On Monday Boris Johnson announced his (apparently irreversible) plans to take us out of lockdown forever. He even provided a detailed timetable of dates when each stage should be implemented.
Mates blogger: Mark Shenton
Mark Shenton is one of over 45 theatre bloggers who are part of the MyTheatreMates collective. This page features Mark's posts on MyTheatreMates. Take a look at our full list of theatre bloggers and our aggregated feed of all our Mates' posts. We’re always looking for new theatre bloggers. Could that be you? Learn about how to join us.
Mark Shenton has been a full-time freelance London-based theatre critic and journalist since 2002, and is proud to have co-founded MyTheatreMates with Terri Paaddock. He has variously (and sometimes simultaneously) been chief theatre critic for the Sunday Express, The Stage, WhatsOnStage, What's On in London magazine and LondonTheatre.co.uk. He has taught at ArtsEd London in Chiswick on musical theatre history since 2012. He was until recently President of the Critics' Circle, and is also on the board of Mercury Musical Developments and the National Student Drama Festival (NSDF). You can follow him on Twitter @ShentonStage, and on instagram at @ShentonStage. His personal website is www.shentonstage.com.
The latest from Mark on MyTheatreMates
Coming out of lockdown: Is it better to wait than to rush to open theatres & risk everything?
Setting a timetable requires Johnson to be a clairvoyant, predicting the future way of a virus that, to be honest, is only really getting started. Yes, vaccines are being done fast (I got my first dose on Saturday), but lifting the lid on Pandora’s box too quickly — by setting a timetable for reopening — won’t benefit anyone’s mental health, if it simply exacerbates the virus and leads to the necessity to shut down again.
‘Few theatrical terrains are as hotly contested as this one’: Mark Shenton picks his favourite Broadway leading ladies
My weekly ShenTens podcast, in which I count down my top ten favourites in a particular category, is inevitably subjective — but few theatrical terrains are as hotly contested as this one: whom I consider to be my favourite Broadway leading ladies.
‘It’s very hard once you’ve got a line like that in your head’: Assessing the aftermath of a bad review
In a free-for-all age of journalism, the currency of individual theatre reviews matter a lot less than they used to; all a theatre PR wants is a spread of five-star reviews, and they’re easier to summon than ever if you don’t look too closely which publications they come from. The general public won’t notice the difference, so its a bluff that often works.
When theatre returns can we look forward to some shape-shifting in opinions about are plus-size performers?
As a plus-sized critic myself, I’m not limited in the shows I review; so why should an actor be limited in the roles they’re invited to play?
Mark Shenton offers a bittersweet celebration of his Top Ten Favourite West End Theatres
My latest ShenTens is particularly bittersweet, as we can’t actually go to any at the moment: my favourite West End theatres.
‘There’s no saying where theatres will be by the time summer arrives’: Is the light at the end of the tunnel even further away?
It won’t be until the vaccine programme has been fully and successfully rolled out throughout the nation, and any necessary tweaks established for mutant strains, that there may be enough confidence to begin to even think about going indoors again to sit amongst strangers.
Dancing to a digital tune: The impact of the pandemic on performers, agents & theatre-goers
Yes, Covid has changed all of our lives — probably forever. At the very least, we will never take the freedoms we used to have – to travel, to meet friends, to socialise in public spaces and gather indoors to watch live performances and other events – ever again.
As we say so long farewell to veteran actor Christopher Plummer, Mark Shenton praises the art of obituary writing
If, as Monty Python famously urges, we should always look on the bright side of life, then the brighter side of death are obituaries. They’re one of my absolutely favourite forms of journalism, and I read them just as avidly as I read the best critics; and it’s for the same reasons.
From Waterloo to Wales: Welcome headlines feature groundbreaking creatives of past & present
Mark Shenton welcomes headlines featuring Stratford East, the National, the British Library and community involvement from Waterloo to Wales.
As more productions are postponed, we can only fantasise about what theatre will look like ’when Covid is over’
Far from returning to ‘normal’, the latest rush in trying to re-open theatres – albeit under supposedly Covid-secure conditions – seems to have created a further climate of chronic uncertainty and even more financial losses.
‘There’s always something new to speak to me’: Mark Shenton chooses his top ten Sondheim songs
We are now onto the third of my new weekly musical theatre podcast series ShenTens. This week I count down my top ten favourite Sondheim songs — at least my favourites right now.
Mark Shenton bemoans the lack of British songwriters in Radio 2’s forthcoming musicals celebration
Radio 2’s Greatest Show could — and should — have been a platform to celebrate more British musicals, especially here, especially now, with the industry floundering so badly. A show of support for our own creators of new musicals would not have gone amiss.
Catching up with the compelling landscape of political theatre both at home & in the US
Though I’ve spent most of the last nine months really missing the real theatre that has fuelled my life for the last 40 or so years since I started going compulsively from the age of around 16, I’ve spent more time than I’d have liked in a different kind of theatre — an operating one, when I had three spinal surgeries in the space of 15 days in September. And I’ve become particularly obsessed by another kind of theatre, too: political theatre.
Mark Shenton’s latest ShenTens podcast throws the spotlight on his top ten favourite movie musicals
Last week I launched a new podcast series ShenTens here, counting down my top ten favourite musicals, and today the second episode is released.
As commercial producers yearn for a return to normal, will subsidised theatre play it safe or break the mould?
Some commercial producers, it appears, wanted the old order to be restored and business to proceed as normal, hence the rush to re-open as quickly as it was legally possible to do so back in November after we emerged from the second lockdown.
From stage to screen (small & big): The adaptations keep on coming
In the last 30 years or more, roughly half of every new musical that arrives on Broadway or in the West End seems to be based on a film.
Mark Shenton kicks off his new ShenTens podcast with a top ten favourite musicals
I’ve launched a brand-new weekly podcast, called ShenTen, in which I will countdown my personal top tens in different theatrical categories.
There’s nothing like it: TV dips into theatrical friendships from Staged to Dames
I’ve just gorged on the second series of Staged, the blissful second series of the actors-in-lockdown zoom show, directed and co-written by Simon Evans, with Michael Sheen and David Tennant playing (versions of) themselves.
From The Beatles to Brexit, from Cats to Covid, Mark Shenton reflects on the latest industry news
Now that I’m getting into a rhythm on these daily columns, I’m going to try to introduce some regular features. And starting today, I’m planning on launching the week with column of disparate “diary” items — some fun, some not, that of stories that have made the news in the previous week.