by Zahid Fayyaz
Fresh from a successful run at the Edinburgh Fringe, Cassie Workman brings her lyrical 55-minute poem to the intimate upstairs space at the Soho Theatre. A spoken-word performance of uncommon intensity, it tells the fictional and fantastical story of the narrator traveling back in time to try to save Kurt Cobain from committing suicide. It touches on additional, more universal themes and issues however, so it isn’t just for the Kurt Cobain fans to enjoy.
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by Laura Kressly
It’s getting late and raining hard, so most people have settled in for the night. Instead of a quiet one, playwright Paula B Stanic’s world premiere takes us to Croydon, where an array of night shift staff are working. We meet a huge host of Deaf and hearing people, including an emergency services dispatcher, a delivery driver, a DJ, a doctor, and a train driver who keep the borough moving whilst everyone else sleeps. As the storm floods the streets, the disparate collection of characters struggle to get their work done and battle with their own demons across short scenes and movement sequences.
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by Diana Miranda
A darkly humorous play about influencer culture in the AI age, Racheal Ofori’s FLIP! is a witty two-hander that follows the journey of friends Carleen and Crystal, popular co-vloggers who go above and beyond for online fame. After a few hit-and-miss attempts, Carleen starts producing content with FLIP, a new social media platform that utilises advanced AI. The fun satire takes a dark turn, and what follows is an exploration of the lengths people may go to craft an identity appealing to the masses, all for the sake of fame and fortune.
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by Zahid Fayyaz
This is the premiere of an adaptation of the popular 2020 Eliza Clark novel, Boy Parts. A comic thriller, this is the story of Irina. She is a Newcastle-based photographer of young men, and is either a violent killer or a damaged fantasist. It’s never clear which one is the correct interpretation of the main character. This makes the show more fascinating, as it leaves the audience and reader without a sure footing.
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by Zahid Fayyaz
Having previously created highly acclaimed solo shows in the last year, friends Frankie Thompson and Liv Ello have joined forces to produce a two-hander. Set in the aftermath of a nuclear apocalypse, the pair play survivors trying to determine who they are and how they fit into this new world. It is a clear nod towards Waiting for Godot. However, this narrative is very loose, and gives way to scenes that are both very funny and moving. These share the pair’s feelings towards society’s expectations on gender and the shape of bodies.
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by Zahid Fayyaz
Fresh from a sold-out month at the Edinburgh Fringe, Ben Target, former Perrier comedy award nominee, comes to London with a run of his highly acclaimed solo show. A return to the stage after spending the last few years collaborating with other artists, this is a brave and startling work.
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by Diana Miranda
Delightfully ludicrous, The Importance of Being Earnest under Mark Beer’s direction captures the sarcastic humour so well-embedded in Wilde’s satire. Through spot-on characterisation, strong performances and a detailed set, this fringe show takes us on a time-travelling ride to London’s 19th Century high-tea culture, where appearances are of the utmost importance.
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by Luisa De la Concha Montes
Led by the Wind is a queer story that follows K (Kiki Ye), a young woman from Fuyang, China living in the United Kingdom. She has been convinced by her family back home to go on a blind date with Bryan (He Zhang), who, according to her family’s standards, is the perfect husband material. As their relationship progresses K starts zoning out, sinking deeper into beautiful dreamscapes with Windy (Vivi Wei), a mysterious woman that represents K’s deepest queer desires. In order to unveil the process of writing this piece, and to deconstruct the complexity of K’s character, I caught up with director Kiki Ye.
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by an anonymous guest critic
Casey Jay Andrews is a regular fixture at the Fringe. She is a purveyor of small, touching stories and beautifully constructed set designs. For this piece, she tells the story of Freddie, born during a meteor storm, who returns to her family home in the woods now inhabited only by her grandad and his Scottie dog. The meteor storm has returned 33 years on, and she and her grandad go out to watch the shooting stars. Meanwhile, her grandad has a secret he has not shared with her.
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by Laura Kressly
Safaris evoke the dynamic of the self and the other, the watcher and the watched. As an activity, it has a colonial legacy where the ‘civilised’ travel to faraway lands to observe ‘exotic’ people and wildlife in their native habitat. More widely, considering safari’s aspect of watching, it links to the gendered phenomenon of the male gaze. In this short performance piece-cum-installation, these differing, contemporary conceptualisations of the safari converge, prompting the audience to consider how women’s bodies – especially those from the Global Majority – are exoticised, othered and preyed on in a white supremacist, heteropatriarchal society.
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