Theatre Picasso ★★★★ Tate Modern | Sep 17, 2025 - Apr 12, 2026


Throughout his life, Picasso was captivated by the performing arts and carefully crafted his own performance as the artist-genius in real life. Theatre Picasso, staged by artist Wu Tsang and writer Enrique Fuenteblanca, explores both of these intertwined themes while also engaging with a contemporary cultural concern: that much celebrated art may have ethically questionable origins. This latter issue likely informs the exhibition’s unusual structure, which opens with Picasso’s obscene imagery and concludes with his engagement with African and Pacific art. Regardless of one’s view on this framing or how successful it is, the exhibition offers fascinating new insights into the complex figure who helped define twentieth-century art. Featuring over fifty works across a range of media, from painting and sculpture to collage and textiles, it includes iconic pieces such as Weeping Woman (1937) and Woman in a Red Armchair (1932). Yet its central focus remains Picasso’s fascination with performance which can be seen in his obsession with bullfighting, and his reimagining of the bull and Minotaur as symbols of his own identity. Picasso's constructed persona also appears in Henri-Georges Clouzot’s 1956 film The Mystery of Picasso. Among the highlights of this retrospective is The Three Dancers (1925), alongside a compelling projection which reveals the process behind some of his works. However, perhaps the most intriguing piece, is Picasso’s illustration of Honoré de Balzac’s The Unknown Masterpiece, which unites the exhibition’s two key themes: Picasso’s dialogue with other art forms and his lifelong preoccupation with self-presentation, the interplay between inspiration and ego, the mask and the man. Theatre Picasso is a profound insight into Picasso’s creative process and his manipulation of the artistic muse. It is an exhibition that should not be missed.

Rated: ★★★★

Reviewed by J.C.
Image: Tapestry Le Minotaure 1935. Photograph: François Fernandez / © Succession Picasso/DACS, London 2025.

When, Where, Getting there:
Map & Location: Bankside, London SE1 9TG, UK

Most Popular

Stories – The Tap Dance Sensation ★★★★★ Sadler's Wells Peacock Theatre | Oct 23 - Nov 2, 2024

Image
Tap dancing is a form usually associated with those wonderful old Hollywood musicals of the 1930s and '40s, but the RB company brings this dance art into the 21st Century with an extraordinary production that also incorporates jazz dance and rap. Stories is a very meta narrative that recounts the experience of Icarus, a young actor who is playing a newspaper worker in a film. While the myth of Icarus is usually seen as a commentary on the hubris of a youth who misuses the invention of his father, in this version things are flipped so that the enthusiastic younger man is trapped in a power relationship with the Daedalus-like figure of his director. That dynamic is also mirrored in the story of the film which is being made – a naïve young worker is first abused by his boss and then lured into a struggle with a gambling gang lord. Stories explores these overlapping tales of manipulation and creativity in a manner that is wonderfully original and totally enthralling. The dance sequ...
Full Details »

Table 17 ★★★ Kiln Theatre | Sep 17 - Oct 24, 2026

Image
Table 17 is a charming little romcom about Jada and Dallas, who meet again after a failed engagement. What will Jada wear for the occasion? Is it a date or not a date? Will they get back together, or have they moved on? The humour is touching and will ring true with anyone who has ever experienced a failed relationship, although the story itself has a somewhat predictable feel. Martha Wallace as Jada and Jamel Westman as Dallas create thoroughly convincing and completely likeable characters. His faux cool and her needy strength generate plenty of laughter, but it is Michael Rishaw who almost steals the show in his turns as the camp, wisecracking maître d’, River, and Jada’s sport-obsessed co-worker and suitor, Eric. His transformations produce amazingly accurate and instantly recognisable types. He also serves as the narrator of this slight story, delivering its moral: “Maybe the lesson isn’t in the outcome, but in the effort. We all deserve such effort.” It is an understated plea for...
Full Details »

A Small and Quiet Light ★★★ Orange Tree Theatre | Sep 21 - Oct 24, 2026

Image
Noor-un-Nisa Inayat Khan had an extraordinary life. Descended from the ruler of Mysore, Tipu Sultan, born in Moscow and raised in Paris, she fled to Britain with her family in 1940 after the fall of France. She joined the WAAF before being recruited by the Special Operations Executive and, in June 1943, was sent to occupied France by Lysander aircraft as a wireless operator. The life expectancy for wireless operators working in occupied France was said to be just six weeks, yet Khan continued operating in Paris for several months after the rest of her network had been rounded up. This is a life full of drama, but the challenge for any biographical play is to shape that material into a story with a clear point and a strong arc of development. The facts may all be fascinating, but the playwright must decide which to include, which to leave out and how much dramatic licence to take with the characters in order to make the story work. Unfortunately, A Small and Quiet Light sticks too clos...
Full Details »

Franz & Marie ★★ Charing Cross Theatre | Sep 28 - Nov 14, 2026

Image
Georg Büchner’s Woyzeck , written in 1836-37 and published posthumously in 1879, is acknowledged to be a series of fragments rather than a fully developed work. The challenge for any adaptor is to transform this political parable into a coherent and moving drama with psychologically complex characters. Woyzeck is the embodiment of the proletariat, exploited by those above him and subjected to a cruel scientific experiment. Given today’s political climate, with the power of oligarchs no longer concealed and the increasingly unsettling presence of AI, there would seem to be plenty here for an adaptor to explore. Unfortunately, this production fails to rise to the occasion. The characters remain largely one-dimensional and the story veers towards melodrama rather than tragedy. The decision to introduce Gaelic music and to create an almost céilí-like atmosphere is particularly unsuccessful. Some of the ballads are suitably plaintive, but their melancholy never deepens our understanding of ...
Full Details »

