young woman from a close-knit Appalachian community, falls in love with and marries John, a witch-boy. As suspicion grows among her family and neighbours that John is not fully human, the couple find themselves increasingly isolated. John has struck a bargain with the Conjur Woman: if he and Barbara remain faithful to one another for a year, he will become human. But the witches have other ideas. If John leaves their ranks, the coven will lose its quorum. The battle lines are drawn and tragedy seems inevitable. The problem is that the narrative unfolds with little surprise. Familiar material can still feel fresh when elevated by an original interpretation, exceptional performances or a memorable score. Leon...

Georgie Dettmer’s debut work assembles a mosaic of stories centred on society’s obsession with images: their creation, consumption, manipulation and abuse. Many of the narratives carry a sexual charge. At its heart is a story clearly modelled on the Gisèle Pelicot case, in which a husband drugged his wife and filmed her repeated sexual abuse by other men. Around it swirl other tales: an actress appearing in a film about that case while becoming the victim of deepfake pornography herself; a kidnapped child narrative that inevitably recalls Madeleine McCann; a supposedly scientific study of sexual response dependent on video technology; and a father using AI to alter images of his son. Framing everything are two young girls whose fascination with the material mirrors the audience's own uneasy attraction to such content. The acting is superb throughout. Maimuna Memon and Lucy McCormick display astonishing versatility, moving effortlessly between characters and emotional registers. The...

Michael Morpurgo’s tale of a horse caught up in the First World War was first published in 1982, but it remained largely under the radar until the National Theatre’s landmark 2007 production transformed it into a theatrical phenomenon. A successful film adaptation by Steven Spielberg followed, but War Horse has now returned to its natural home: the stage. Happily, this revival captures all the wonder, emotion and imaginative power that made the original production so unforgettable. The production’s greatest triumph remains the astonishing puppetry. Joey and his fellow horses are brought to life with such skill and sensitivity that within moments they cease to be stage constructs and become living, breathing creatures. It is a remarkable feat of theatrical illusion. The story begins when Albert’s hard-drinking father squanders an absurd sum on a riding horse at auction and then wagers with his brother that the animal can be trained to plough the family’s fields. The task falls to young...

Working under considerable pressure, Peter Shaffer wrote Black Comedy as a companion piece to the 1965 Chichester Festival production of Miss Julie by August Strindberg. Despite significant reservations from the original production company, the play proved an immediate success. It has since been staged around the world and continues to delight audiences with its ingenious premise and relentless comic energy. At the heart of this delightful farce lies the theatrical conceit that the characters stumble about in what they believe to be complete darkness, while the audience watches their misadventures in full light. Conversely, whenever the stage is dark to the audience, the characters experience illumination. More than a clever gimmick, this inversion becomes a metaphor for the secret and seriously complicated amorous life of the struggling sculptor Brindsley Miller. Brindsley is preparing to meet two crucial visitors: his prospective father-in-law, a military man of rigid convictions, a...

Avenue Q first arrived on Broadway in 2003 and, the following year, won the Tony Awards for Best Musical, Best Original Score and Best Book of a Musical. Now, twenty years after its London debut, it returns in a lightly updated production that retains the joy and warmth of the original. While some audience members will no longer know who Gary Coleman is, this Sesame-Street-for-adults show has lost none of its relevance. Its themes of underemployment, self-acceptance, mutual respect and the search for connection feel just as timely now as they did then. Sharp satire is wrapped in the velvet glove of a puppet-show-for-grown-ups and delivered with wit and affection rather than accusation. Songs such as “Everyone’s a Little Bit Racist” and “It Sucks to Be Me” continue to land well, presenting uncomfortable truths in a disarmingly approachable way. “The Internet is for Porn!” still earns knowing laughter, while “If You Were Gay” remains both funny and unexpectedly touching. The staging and...

