In 1986, Arthur Miller was in his 70s. He still had more plays and screenplays to come, but his most well-known works were already created and he was starting to slow his output. Danger: Memory is one of these late, lesser known works, and spotlights the worries of someone in the twilight of their life. Two unrelated and stylistically different one-act plays are thematically timeless, but the truncated length doesn’t serve Miller’s usually rich stories and characters particularly well. 

Leo and Leonora spend most of I Can’t Remember Anything bickering like an old married couple. Though that’s how they come across for much of the play, their relationship is never defined – a persistent bugbear. Leonora’s husband is dead and her grown son is in Sri Lanka, but the reason these two people (who don’t like each other much) spend every evening together is never made clear. Much of their moaning revolves around old memories, forgotten details and an existential view of life which, though relatable, says little. Actors Julian Bird and Deborah Javor have great chemistry and some touching moments of tenderness, but the script is less of a narrative and more of a casual conversation that barely conceals Miller’s politics. Their characters have a decent amount of development, but the story is lacking. Enjoyable in the moment and evoking plenty of laughs, the end result is rather forgettable.

Clara has more tension and action than I Can’t Remember Anything, but the characters have less substance. The 70s cop drama with a stunned Julian Bird as Albert and relentless interrogator Detective Fine by the excellent Anthony Taylor is punchy but still powerful. Albert struggles to recall details of people close to his now dead adult daughter, but memories of her childhood are vivid. Simeon Miller’s intermittent flashbulb lighting design startles the way a sudden recollection does; this piece draws the audience in more than the first. The flashbacks with Clara (Kristy Quade) are moments of calm amongst the rapid-fire questioning, but the content lacks weight. There’s a hint of Miller’s earlier family dramas in these moments, but they don’t go as far as they could.

Good performances and lovely individual moments hold attention for two hours along with the wonderful novelty of seeing this rare text on stage, but as individual pieces the snapshots they provide are somewhat unsatisfying. Miller does grand domestic conflict so well that these single acts with limited plot development and hints of complex characters leave the audience wanting more.

Danger: Memory runs through 15 October.

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All praise Emma Rice! Under Dominic Dromgoole’s artistic directorship, The Globe’s commitment to innovation in Shakespeare production first established during Mark Rylance’s reign fell by the wayside in favour of new writing; his Shakespeare generally stuck to original practices (OP) that Rylance and his team developed and championed. Shakespeare under Dromgoole was largely in this safe, now established style. There is value to be had in OP productions without a doubt, but entire seasons of it year in and out could certainly put off a seasoned regular. OP productions are so helpful in providing context for exams and a novelty to those who’d never seen this sort of work before, but for someone who has seen a lot of Shakespeare, there’s nothing inherently interesting in yet another OP production.

Rice’s appointment made the old, middle class (usually male) academics positively apoplectic what with her lack of Shakespearian credentials, intention to innovate and blatant feminism. Others were ecstatic on hearing the announcement – finally, Shakespeare that’s fit for the 21st century and something unlikely to have been seen before on the Globe’s stage. Since the season’s opening, her heavily adapted productions have received mixed notices from the mainstream press who, like the academics that bemoan the death of tradition, are mostly middle aged or older men, white and middle class (there are obviously exceptions). 

Matthew Dunster’s urban Imogen, the final show of Rice’s inaugural season, is the opposite of the restrained and well-spoken Shakespeare that these scholars and press use as a benchmark for quality. This anarchic gangland update of Cymbeline is exceptionally alive, aggressive, dirty and unapologetic. If we want young people and the general populace to take interest in Shakespeare, this is the sort of relevant work we need – not another well-spoken, corseted rendition. This production will rile those aforementioned critics and scholars, but they are wrong. It’s an absolute, undeniable fact that Dunster’s Imogen is a necessary, vital work.

Most of the ensemble employ a contemporary urban/London accent that comes with an undertone of aggression and a ballsy edge. Its energy and rhythm still works within Shakespeare’s verse, even without the open vowels and carefully pronounced consonants. The use of contemporary additional lines and ad libbing is no different than what is likely to have happened in Shakespeare’s day, and furthers the production’s accessibility. It is the accent of youth, the working class and this country’s disenfranchised. Dunster’s small choice to use this accent gives entire demographics validation on stage – their stories and lives are important and worthy of attention.

Placing young princess Imogen at the centre of the story is an empowering choice – Maddy Hill plays a strong, feisty and independent young woman. She admirably fights off her laddish step-brother Cloten’s (Joshua Lacey) revolting advances and for her husband Posthumous (Ira Mandela Siobhan) that her dad Cymbeline (Jonathan McGuinness) banished. Her constant battling against patriarchal structures that keep her second place to men rings painfully true today. Hill is supported by an outstanding ensemble that is racially, ability, and gender-diverse.

Jon Bausor’s simple but evocative set is reminiscent of a slaughterhouse or meth lab. Plastic sheeting that wraps around all but the very front of the stage shifts the antechamber forward so it’s closer to the audience, and can be drawn all the way back in the name of flexibility and openness. Flooring drives action towards the middle of the stage unnecessarily, though the front corners are still used – just not with any regularity. This is one of the production’s only faults.

