theatreCat

Twelve years ago, Priyanga Burford came upon an unusual, striking story that moved her to admiration and fellowship: Noor-un-Nisa Inayat Khan, like her half-Indian, was one of the first female agents sent from Britain into Nazi-occupied France in the dark…

MOLIERE WOULD HAVE LOVED IT Much to celebrate here, and not only the return of that maverick angel Mark Rylance: once again treading a London stage, adorned with a clerical collar and at one point (actually, two points) hopping in fruitless pursuit of a v…

HOBO , GENIUS, AMERICA’S SOUL “Everybody might be just one big soul, so everywhere you look in the day or night, that’s where I’m gonna be” .

HOLD THE FRONT PAGE, OR HANG ON A MINUTE..

ABSURDITIES OF PASSION WIND UP A TORRID SUMMER This is by Turgenev, revolutionary in his time (banned for a while), now adapted with mischief and appreciation by the late Brian Friel and directed – with even more mischief but a redeeming humanity – by Ly…

THEY’RE BACK.

WHEN THE SAGE OF SCARBOROUGH SAW THROUGH THE SWINGING ‘SIXTIES 1969: nearly half a century ago, and this was Alan Ayckbourn’s breakthrough.

A LEGEND REBORN On a sweltering opening night under the trees, what more can you ask than fresh life and passion flung into a famous show which had become, frankly, a bit of an eye-roll?

SHAKESPEARE: OUTDOOR, OUTRAGEOUS AND OPEN-HEARTED Start by knowing that this is a bangingly entertaining evening out under the Suffolk skies, with ragamuffin costumes and lovely ramshackle beach-huts under the great chestnut tree.

THE SEASON BEGINS!

TROUBLED HEARTS AND TORCH SONGS When someone pops a sticker on your cameraphone at the door it generally means a performer is going to get their kit off, repeatedly.

FLOWERS, PHONETICS, PHABULOUS Always a joy to have them back: the phoneticist and the flower-girl, born to enthral one another and us.

AMBITION, LOVE AND CHOICES IN AN OLDER IRELAND Jonathan Bank’s Mint Theater company lately gave us an arresting revival of Miles Malleson’s Yours Unfaithfully in this theatre, and here he is reinvigorating another 1930s play, this time by the near-forgott…

SOLDIERING AND SACRIFICE .

1939: TWO NATIONS, TWO MEN, TWO WIVES It has a familiar sitcom structure: a couple whose marriage is not what it respectably seems, making anxious preparations for weekend guests.

LAUGHING AT LIES It’s ten years since Florian Zeller’s elegantly embroidered trompe l’oeil sex-comedy about two couples opened at the Menier under LIndsay Posner’s direction (it’s him again for this revival).

OL’ BLUE EYES, THE COMEBACK It’s one of the great showbiz comeback stories: how a tough Italian-American kid saw Bing Crosby in 1935 and had a dream; rose in he 1940s to crazy fame, albums and films, married his Nancy with the laughing face.

BEAUTIFUL This, to me unexpectedly, was the most beautiful single hour in a theatre yet.

WORTH SINGING ALONG TO?

THE ELDERLY ENDGAME We are seated in a big arena, on three sides of a care-home sitting-room, clearly secure – staff tap door keypads – designed for the containment of dementia cases..

A SWELL PARTY, EVENTUALLY We “Call the Midwife” fans all suspected there was more pizazz to nurse Trixie than bicycling round Poplar in the 1950s, and indeed Helen George always was a dead classy, RAM- trained musical-theatre professional.

HOME AGAIN IN TRIUMPH Can it really be nearly twenty years since this show about WW1 galloped into world theatre history on this stage?

THE SAD SERIOUS COMEDY OF DEATH A Devon cottage kitchen, opening to a tangled spring garden: beyond this idyll a semi- abstract tangle of branches around a great circle of sky: a hole , perhaps a portal.

A FUNNY SHOW HAPPENENED ON THE WAY TO THE COLISEUM Ancient Greece is suffering drought and near-famine, and on a small island (population 16 and a half) prayers to Dionysius (“Dionysus, end this crisis!”)

THREE WOMEN AND A DISTANT QUEEN Ava Pickett’s breathlessly exciting début play won, at the Almeida, both a prestigious prize and mixed reviews.

FREAK ALONG WITH ANCIENT GREEKS The Greek gods, with their legends , family rifts and seduction of hapless mortals, are irresistible to all who love dramatic retellings.

SAD HEARTS AND SHOWBIZ The play begins in a pure music-hall moment: below the stage a hammeringly jolly piano, onto it a capering leg-show chorus and sparklers, ushering in The Great Houdini.

