Back in 2009, when The Great British Bake Off first appeared on our TV screens, nobody could have predicted that a show about people making cakes in a tent would even get a second series, let alone become a national and international sensation. But the…
‘You couldn’t really ask for a more genuinely touching show’: THE GREAT BRITISH BAKE OFF MUSICAL – Noel Coward Theatre ★★★★
A British institution, Bake Off is may not seem like the most likely source for a musical but thankfully, its musical adaptation, The Great British Bake Off Musical at the Noel Coward Theatre, works incredibly well and is an easily digestible, heart-warming show and a love letter to the series so many love.
NEWS: Rachel York & Haydn Gwynne join the cast of Anything Goes at the Barbican & extra dates added
Broadway star Rachel York and Tony and Olivier nominee Haydn Gwynne will join the cast of critically-acclaimed Anything Goes for the final weeks before the show must end on 6 November 2021.
‘Played perfectly’: COPENHAGEN – Mayflower Mast Studios, Southampton ★★★★
If you’ve been starved of productions to make you think, Copenhagen at Mayflower Mast Studios, Southampton is an excellent way to ease yourself back into a stalls seat and re-engage your brain.
NEWS: Nancy Carroll & Haydn Gwynne lead the casting announced for Theatre Royal Bath’s Welcome Back Season of plays
Casting has been announced for the first two plays in the Theatre Royal Bath’s WELCOME BACK Season this autumn, running from 14 October to 12 December 2020. Two of the country’s leading actresses, Nancy Carroll and Haydn Gwynne, are joined by a distinguished cast of experienced stage and screen performers.
‘A historical epic that demands to be heard’: THE WELKIN – National Theatre
Lucy Kirkwood returns to the National Theatre with The Welkin, starring a brilliant ensemble led by Maxine Peake.
‘Haydn Gwynne in full snarling Hedda mode is something to see’: HEDDA TESMAN – Chichester ★★★
But more and more, there’s a sense in Hedda Tesman at the Minerva that what you are seeing is some damn fine acting in a rather ho-hum play.
‘A thoroughly plausible, engrossing update’: HEDDA TESMAN – Chichester ★★★★
Cordelia Lynn’s Hedda Tesman renews Ibsen’s play in the light of today without in any way losing sight of the original. In this age of radical reinterpretations, that’s quite some achievement.
‘A stylish restoration’: THE WAY OF THE WORLD – Donmar Warehouse ★★★★
The latest Restoration comedy on offer in London is the Donmar Warehouse’s sumptuous production of William Congreve’s The Way of the World that stretches into the night for more than three hours.
‘A full period-dress production, executed immaculately’: THE WAY OF THE WORLD – Donmar Warehouse ★★★★
This is a full period-dress production, executed immaculately but probably needing another few cuts to be unalloyed joy. The plot is labyrinthine, with a wordy torrent of finely honed wit and derision, fuelled by greed more than love.
‘Plenty of potential here’: THE WAY OF THE WORLD – Donmar Warehouse
The Donmar’s new version of William Congreve’s play has plenty of musings on marriage and the role of women which still feel extremely pertinent; it just needs to even out the tone to make this restoration comedy really fizz.
Haydn Gwynne replaces Linda Bassett in The Way of The World at the Donmar Warehouse
Haydn Gwynne will be playing the role of Lady Wishfort at the Donmar Warehouse in James Macdonald’s new revival of William Congreve’s Restoration comedy The Way of The World, replacing Linda Bassett who has had to withdraw from the production.
CORIOLANUS – Barbican Theatre (RSC) ★★★
The evening’s star performance comes from Haydn Gwynne who brings a strength and elegance to Volumnia. Playing the ever loving yet overbearing mother of Coriolanus, she dreams of success and glory for her son.
CORIOLANUS – Barbican Theatre (RSC)
Angus Jackson bookends the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Rome season, his traditional dress Julius Caesar having opened it he now caps it off with a modern set Coriolanus.
CORIOLANUS – RSC, Stratford-upon-Avon ★★★
Coriolanus doesn’t often hit the modern stage: its plot, a hymn to the necessary evil of educated patrician privilege in order to provide for the politically fickle, unthinking plebeian multitude, doesn’t sit at all well with modern political correctness.
A deserved West End airing of New Songs 4 New Shows
The one that absolutely blew me away in performance was Wigmaker, which is billed as a “modern hairy fairy tale” about a beautiful wigmaker whose wigs come to life at night. The music and lyrics to this piece by Douglas Hodge are stunning.
NEWS: Sally Dexter & Clive Carter join all-star New Songs 4 New Shows concert, 28 Nov
Final casting has now been announced for NEW SONGS 4 NEW SHOWS, which runs for one night only at the West End’s Lyric Theatre on Monday 28 November. Olivier Award winner Sally Dexter and Clive Carter, both Wicked West End alumni, and rising star Katie Bernstein join the line-up.
NEWS: Mel Giedroyc & Caroline Quentin join all-star New Songs 4 New Shows concert
NEW SONGS 4 NEW SHOWS will give the West End a unique experience of seeing star performances of songs from four new musicals in a one-off Gala Concert at the Lyric Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue on Monday 28 November 2016. Stars participating include The Great British Bake-Off’s Mel Giedroyc, Douglas Hodge (performing from a musical he has also written), Haydn Gwynne and Caroline Quentin (playing Joan Littlewood).
NEWS: NT Live broadcasts The Threepenny Opera on 22 Sep
Rufus Norris’ production of Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill’s The Threepenny Opera will be broadcast live to cinemas around the world as part of the NT Live season. The National Theatre’s new adaptation by Simon Stephens will screened live from the National’s Olivier Theatre on the 22 September 2016 at 7pm.
The S & S Award photos: The future of new musical theatre starts Here
This year’s S and S Award went to the all-female (yeah!) writing team of Alex Young and Kate Marlais for Here, which is set in Cumbria in 1943 and inspired by the life of German artist Kurt Schwitters who fled there to escape Nazi oppression.
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