Conventional and aerial fight choreography by Rachel Bown-Williams and Ruth Cooper-Brown doesn’t shy away from graphic tribal/gang violence and is of an appropriate scale for such a grand venue. Tracksuits and trainers are a functional uniform that’s easily colour coded to indicate Roman or English allegiance. This is a world where only the strong survive and the risk of betrayal is high, though there are gorgeous moments of tenderness, intimacy and brotherhood amongst the hardness. Shakespeare’s story translates remarkably well to this modern context, and the concept is imbedded thoroughly into the re-worked text, including the final jig. 

In Dunster’s Imogen, we see a Shakespeare that is hip, relevant and achingly alive. People from all walks of life can see themselves reflected in his modernised characters, not just the well-spoken middle and upper classes. Dunster’s commitment to Rice’s mission to make the Globe a place where audiences “ cheer and whoop and smell and feel the spit of actors on our faces” thorough, laudable and wholly necessary. 

Imogen runs through 16th October.

The Play’s the Thing UK is committed to covering fringe and progressive theatre in London and beyond. It is run entirely voluntarily and needs regular support to ensure its survival. For more information and to help The Play’s the Thing UK provide coverage of the theatre that needs reviews the most, visit its patreon.

Layla is fifteen years old. She’s the cleverest girl in her year, writes poetry, and has a supportive mum. The trouble is, her best friend Monica’s got with a proper rude boy who launches a full-on campaign of abuse against Layla. As the bright, happy girl monologues her ordeal around short scenes, the focus splits – though her treatment at the hands of her peers is a horrific primary storyline, other concerns arise. Issues such as body image, friendship, gender pay gap, education, dating and alternative families all find their way into Sabrina Mahfouz’s script. Mahfouz makes Layla a rounded, complex character with potential for numerous stories rather than becoming a single-issue driven vehicle; an excellent cast and supporting characters give the play depth and an appeal to its teenage target audience.

Shanice Sewell plays Layla with vivacity and charm. She is the daughter every mum wants – a good kid with ambition and warmth. Emma White’s Monica is a great foil who, although a girly contrast to Layla’s sporty boyishness, doesn’t alienate audience members who focus more on fitness, fashion and boys than school. Alex Stedman plays several male roles in a skilled display of multi-rolling. There is some lovely chemistry developing between the three actors that is sure to grow as the run goes on.

Though Monica’s choices come with clear moralising, it isn’t too heavy handed. She’s more misguided than a bad girl, demonstrating how easy it is to be lead astray. Her boyfriend Joe is a nasty piece of work, but contrasted by Layla’s doting father and quiet boy Reece, who’s long fancied her. Mahfouz commendably paints almost all of the characters as flawed, but positive – she and Theatre Centre totally get that preaching to kids doesn’t work.

The hour-long running time is spot on for the format. More scenes and fewer speeches would make the piece more dynamic were it longer but as is, it works. Designer Ele Slade’s monochrome set hints at the young people’s London without diminishing their colourful characterisation.

Layla’s Room, though clearly pitched to a teen audience, appeals more widely through its easygoing characterisation and approaching the ideas without condescension. The story is warm and caring, setting realistic examples without over-egging the message.

Layla’s Room tours through 23 November.

The Play’s the Thing UK is committed to covering fringe and progressive theatre in London and beyond. It is run entirely voluntarily and needs regular support to ensure its survival. For more information and to help The Play’s the Thing UK provide coverage of the theatre that needs reviews the most, visit its patreon.

August Strindberg’s expressionistic A Dream Play has inspired theatre makers since it’s debut in 1901. In the otherworldly Vaults, BAZ Productions reinvents the innovative work for a modern audience. A collage of loosely connected characters flit back and forth through time and space, never quite fully formed but too visceral to be wholly in the mind. This is no linear, unified world, but one that traverses several planes of existence. Live music and interaction fosters inclusivity, though some of the content is far from warm and cuddly. This dreamplay is certainly surreal and atmospheric, but overly broad themes and the lack of a strong through-line makes for a generalised moodiness that leaves little lasting impact beyond striking imagery.

Laura Moody’s acoustic cello and operatic vocals add richness and depth to the piece, and are the most striking feature of dreamplay. Even the softest tones echo through the Vaults’ tunnels and quite possibly still linger there in the darkness. There is not enough music to form a soundtrack, but any more of her music would cause it to lose its impact.

Four actors form the rest of the ensemble cast who take on multiple roles. With impressive CVs behind each of them, their performances are suitably engrossing even though the script’s scenes deliberately evade connection to others. Jade Ogugua particularly entrances as the non-verbal dancing girl who wears her heart on her sleeve, and Jack Wilkinson’s stage door keeper elicits laughter from his attempts to wrangle defiant performers.