AFTER THE SHOOTING Despite the title, Anna Yates’ setting in an episcopalian church room full of calm skylight, and one effective moment near the end, Fran Kranz’ tense 105-minute play draws little from any Christian sensibility of forgiveness or eternity.

A MUSICAL IS BORN…OUT OF POP”S PAST I liked this rackety, brassy, exhilarating banger of a show: a cartoonish bit of history, a jukebox musical with a heart of gold .

ETHICS AND EVASIONS It’s a cluttered upper room, overcrowded with grand old furniture, a gramophone, harp, oddities like fencing foils and a home-built valve radio.

UNIVERSAL , INTIMATE, TRUE Sometimes it’s more than worth it to flog irritably through a London strike day, make it without even time for a drink but find something plain wonderful.

IMPRESSIONS AND OBSESSIONS The old `Players’ Theatre has a good eye of oddball new musicals, cheap enough to sample before anyone’s train home.

A SHUDDER FROM THE PAST I came to this fresh from admiring two 76-year-olds , Anna Wintour and Meryl Streep, being painfully cool and haughty in a trailer plugging Devil Wears Prada 2.

FRIENDSHIP, BRILLIANCE, DOUBT The universe as a bundle of unknowable of approximates: Relativity and Complementarity, Uncertainty theory, quantum mechanics, particles hanging out in two places at the same time, Schroedinger’s Cat.

A HOUSE OF ANCIENT SHAME What terrible secrets lie in an impressive yet spooky mansion, with artful descending ceilings and a trapdoor designed by Jon Bausor ?

RUPERT AND BRENDA Couldn’t miss this piece of 40th anniversary history by Robert Khan and Tom Salinsky because I had a very small – infinitestimal – dog in this fight.

CRY HAVOC!

TOO DEEP FOR TEARS Perhaps this imagining of the young Vincent gains extra power after the emotional hit of the recent Van Gogh at Arles exhibition; starry nights and wonder lie fresh in memory, , signals of immortal beauty from his last years.

REACH FOR THE LIMITLESS STARS This 70-minute squib was a big Fringe hit, though one clenched reviewer suggested that it could only appeal to those who love physics.

SECOND HOME HOLIDAY HELL IN OLD RUSSIA Watch a Chekhov play, and however deep the characters’ despair and disappointment you feel the author’s love, just as you do for the hopeless in Tennessee Williams.

MYSTICISM AND MISCHIEF This extraordinary show from Kadimah Yiddish Theatre, based on Isaac Bashevis Singer’s story (and absolutely not with the Streisand movie ending) – drove Sydney Opera House audiences and critics wild.

BROKEN HEARTS AND MACAROONS: A DISTANT WAR CLOSE TO HOME How is it for a family to be a symbol, focus and vortex of murderous global disharmony?

A DARKNESS FROM THE PAST, WITH MODERN ECHOES Fittingly in ou age of outing, condemnation and cancellation there have within a twelvemonth been three plays about the 17c Witchfinder General, Matthew Hopkins: The Ungodly, A Tryal of Witches, and now this ve…

1939: GLOBAL MOMENT , INTIMATE PAIN There are some tremendous moments in the last ten minutes of this late-period Arthur Miller play: some from Pearl Chanda as Sylvia, some from Eli Gelb as her emotionally disintegrating husband Phillip and Alex Waldman as

A THOUGHTFUL ANGER We need to know and feel something beyond the daily global news; sometimes theatre can place us carefully and mercilessly in the room and try to make us understand the experiences of those caught up in war, and the political forces swee…

A 1920’s BIRD OF PARADISE IN THE HENCOOP Trust Trevor Nunn to make this a bit of an event: a rarely-seen Noel Coward play set with ferocious accuracy and style in its birth-year 1925.

THE MARY ANN WHO BECAME GEORGE ELIOT It’s 1842; Bird Grove is the handsome house near Coventry which Robert Evans bought in his retirement from managing a grand estate.

PEERLESS, COMPLETE WITH PEERESSES Melodious romantic yearning and extreme nonsense, Victoriana sending itself up in rap-speed pattering rhyme and lovesick fairies invading the House of Lords: all curated by Charles Court Opera and directed by John Savourn…

GAGS BEFORE GRAVITAS They’re a national treasure:Jim Hacker and Sir Humphrey, inventions of Jonathan Lynn and Anthony Jay long before the age of Spads and WhatsApps.

WICKED ECHOES FROM ANOTHER DEPRESSION Well, here’s something oddly familiar!