This world premiere of Mandela at the Young Vic Theatre, by Laiona Michelle and composers Shaun and Greg Dean Borowsky, acknowledges “proud partnership” with his family, tells the story with impassioned and rightly partisan simplicity. Michael Luwoye is a towering Mandela: idealistic, sorrowful at violence, deploying his familiar humour and unresentful humanity.
REVIEW ROUND-UP: Mandela at the Young Vic Theatre
Discover what critics have had to say about Mandela at the Young Vic Theatre, the new musical based on the life of Nelson Mandela.
‘Full of fun but also astringently bracing & darkly sexy’: OKLAHOMA! – Young Vic Theatre ★★★★
Traditionally, audiences don’t go to Oklahoma! to be unsettled. On the other hand you don’t go to the Young Vic to have your expectations cosily met by a singalong, with the dark bits tastefully brushed over.
‘Likely to infuriate as many people as it enchants’: OKLAHOMA! – Young Vic Theatre ★★★
Daniel Fish’s sexed-up, pared-down version of Oklahoma! at the Young Vic Theatre (co-directed for London by Jordan Fein) is less a revival and more a full blown deconstruction of the original material.
‘I was gripped in the presence of two great artists & gripped by their stories’: THE COLLABORATION – Young Vic Theatre ★★★★★
Anthony McCarten’s new play The Collaboration at the Young Vic kicks off as you arrive in the auditorium with an 80s DJ set. It’s toe-tapping, hip and creates a party, edgy, youthful yet nostalgic atmosphere.
REVIEW ROUND-UP: The Collaboration at the Young Vic Theatre
Emma Clarendon rounds up the reviews for the world premiere of Anthony McCarten’s The Collaboration, now running at London’s Young Vic Theatre until 2 April 2022.
‘Art is about hearts not dollars, a sacred human magic’: THE COLLABORATION – Young Vic Theatre ★★★★
Two artists in a studio: Andy Warhol and Jean Michel Basquiat. They have been put there to collaborate in 1980s New York.
REVIEW ROUND-UP: Best of Enemies at the Young Vic Theatre
On LoveLondonLoveCulture, Emma Clarendon rounds up the reviews for the world premiere James Graham’s latest political drama, Best of Enemies, now running at the Young Vic Theatre until 22 January 2022.
‘A political fairy tale but one worth reading to your kids’: BEST OF ENEMIES – Young Vic Theatre
James Graham finds an analogue for today’s culture war in 1968 USA care of Gore Vidal and William F Buckley.
‘An entertaining, instructive, questioning, honest play’: BEST OF ENEMIES – Young Vic Theatre ★★★★
James Graham’s mission might seem unfashionable: trawling 20th-century history and public culture, looking not for villains and heroes but for the nuances of human behaviour.
‘James Graham asks interesting questions about public posturing versus private belief’: BEST OF ENEMIES – Young Vic Theatre
James Graham’s new play Best of Enemies takes us back to the 1960s, demonstrating that the roots of our division partially lay in the creation of televised intellectual debating.
‘It’s hard to take your eyes off Cush Jumbo’: HAMLET – Young Vic Theatre
Cush Jumbo’s Hamlet has been a long time in the making. In fact, what with the pandemic and the Young Vic’s long lead times for shows (which allow for some serious forward planning), I booked my tickets around three years ago.
NEWS: Winners of the Black British Theatre Awards 2020 are announced
The first televised Black British Theatre Awards 2020 were a vibrant affair hosted by presenter and comedic actor Eddie Nestor, filmed at London’s Young Vic Theatre and broadcast on Sky Arts.
NEWS: We round up the response to the latest tranche of Culture Recovery Fund grants awarded by the Government
More than 1,300 arts and cultural organisations have benefited from a share of £257 million as part of a vital financial boost from the Government’s £1.57 billion Culture Recovery Fund.
NEWS: The Black British Theatre Awards reveal 2020 nominees & announce the ceremony will be broadcast on Sky Arts
The BBTAs have revealed the 2020 Black British Theatre Awards nominee list, voted almost entirely by the public and representing some of the finest work by Black performers and creatives in UK theatre. The 2020 awards ceremony will air on Sky Arts this autumn, as part of the channel’s free to air line-up.
After Matt Smith & Claire Foy in Lungs, here are 5 more plays perfect for the social distance treatment
The idea of re-performing Lungs while the actors safely socially distance got me thinking about other plays which have been performed over the past year or two that could be similarly revived.
‘Gillian Anderson’s performance is a scorcher’: A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE – Young Vic Theatre (Online review)
World on fire: The NT Live recording of this classic Young Vic production stars Gillian Anderson and is genuinely unmissable.
NEWS: National Theatre at Home screens Tom Hiddleston’s Coriolanus & A Streetcar Named Desire with Gillian Anderson
The National Theatre has announced its third tranche of archive shows that will be streamed every Thursday at 7pm BST via its YouTube channel as part of lockdown initiative National Theatre at Home.
‘Urgent, provocative & familiar all at the same time’: NORA: A DOLL’S HOUSE – Young Vic Theatre
Despite the challenges, and judging by the Young Vic’s typically youthful, mixed audience, Nora: A Doll’s House is a production to which they can relate and which, so far as I could see, kept them on the edge of their seats.
‘It takes some guts’: FAIRVIEW – Young Vic Theatre ★★★★
In Jackie Sibblies Drury’s case, Fairview is very much tied up with the method, the form. She blows the traditional form sky high, introducing repetition, caricature and a final twist.