That’s Not My Name, Bread & Roses Theatre

By Luisa De la Concha Montes

Described as a “an internal stream of consciousness and sketch comedy” That’s Not My Name, written and performed by Sammy Trotman, is a one-woman show that explores the absurdity of psychiatry. Through a direct and satirical exploration of her own experience of psychiatric wards, diagnosis and stigma, Sammy skilfully navigates the stage and eases the audience into an unconventional take on mental health.

Continue reading

The Shadow Whose Prey the Hunter Becomes, Battersea Arts Centre

By Romy Foster

Framed by the lens of the intrusive and boundary-breaking rise of artificial intelligence, The Shadow Whose Prey Becomes the Hunter by Back to Back Theatre serves as a wake-up call on how non-disabled people alienate people who have what are referred to in Australia as ‘intellectual disabilities’. (Australia and the UK have very different language for disability. In Australia ‘people with intellectual disabilities’ is considered polite. This is the language used the show.)

Continue reading

Wipe These Tears, Camden People’s Theatre

by Laura Kressly

Operation Desert Storm. An English primary school. Guantanamo Bay. The Green Zone. A village in Afghanistan. These are some of the places where writer Sînziana Cojocărescu situates individual stories of colonisation and oppression. Informed by interviews with over 90 people involved in or survivors of war and conflict, as well as activists and researchers, the resulting collage of violence forces audiences to reckon with white western imperialism.

Continue reading

Only an Octave Apart, Wilton’s Music Hall

by Zahid Fayyaz

This show comes straight from New York to one of the world’s oldest surviving music halls in East London. It is a very classy and entertaining tour de force. The concept is a simple one – that a cabaret artist and an opera performer, Justin Vivian Bond and Anthony Roth Costanzo, join forces to sing songs from their respective fields. The message is despite being from different disciplines they have a lot of similarities, except for being one octave apart.

Continue reading