by Laura Kressly In the middle of a dark room, I am ushered into what looks like a largish, stand-alone cupboard. With a spotlight above a single chair facing a perspex sheet covered with a window blind, there is an immediate sense of the audience becoming the performer. Given that the four mini-plays making up […]
‘Has an intimacy redolent of Graham’s earlier works’: BUBBLE – Nottingham Playhouse (Online review)
One of the highest profile events in Nottingham Playhouse’s Unlocked Festival was Bubble, a hybrid production, performed in-house and live streamed over the weekend to a potential international audience – a new James Graham comedy about life in lockdown.
‘Hare allows much more of his own personality to emerge’: BEAT THE DEVIL – Bridge Theatre
The first short play is Beat the Devil in which David Hare stakes first claim to what will surely be a new genre or at least a familiar theme in the coming months – the Covid monologue.
‘There is a real humanity there’: MIRACULOUS – Edinburgh (Online review) ★★★★
In Miraculous, Borderline Theatre Company and the Gaiety Ayr have created a bouncy online version of David F Ross’ comedy caper novel about an Ayrshire band that once had an unexpected number one hit.
‘Truly lifts a mirror up to pandemic life’: BARD IN THE YARD – Park Hill Park, Croydon
If you can afford your own private performance, Bard in the Yard is a wonderful, gentle re-introduction to live theatre and a reminder of why we love it so much.
Please help, Oliver Dowden: Theatres are on their knees
I’m sharing the message that I’ve sent to Oliver Dowden, the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS).
Large West End production compan…
NEWS: Edinburgh Fringe receives £1.25 million ‘life raft’ from Scottish Government
The Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society, the charity which oversees the Edinburgh Fringe, has been awarded £249,000 grants and a £1million interest-free loan to help support it through Covid-19 recovery.
‘A devastating moment for our industry’: Edinburgh’s Lyceum Theatre in hibernation
Edinburgh’s Lyceum Theatre has entered a period of “hibernation” as a building-based producing theatre, postponing all 2020 shows and entering into negotiations with all staff over redundancies.
Why is theatre so London-centric… even online? 11 must-watch streams from beyond the M25
‘Theatre is everywhere. It is regional. It is rural. It is poor. Now it is in your front room, it can be from anywhere.’
‘There are going to be some pretty sad stories that will come out of this period’: Baby Reindeer writer/performer Richard Gadd on his Corona cancelled West End run
‘I actually managed to be quite philosophical about it in the end. There’s a sense that we’re all in it today, and there are much bigger things at play, like people dying and getting sick.’
‘If new funds don’t come in, we can probably manage until the beginning of the autumn’: Artistic director Anthony Biggs on the Playground Theatre in lockdown
As the weeks of lockdown continue, with theatres up and down the country and around the world closed for the foreseeable future, I caught up with another artistic director, Anthony Biggs of west London’s Playground Theatre, to find out more how they were responding.
‘I’m not going to accept that I can’t grow an audience in that time’: British theatre’s shutdown described by industry insiders
Weeks into lockdown, with theatres up and down the country and around the world closed for the foreseeable future, I caught up with the artistic directors of Cirencester’s Barn Theatre, Belarus Free Theatre and Pitlochry Festival Theatre. How are they being affected? Will they survive?
That was the weekend we knew the theatres would go dark
On the weekend of 14 March 2020, following the closure of theatre on Broadway (on 12 March), it became clear that something overwhelming was about to happen to British theatre.