“That Italian artist who makes clothes.” Attributed to Coco Chanel, this remark about Elsa Schiaparelli neatly captures the contrast between the two women’s approaches to couture. Chanel is synonymous with elegant simplicity, whereas Schiaparelli’s work immediately brings to mind terms such as “theatrical”, “shocking” and “eccentric”. Born in 1890, she brought a bold, provocative edge to fashion that was utterly distinctive. This remarkably comprehensive exhibition charts her rise from the practical, understated Pour le Sport range, through the chic and functional Pour le Ville, to the gloriously extravagant and dramatic Pour le Soir. It shows how she was shaped by the artistic movements of her time, particularly Dada, and how she in turn influenced them. Highlights include the Jean Cocteau-inspired coat and Salvador Dalí’s lobster dress, alongside Picasso’s painting of Nusch Éluard in a Schiaparelli outfit. The exhibition also explores her work in film and her costume design for actre...

After a year in London, twenty-three-year-old Franky returns to her small hometown in north west England. She intends to stay for the weekend, but her brief visit stretches far longer as secrets from both the present and the past begin to surface. Playwright Kit Withington has created a richly convincing cast of characters and demonstrates a keen ear for crisp, natural dialogue. The exchanges are warm, sharp and frequently very funny, drawing the audience in with ease. If the play has a weakness, it is that it takes rather a long time to arrive at the central secret that has fractured the family. Even then, the revelation feels somewhat telegraphed, and it is not entirely convincing that this long festering wound is only now being confronted. The themes of grief and family pain are handled with sensitivity, but they do seem to tread familiar ground. That said, the performances are uniformly strong. Rowan Robinson is appealing and endearing as Franky, while Olivia Forrest brings lively ...

Georges Seurat’s seascapes offer a quietly mesmerising encounter with one of the most distinctive imaginations in modern art. Immediately recognisable, his pointillist technique remains as striking now as it must have been when it first appeared. Rather than blending colour on the palette, Seurat places tiny touches of pigment on the canvas and allows the viewer’s eye to complete the image. The effect is both precise and atmospheric, creating paintings that feel calm, detached and radiant with light. This exhibition is especially rewarding because it shows Seurat working through his method from sketch to finished canvas. That progression makes clear how carefully he observed the sea, the sky and the shifting conditions of light before translating them into paint. The preparatory drawings and studies reveal an artist patiently refining composition and colour, while the completed works display a controlled harmony that never feels mechanical. The two studies (nos. 19 and 20) for "Th...

In 1879, Henrik Ibsen first staged A Doll's House . The play was a social provocation, and the breakdown of Nora and Torvald’s marriage was widely seen as an attack on patriarchy and a challenge to the roles imposed on women in marriage and society. It shocked audiences and provoked moral outrage across the ideological spectrum. In Anya Reiss’s twenty-first-century adaptation, however, the concerns are markedly different. Both partners are recast as mean-spirited, materialistic narcissists, and the collapse of their marriage stems less from structural injustice than from their own shallow values. It is more likely to leave audiences despairing at the state of the contemporary world that has produced such self-absorbed individuals. The tentative hopefulness present in Ibsen’s original, the sense that society might be reshaped for the better, is entirely absent. Instead Reiss offers a bleak, almost fatalistic vision, and her reworking of Ibsen’s characters and plot carries a tone of ...

He is an astronaut with the European Space Commission, while she works with a documentary film-maker. Both have emerged from deeply dysfunctional childhoods. At one point, we are given a catalogue of the cruelties he has endured since youth. She, meanwhile, has been shaped and manipulated by her father, a horror film director who cast her as a child actress. Given the backgrounds of these two characters, this is not a love story likely to end well, and its dark trajectory is signalled from the outset. We first meet Daniel Defoe on his space mission, his actions framed by a chorus who also comment on the couple’s later interactions. However, because the narrative is structured in this way, and because the conclusion is never in doubt, it becomes difficult to invest fully in the relationship. The process of falling in love also feels only lightly sketched in, as though of secondary importance. Instead, the drama centres on the pair’s fierce and often exhausting arguments. Emily unleashes...

