Bruce Norris, previously best known for race drama Clybourne Park takes on social taboo issues without a pause.
‘People won’t be forgetting this in a hurry’: CYPRUS AVENUE – Royal Court Theatre
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Cyprus Avenue uses shock tactics to show us the horror within, but it is a comedy with depth, perceptiveness and a touch of genius.
‘Beautifully balanced & unusual piece of theatre’: BERBERIAN SOUND STUDIO – Donmar Warehouse
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It is easy to see why a film set mainly in a recording studio is so suited to the stage and Tom Scutt has created a beautifully balanced and unusual piece of theatre in Berberian Sound Studio.
’An evening of meandering chat’: SHIPWRECK – Almeida Theatre
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Annie Washburn’s new play Shipwreck is intended as a reckoning with Trump. The show pitches itself as a invitation to dinner with the 45th President, but unfortunately would be better described as an evening of meandering chat with a cast of confused New York liberals.
‘Uneven account’: THE LADY FROM THE SEA – Print Room at the Coronet
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The Lady from the Sea, rarely performed in the UK, is a fascinating and alluring play, but this production from Norwegian Ibsen Company provides an uneven account.
‘Culmination of a triumphant season’: PINTER SEVEN – West End
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The culmination of Jamie Lloyd’s Pinter at the Pinter season, which has been a triumph, is two short plays from very early in Harold Pinter’s career both of which he directs. Not has only the production of all Pinter’s short plays proved that there is a large, enthusiastic audience for apparently difficult and oblique drama; it has also made the case that Pinter’s short drama, comparatively overlooked, should be judged on a level with his full-length plays. They include some of his best writing.
‘Intriguing but strangely disconnected’: When We Have Sufficiently Tortured Each Other – National Theatre
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The publicity for Martin Crimp’s new play, gleefully stoked by the National Theatre, has been all about Cate Blanchett and ‘bondage’ scenes
‘Engagingly told’: KOMPROMAT – Vault Festival
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David Thame has created a neat drama in Kompromat, but its explicit relationship to such a complex story, with real consequences for people who are very much alive, leaves a lingering sense that this speculative play allows the writer both to have his cake and to eat it.
‘Excellent, enthralling account of a fascinating play’: OUTLYING ISLANDS – King’s Head Theatre
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The revival of David Grieg’s 2002 play, Outlying Islands, at the King’s Head Theatre reintroduces a play of wonderful, haunting poetry and complexity, a flawed but brilliant piece of writing.
The clarity & confidence of this production makes it a must-see’: THE TRAGEDY OF KING RICHARD THE SECOND – Almeida Theatre
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Joe Hill-Gibbins’ of The Tragedy of King Richard the Second is inherently divisive, and the critics have obliged but, only three days into the year, it is very hard to imagine a more exciting or compelling Shakespeare coming along in 2019.