The script has lovely individual moments that are beautifully realised fully formed by director Sarah Bedi, but beyond satisfying visual appetites, it lacks substance. The text draws the audience in, but after we are spit back onto the surface of Lower Marsh, it mostly fades. Flickering images remain as if on deteriorating film stock, but with no coherent message – a disappointing effect after such striking execution, even if this is reminiscent of a dream.

dreamplay runs through 1 October.

The Play’s the Thing UK is committed to covering fringe and progressive theatre in London and beyond. It is run entirely voluntarily and needs regular support to ensure its survival. For more information and to help The Play’s the Thing UK provide coverage of the theatre that needs reviews the most, visit its patreon.

Johannes, a young man with pronounced learning difficulties, is in solitary confinement for raping and murdering a young girl. The prison captain Agnes, seeing goodness in the boy, introduces him to Christianity and gains permission for him to live and work on a remote island farm. Sadly, her good intentions don’t come to fruition in this story that disintegrates as quickly as its moral compass does. A strong cast of four help ease the discomfort that abuse and structural weakness encourages, though good performances aren’t enough to redeem The Awakening.

Unn (Joana Nastari) lives alone on the farm she runs whilst her brother is at sea fishing most of the year. Keen to have help, she seeks out Agnes for help finding a suitable farmhand. Nastari is the highlight of the show as she delicately guides Unn’s transformation from cold dictator to accommodating teacher; it’s a marvellous transformation despite the character’s questionable ethics. Alex Dowding’s Johannes is charming and innocent, with the added depth of a violent edge that could emerge at any moment. 

Despite the performances, Julian Garner’s script is the problem here. The plot becomes more and more choppy as it goes on, as if Garner cut entire scenes in the last third in order to meet a running time restriction, leaving the whole thing to collapse at sea. The ending offers no resolution or explanation for Unn’s choices, and supporting character Iversen is underwritten and implausible. An interval serves to fragment the story even further and the initial work on relationships to disappear.

The minimalist set by Florence Watts is versatile and indicative of the Scandinavian setting, complimented by Jennifer Rose’s sleek lighting. Director Medelaine Moore captures the rhythm of the scenes well, though she makes some questionable staging choices in the routes through and around the space – they become comical rather than indicative of a location change.

The Awakening feels like the work of an inexperienced playwright, though the production does a fairly good job at realising the characters and ideas that are lightly sketched in the script. It has the potential to be a challenging story; instead it drifts away into nothingness.

The Awakening runs through 24 September.

The Play’s the Thing UK is committed to covering fringe and progressive theatre in London and beyond. It is run entirely voluntarily and needs regular support to ensure its survival. For more information and to help The Play’s the Thing UK provide coverage of the theatre that needs reviews the most, visit its patreon.

I can’t imagine living in a country where theatre is censored for criticising the government, and theatre makers who create politically subversive work risk arrest, torture and death. But this is the reality of Belarus Free Theatre. Its three founders, now refugees living and working in London, risk imprisonment if they return to their home country. They stubbornly continue to make work that’s ferociously critical of the Belarusian and Russian governments, and aggressively eye-opening for audiences like us who do not live under an oppressive dictatorship. 

Unadulterated rage and brutal experiences at the hands of the Belarusian and Russian judicial systems underpins Burning Doors, a nearly two-hour long collage of striking visual theatre. BFT tries to do too much here though, and it’s totally overwhelming. Though the show will undoubtedly linger for some time, a narrower selection of content and narratives explored more in-depth would have more personal impact.

Featuring Pussy Riot member Maria Alyokhina and her experiences in prison, the piece has a focus on the true stories of activists at the hands of the government. Dostoyevsky and Foucault also inform the piece, though there is the sense that there is much more at play than three individuals’ stories. There is a disconnect between the experiences shown, making them feel like isolated incidents rather than a sample of widespread persecution. Some wider context is provided, but there is little sense of the world these activists live in. It feels like it would be helpful to have more knowledge of Russian and Belarusian politics, and not having this knowledge is somewhat alienating.

That’s not to say that the show isn’t powerful. The company’s fearlessness in using extreme physical performance to show the brutality of the regimes is admirable and courageous. The final half hour or so is an extended movement sequence using acrobatics, rope work and combat utterly  horrifies – there is no doubt that the depicted of torture and abuse has happened and continues to do so in prisons all over Russia and Belarus. This section is by far the strongest. 

The ensemble cast of seven work together seamlessly and have a fantastically watchable rapport. Their unwavering commitment and passion makes for compelling viewing. Their precision is enhanced through Joshua Pharo, Nicolai Khalezin and Richard Hammarton’s design. 

Though Burning Doors huge ambition and absence of a through line ultimately do the show a disservice, it’s bold portrayal of government sanctioned torture against its own people is radical, challenging and necessary.

Burning Doors runs through 24 September, then tours nationally and internationally through 3 December.

The Play’s the Thing UK is committed to covering fringe and progressive theatre in London and beyond. It is run entirely voluntarily and needs regular support to ensure its survival. For more information and to help The Play’s the Thing UK provide coverage of the theatre that needs reviews the most, visit its patreon.