In 1941, the physicist Werner Heisenberg, best known for formulating his uncertainty principle, visited his mentor Niels Bohr in occupied Denmark. The purpose of that meeting remains mysterious and, even with access to the later letters of the two men, their recollections of what took place differ considerably. At the heart of the matter lies the failure of Germany’s efforts to develop a nuclear weapon and Bohr’s role in the Allies’ success in this endeavour. Questions of patriotism and the moral neutrality of scientific inquiry are explored in the context of the individual’s broader ethical responsibility to humankind, set against the temptations of personal ambition. These are complex issues, and coming to terms with them is not made easier by the fact that the scientific territory itself remains opaque to most of us. Michael Frayn’s play attempts to render the physics more accessible, while also reflecting some of its underlying principles. As Frayn observes in the programme notes, ...

In The Print chronicles a turning point in the history of Britain’s labour movement. In 1984, when Brenda Dean became the first woman to head a British union, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was already advancing an agenda to curb the power of organised labour. On becoming general secretary of SOGAT, the Society of Graphical and Allied Trades, Dean found herself navigating not only bitter internal struggles between rival unions, but also the growing influence of Rupert Murdoch, owner of four of Britain’s most powerful newspapers. The play capably traces this complex conflict between management-driven modernisation and a union determined to protect its members’ pay and conditions. However, it too often tells rather than shows. Excessive narration drains the drama of urgency, with scenes feeling less like lived experience and more like illustrative fragments in a historical lecture. Much of this narration falls to Claudia Jolly as Dean, and while she brings intelligence and flashes of ...

Spoilt, rich people whose sole occupation is scheming to destroy the lives of the naïve and gullible. No, this is not a dramatised version of the Epstein files. Pierre Choderlos de Laclos’ eighteenth-century epistolary novel, depicting amoral aristocrats on the brink of the French Revolution, has inspired many incarnations, yet it continues to shock and, at times, to delight. Christopher Hampton’s stage adaptation, first presented in 1985, streamlines the narrative, focusing on the rivalry and tangled emotional connection between the two master manipulators: the Marquise de Merteuil, played by Lesley Manville, and the Vicomte de Valmont, portrayed by Aidan Turner. Together they engage in a vicious game, with Valmont attempting to seduce both the innocent Cécile de Volanges and the devout Madame de Tourvel. It is wickedly entertaining material, and it proves just as intriguing in this context as it does in the well-known teen film, Cruel Intentions . There are, however, some issues with...

When some 18th-century diaries written by the founder of Harford House are discovered, his descendant Fenella calls in two academics, Abi and Marva, to examine them. The manuscripts, which detail Harford’s involvement in the slave trade, soon prove to be far more than a mere catalogue, and the complex history of Britain’s role in the enslavement of Africans acquires a distinctly human face. The subject is a fraught one, with strong, often ahistorical and unnuanced opinions drowning out the complicated reality. Winsome Pinnock has written a fascinating and richly funny play that shows how this heritage touches three women, each in a very different way. Pinnock manages to explore the complexity of her subject with extraordinary humour and humanity. This is theatre at its finest, taking on a difficult subject, humanising it, making it dramatically compelling and avoiding the needlessly didactic. There is much to learn and much to ponder in this play, but it is also deeply entertaining. Sy...

Written in 1979, David Hare’s tale of a 1960s rock icon who has watched the summer of love dissolve into a nightmare of drugs and disillusionment is potent stuff. Maggie Frisby, inevitably reminiscent of Janis Joplin, drinks to excess and has been reduced to performing at a spring dance at Jesus College, Cambridge. The singer is at her lowest ebb, bitter, volatile, and narcissistic. When her sober, sensible ex-husband, who wrote most of her songs, and her cynical, exploitative agent arrive nothing bodes well for this gig. With Frisby and her agent, Saraffian, Hare evokes two of the most enduring stereotypes of the rock 'n' roll world, and Rebecca Lucy Taylor, aka Self Esteem, and Phil Daniels inhabit them with relish. Taylor is mesmerising as the drunken, unpredictable Maggie, while Daniels could rival Uriah Heep in sheer unctuousness. Both performances are captivating, and when Taylor strides onstage to belt out her hits, the energy is nothing short of explosive. The rest of t...

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 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...