In the face of the coronavirus crisis, London and UK theatres have closed their doors until further notice. Our theatre-loving Mates are still blogging during lockdown, if not quite as frequently. We’re doing our best to help keep theatre alive in unprecedented times. Stay safe.
MyTheatreMates is a portal for independent theatre bloggers, run by Terri Paddock. We currently have over 45 bloggers whose sites and content are regularly featured and hundreds more guest bloggers. We love meeting new mates! Are you a champion of theatre? Do you regularly blog and tweet about it? Why not join us?
Terri Paddock co-founded MyTheatreMates in 2015 with the help of leading theatre critic and industry commentator Mark Shenton, a mate for life! Find out more about the ethos behind the site. And join our mailing list.
Recent articles
Recalling Tom Hiddleston in CORIOLANUS: ‘One of the best nights of theatre of my life’
30th May 2020It is not often that one reviews a play one saw six years ago, but with the forthcoming National Theatre At Home streaming of the Donmar Warehouse production of Coriolanus, right now seems a strangely appropriate time to recall one of the… .. Read more
Streetcars, Smoke & Southern Belles: Taking on Tennessee Williams
30th May 2020Following National Theatre at Home's broadcast of the Young Vic’s superb 2014 production of A Streetcar Named Desire, it’s timely to note how representations of Tennessee Williams’ work has changed as a result, with a broadening of approaches particularly visible in… .. Read more
NEWS: West End revival of Hello Dolly!, starring Imelda Staunton, postpones ‘until the time is right’
29th May 2020The hugely-anticipated new West End production of Hello, Dolly! starring Imelda Staunton, which was due to begin performances at the Adelphi Theatre in London on Tuesday 11 August 2020 for a 30-week season, has been indefinitely postponed. Producers said today that new… .. Read more
‘The story of a violinist takes on an introspective dimension’: AMSTERDAM – Orange Tree Theatre (Online review)
29th May 2020While world history is ‘officially’ about facts, in reality, it is an amalgamation of thousands of experiences into one coherent narrative. Even so, the experience of a country as a whole isn’t necessarily the same as a particular community or… .. Read more
NEWS: Joseph & the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat reschedules for July 2021
29th May 2020New 2021 performance dates have been announced for the West End return of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at The London Palladium. Due to the current global situation and the uncertainty around the resumption of… .. Read more
‘A devastating moment for our industry’: Edinburgh’s Lyceum Theatre in hibernation
29th May 2020The Lyceum Theatre in Edinburgh has entered enter a period of “hibernation” as a building-based producing theatre, postponing all 2020 shows and entering into negotiations with all staff over redundancies. Having already lost £700,000 income due to the pandemic, and… .. Read more
NEWS: The Seagull starring Emilia Clarke & A Doll’s House with Jessica Chastain officially postponed
28th May 2020The Jamie Lloyd Company, the partnership between Ambassador Theatre Group (ATG) and Artistic Director Jamie Lloyd have announced that, due to the ongoing impact of the Coronavirus pandemic, Anya Reiss’ adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull and Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s… .. Read more
‘Never before available to a wide audience, Brecht’s premiere is theatrical gold’: Mother Courage & Her Children – Berliner Ensemble (Online review)
28th May 2020The Berliner Ensemble have located a jewel in their theatre history. Bertolt Brecht’s Mother Courage is a modern classic of the German theatre. Written in 1939, it is often described as “the greatest anti-war play of all time”, and when… .. Read more
For many cash-strapped theatres, Covid has just accelerated things to come
28th May 2020Sonia Friedman’s words in The Telegraph last week, about the perils facing the theatre industry, make for uncomfortable reading. Let’s look at the stats: 70 per cent of our performing arts companies will be out of business before the end… .. Read more
NEWS: Old Vic livestreams Matt Smith & Claire Foy in Lungs, staged in an empty auditorium
27th May 2020The Old Vic has announced a new artistic initiative Old Vic: In Camera, combining a run of socially distanced performances of Duncan MacMillan’s LUNGS, with Claire Foy and Matt Smith reprising their roles, followed by a major series of rehearsed play-readings, all streamed live from the iconic Old Vic stage with… .. Read more