Boys Will Be Boys
✮✮✮✮ Jez Butterworth's Mojo Sydney Theatre Company | Sydney directed by Iain Sinclair When boys grow up and begin to find their feet in the adult world as men of stature, the acquisition of masculinity often becomes critically important. The characters in Jez Butterworth’s Mojo seem to spend all their waking moments satisfying that overwhelming and insatiable need to be seen and treated as men of worth, and in the London underground gangland of the late 1950s, this involves u
A Sharp Retro Take On Orwell's Futurist Dystopia
✮✮✮✮ George Orwell's 1984 Playhouse Theatre | London directed by Duncan Macmillan & Robert Icke Theatre adaptations of classic novels would probably go in several critics’ personal Room 101s – especially those with narrators, or, heaven forfend, voiceovers. But this latest transfer from Islington powerhouse the Almeida Theatre manages to be intensely literary without any of the staid, storytelling bookishness that can plague the genre. Together, Duncan Macmillan and Robert Ic
Baseball Caps Not Bowler Hats
✮✮✮ Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot Arcola Theatre | London directed by Simon Dormandy It’s been a long wait for an update to Beckett’s 1953 play, but this slick and lively new version at the Arcola theatre is stepping with bravado into a storied production history. The play conjures ideas of almost unbearably nostalgic tramps in battered bowler hats and beaten up suits; quaint, antic figures on a dusty country road. Director Simon Dormandy hasn’t had the heart – or guts
It's a Knockout!
✮✮✮✮ Rocky Winter Garden Theatre | NYC music Stephen Flaherty lyrics Lynn Ahrens book Thomas Meehan & Sylvester Stallone directed by Alex Timbers We all know the story. It’s iconic. It even comes with a Hollywood fable. Or so they say. Sylvester Stallone, star and writer of the 1976 Academy Award winning film, scrimping at the bottom of the ladder, was offered top dollar for his screenplay. But Stallone, uninterested in money, wanted only to play the title role and held out r
Letters That Remain
✮✮✮ 1/2 Share White's Annapurna The New Group | NYC directed by Bart DeLorenzo Paonia, Colorado. The plucking of an acoustic guitar blends with sizzling light as the aroma of sausages tickles your nostrils. A cluttered trailer, resembling an episode of The Hoarder Next Door, is situated amongst the snowy mountains’ vibrant chilly blue air, as complementary orange rays of hot sun radiate through its roof. Ulysses and Emma together, happily married. Until 20 years ago. Emma app
Everybody Steals
✮✮✮✮ Alan Ayckbourn's A Small Family Business National Theatre | London directed by Adam Penfold Following on from his 1977 hit Bedroom Farce, Alan Ayckbourn’s A Small Family Business first premiered at The National Theatre in 1986 to rave reviews. At the time it was celebrated as an anti-Thatcher piece, hailed by Mark Ravenhill as “one of the most intensely political plays of the period.” How does the play hold up 27 years later? Extremely well, it seems. The idea of trying