Golden Boy ★★★★ Almeida Theatre | Sep 8 - Oct 31, 2026

Image
Written in 1937, Golden Boy is probably Clifford Odets’ most famous work. The story of a young man torn between becoming a violinist or a boxer is a critique of the corrupting influence of the materialism that underpins the American Dream. The theme echoes F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby , right down to the famous scene in which Gatsby contemplates his beautiful shirts. Young Joe Bonaparte is similarly seduced by a world that values appearances over substance when the gangster Eddie Fuseli showers him with silk shirts and other trappings of success. In forsaking his calling as a musician for the fame and money of boxing, Joe ultimately sacrifices not only his family ties but also his sense of self. The performances are uniformly strong. Josh O’Connor gives Joe an intense, increasingly volatile presence, convincingly charting his transformation from a gifted young musician into a man consumed by ambition and violence. Hayley Squires is equally compelling as the hard-nosed Lorna ...
Full Details »

Catarina and the Beauty of Killing Fascists ★★★★★ National Theatre | September 19 - 26, 2026

Image
In Leipzig in 1930, Bertolt Brecht’s The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny was disrupted by Nazi supporters protesting against what they regarded as politically and morally offensive material. Unsurprisingly, Brecht is frequently referenced in Catarina and the Beauty of Killing Fascists and, like Brecht’s work, Tiago Rodrigues’ drama proves to be both intelligent and incendiary. The play’s central premise is that a Portuguese family has created a rite of passage in memory of a woman who was murdered by Fascists. On turning 26, members of the family are expected to kill a selected fascist. The family members all take the name Catarina in memory of the murdered woman, and now it is the turn of one of the great-granddaughters of the family matriarch to carry out the ritual killing. When she hesitates to follow the family tradition, what ensues is a multi-layered exploration of resistance to authoritarianism and the morality of killing in the name of political resistance. The dense ...
Full Details »

Darkling ★★★★ Bush Theatre | Sep 5 - Oct 24, 2026

Image
On 3 December 1984, a leak of methyl isocyanate gas from the Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India, released a highly toxic cloud over the surrounding area. Thousands of people died within days, while many more suffered serious injuries and long-term health problems. The disaster is regarded as one of the world’s worst industrial catastrophes, with estimates of the eventual death toll reaching into the tens of thousands. The scale of the tragedy is almost impossible to comprehend, but in Darkling , Linnea Berthelsen creates an individual who becomes emblematic of those whose lives were devastated by the catastrophe. The overwhelming scale of the event is brought down to a human level, allowing the audience to grasp its impact through the story of one poor young girl and her family whose lives are shattered. The monologue evokes the everyday life of a girl growing up in the slums of Bhopal, capturing its mixture of joy and hardship. There is abuse and racism, but also a strong ...
Full Details »

Renoir & Love ★★★★ National Gallery | Oct 3, 2026 - Jan 31, 2027

Image
In a 1946 interview with the American journalist Jerome Seckler, Henri Matisse said, “I think that art must not be a disagreeable thing. There is enough unhappiness in life to turn one towards the joy.” The quotation might equally well describe Renoir’s attitude to painting. He stands out from his contemporaries in his celebration of humanity and his joyous embrace of modern life. The son of a tailor and a dressmaker, he came from a working-class background, yet his paintings rarely dwell on social questions. Instead, they embrace the world with an exuberance that is fundamental to his art. This exhibition, covering the first twenty years of Renoir’s working life, brings that joie de vivre into focus. Across six galleries, it traces his delight in the simple pleasures of good food, convivial company, romance and love through the themes of "The Bohemian Years", " Fêtes Galantes ", "Streets of Paris", "Beyond the City", "Family" and ...
Full Details »

CADEL: Lungs on Legs ★★★★ Riverside Studios | Oct 13 - Nov 15, 2026

Image
This is the true story of an Australian cyclist who dreamt of winning the Tour de France. In a sport plagued by drugs and cheating, he strove to run an honest race and to triumph for his country. Connor Delves, who wrote and stars in this biography, creates a portrait of grit and determination that will resonate with fans of the sports underdog genre. Think Rocky Balboa on a bicycle. It is an inspiring tale of perseverance and resilience, and Delves puts in a fine performance, most of which is on various bicycles. While we are given some of Cadel Evans’ difficult background, as his parents moved from place to place and later divorced, there is little attempt to draw an in-depth psychological portrait of the athlete. His relationship with Aldo Sassi, his coach who died before Evans achieved his goal, is also only sketched in. Nor is there much exploration of the complexities of competing at this level, the commodification of athletes or their relationships with sponsors. CADEL: Lungs on...
Full Details »

A Month in the Country ★★★★★ Donmar Warehouse | Aug 22 - Oct 3, 2026

Image
Brian Friel’s version of Turgenev’s A Month in the Country is more sexually and psychologically explicit than the original, with the character of Natalya firmly at its centre. Her boredom, sense of entitlement and neediness become the driving forces of a drama in which desire, jealousy and emotional frustration steadily destabilise a superficially tranquil household. Friel makes the play leaner, livelier and considerably funnier than the original. Turgenev regarded his plays as works to be read rather than performed, and Friel cuts the wordiness while bringing the characters’ suppressed feelings sharply to the surface. However, he retains Turgenev’s rich imagery. The curtain rises on a card game in which the comic tutor Schaaf declares that hearts are trump, neatly prefiguring the romantic entanglements to come. Aleksey’s kite, a symbol of youthful freedom and carefree abandon, vividly suggests why Natalya is increasingly attracted to the young tutor. Indeed, his exuberance stands in ...
Full Details »

The City Life Magazine | Reviews & Ratings