Watching Mike Bartlett’s play Cock today, it seems strange to think that it was actually written 13 years ago, as it covers themes that are so resonant with life in 2022.
‘This is an entertainment that is lit up by the excellence of its acting’: COCK – West End
Mike Bartlett’s Cock invites suggestive comments, but the main thing about the play is that it has proved to be a magnet for star casting.
‘Mike Bartlett’s play continues to fascinate & challenge’: COCK – West End
Theatre has always been a place to explore identity by using different character perspectives to consider points of view, social structures or inherited notions of what an individual can and should be.
‘Taron Egerton is utterly at home in the theatre’: COCK – West End ★★★★
Mike Bartlett’s mischievous, half-earnest play is about a gay man wrestling with his identity (and his furious partner) after falling for a woman. Who he loves both as a person and – to his confusion – as an anatomy. It’s clever to revive it in this even more gender-anxious time.
‘A complete sensory experience’: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time – Touring ★★★★★
This Olivier Award-winning adaptation of Mark Haddon’s novel is getting a deserved revival in London before embarking on a UK tour.
NEWS: West End production of the Mike Bartlett play C O C K will star Taron Egerton, Jonathan Bailey, Jade Anouka & Phil Daniels
Taron Egerton, Jonathan Bailey, Jade Anouka and Phil Daniels will star in C O C K, the first West End production of Mike Bartlett’s Olivier Award-winning play about love and identity.
Mark Shenton confesses all about his top ten guilty theatrical pleasures
We’ve all got them: things we enjoy — sometimes mightily — that it’s just a little bit embarrassing to admit to liking. Like admitting, in my case, a massive passion for Selling Sunset, the real estate reality TV show set in the cramped offices of an LA boutique agency that sell houses to millionaires and billionaires. (But somehow seem to work cheek-by-jowl in a tiny office on Sunset Boulevard).
Love London Love Culture reflects on the Olivier Awards 2020
While it has taken a while for the winners of this years Olivier Awards to be announced, there was plenty to be celebrated – as well as a strong reminder of the power of theatre.
NEWS: Three prizes each for & Juliet, Dear Evan Hansen & Emilia as Olivier Awards 2020 winners are announced
The winners of the Olivier Awards 2020 with Mastercard were announced in a special ITV programme filmed at The London Palladium, and on Official London Theatre’s YouTube channel.
NEWS: Bridge Theatre announces plans to reopen with star-studded rep season
London Theatre Company has announced its repertoire plans to reopen the Bridge Theatre during September and October 2020, “assuming that the Government gives the go ahead for indoor performances with socially distanced audiences”.
NEWS: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time’s third tour includes a run at Troubadour Wembley Park Theatre
The Olivier and Tony Award-winning production of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time will tour the UK and Ireland this autumn, including a limited run in London at Troubadour Wembley Park Theatre.
Decade Round-Up: The Musicals
And so here it is… my top 10 musicals of the decade. It turned out to be a slightly emotional journey. But it turns out musicals meant a lot in that time and I’ll fight anyone who says musicals aren’t a serious artform.
Decade Round-Up: The Plays
This isn’t a ‘best of’ list it’s my best-of list, these are the plays that shaped me this decade and will stay with me well into the next.
Theatre review of the 2019 & what to see in 2020
With a new year fast approaching, it is an interesting time to reflect on small changes across the theatre landscape in 2019 that will continue to shape how UK theatre will look as it moves into a new decade.
NEWS: New shows at Bridge Theatre star Roger Allam, Colin Morgan & Simon Russell Beale, plus The Book of Dust & They Shoot Horses, Don’t They
New 2020/2021 productions at London’s Bridge Theatre will begin with Polly Findlay directing Roger Allam and Colin Morgan in Caryl Churchill’s play A Number at London’s Bridge Theatre.
‘You really feel each character’s pain, despair & anger’: DEATH OF A SALESMAN – West End
Marianne Elliott and Miranda Cromwell’s production of Death of a Salesman uncovers new layers to Arthur Miller’s intense and profound play.
‘A masterpiece in theatrical storytelling’: WAR HORSE – Touring
The National Theatre production of Michael Morpurgo’s novel War Horse is both the most visceral depiction of war I’ve seen on stage and a masterpiece in theatrical storytelling.
CD Review: Company 2018 London cast / Follies 2018 National Theatre cast
We should celebrate the fact that within the space of a year London has played host to stagings of not one but two Sondheim masterpieces that have all but redefined them in theatrical terms: Company and Follies.
NEWS: Young Vic’s highly acclaimed production of Death of a Salesman will transfer to the West End
The highly acclaimed, sold-out Young Vic production of Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman will transfer to the Piccadilly Theatre from 24 October 2019 to 4 January 2020, with a press night on 4 November 2019.
‘Best Arthur Miller production I’ve ever seen’: DEATH OF A SALESMAN – Young Vic
Directed by Marianne (actual genius) Elliott and Miranda Cromwell and featuring an African American Loman family, this Death of a Salesman is the clearest, most moving and profound vision of this play I’ve ever seen.