Find out what is being said about the 40th anniversary production of Michael Frayn’s comedy Noises Off at London’s Phoenix Theatre with our review round up.
‘Frayn’s play has still got it’: NOISES OFF – Phoenix Theatre
Noises Off at the Phoenix Theatre is a fast-paced show that still demands an enormously skilled and precise technical performance from every member of its cast and Lindsay Posner’s team makes it look far easier than it really is. 40 years on, Michael Frayn’s play has still got it.
‘It’s just all very beautiful’: NOISES OFF – Bath & Touring ★★★★★
Millions know it by now, but in case like my enthralled companions last night you aren’t among them, grant me a moment or skip the the penultimate paragraph. Noises Off has been a national treasure since 1982, written by Michael Frayn after realising that the hurtling backstage business of doors, props and actors under stress is funnier than most actual farces. He wrote a squib called EXITS, the great producer Michael Codron encouraged something fuller.
‘A ridiculous – & ridiculously enjoyable – show that boasts the finest score in musicals’: ANYTHING GOES – Barbican Theatre
As soon as the title number’s patter chorus kicks in, there’s a smile on every face at the Barbican Centre, where Cole Porter’s Broadway classic Anything Goes runs until 6 November 2021.
REVIEW ROUND-UP: Anything Goes at the Barbican
We round up the reviews for Kathleen Marshall’s production of Anything Goes, now playing at the Barbican.
‘Making a splash’: Anything Goes – Barbican / Singin’ in the Rain – Sadler’s Wells
Two classic revivals — both coincidentally first launched in the spring and summer of 2011, one on Broadway (Anything Goes, in a production directed and choreographed by Kathleen Marshall), the other at Chichester, before transferring to the West End’s Palace Theatre (Singin’ in the Rain, directed by Jonathan Church with choreography by Andrew Wright) — have returned in triumph on consecutive nights this week.
Mark Shenton’s weekly chart of forthcoming theatrical comings & goings has some new entries
This weekly column keeps track of the shows that are coming back, or are newly being announced, as theatres prepare to re-open from next month onwards. It will be updated weekly until such time as it becomes a reality, and from then on will provide a weekly update to that week’s openings and future ones.
Returning & new productions heading for the West End & beyond post-lockdown: Are you up to date?
Meanwhile, I want to start keeping track of the shows that are coming back, or are newly being announced, in a new feature here that will be updated weekly until such time as it becomes a reality, and from then on will provide a weekly update to that week’s openings and future ones.
NEWS: Further casting & new schedule is announced for Anything Goes at the Barbican Theatre
Anything Goes will open at London’s Barbican Theatre from 23 July 2021 for a strictly limited 12-week season until 17 October.
NEWS: Felicity Kendal & Gary Wilmot join the cast of Anything Goes at the Barbican Theatre
Award winning actress Felicity Kendal will make her West End musical debut starring as Evangeline Harcourt, alongside leading actor Gary Wilmot as Elisha Whitney, in Anything Goes at London’s Barbican Theatre, running for a strictly limited season from 5 June to 22 August 2021.
NEWS: Felicity Kendal stars in William Boyd’s play The Argument at Theatre Royal Bath
Theatre Royal Bath today announces The Argument by William Boyd, its third Summer Season production, with Felicity Kendal starring in the role of Chloe.
Review Round Up: Lettice & Lovage, Menier Chocolate Factory
Felicity Kendal and Maureen Lipman star in Trevor Nunn’s production. But what are critics making of it?
LETTICE & LOVAGE – Menier Chocolate Factory
So why doesn’t the current production of Lettice and Lovage at the Menier Chocolate Factory push my buttons? I fear it suffers from Forty Years On Syndrome – a circumstance whereby even with what seems like dream casting of Richard Wilson as an irascible headmaster, Alan Bennett’s masterly first play comes up lifeless and irrelevant at Chichester.
LETTICE & LOVAGE – Menier Chocolate Factory
Felicity Kendal hurls herself through it, bright-eyed and irresistibly overdramatic, plucking ever more nonsense from the air.
NEWS: Felicity Kendal & Maureen Lipman lead Lettice & Lovage at Menier
Felicity Kendal and Maureen Lipman will star in the first major London revival of Peter Shaffer’s Lettice and Lovage, directed by Trevor Nunn at the Menier Chocolate Factory.
A ROOM WITH A VIEW – Touring
A brief and splendid scuttle of bare-arsed embarrassment by three men enlivens Act 2, the eldest – Simon Jones as Mr Beebe – in nothing but his clerical collar. That’s our happy view.
What we’re looking forward to in Chichester Festival’s winter season
We’re confirmed fans of Chichester Festival Theatre here, and for us their announcement of a new season is a bit like Christmas! The Winter 2016 season has a great range of entertainment and there’s sure to be something for everyone’s tastes! Edward Fox, Liza Goddard, Amanda Holden, Felicity Kendal, Robert Powell, Reece Shearsmith, Ken Stott and Imogen Stubbs are among the stars appearing in plays by writers from Alan Ayckbourn to Ronald Harwood, alongside contemporary work from Frantic Assembly and Spymonkey
NEWS: Felicity Kendal stars in A Room with a View tour before West End
Felicity Kendal stars in A Room with a View, adapted from EM Forster’s novel by Simon Reade and directed by Adrian Noble. Full cast is now announced for the production which opens for a two-week run at the Theatre Royal Bath from 28 September to 8 October 2016, before touring until 3 December to Brighton, Richmond, Guildford Norwich, Cambridge and Chichester followed by a West End transfer.
HAY FEVER – Duke of York’s Theatre, West End
This is a play I know extremely well. My own production (“one of the best the Nuffield Theatre has housed” – Guardian) formed part of my Theatre Studies degree at Lancaster in 1973, the year Noel Coward died. I have seen every major revival, and some dodgy tours, from the splendid Michael Denison and Dulcie Gray version which first inspired me as a teenager at the Grand Theatre Leeds, to glossy London and Chichester productions with Dame Judi, Maria Aitken, Penelope Keith, Geraldine McEwan and Diana Rigg. And the awful one with Lindsay Duncan strutting about in jodhpurs.
HAY FEVER – Duke of York’s Theatre, West End
Whenever I see this beloved play again, I wish it was my first time. It should be seen in youth – when the dread of embarrassing parents getting emotional is at its height ; and again in middle-age, to empathize with Judith Bliss’ envy of the fresher generation.
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