The Lost Boy Peter Pan, Pleasance Theatre

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Think of your favourite stories as a young child. What did they have in common? Adventure. Youth. Fantasy. Foreign lands. Probably at least one good fight. Stories like Alice in Wonderland, Treasure Island and Peter Pan are still popular, and for good reason. They’re compelling, well told stories.

But as a proud killjoy feminist, returning to these childhood favourites as an adult has proved troublesome. Action to the Word’s fairly solid reinvention of Peter Pan for seven actor-musicians is a fun, inventive adventure story that stays close to the original.

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Parliament Square, Bush Theatre

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by guest critic Nastazja Somers

James Fritz’s Parliament Square, the winner of 2015 Bruntwood Prize Judges Award, is an
ambitious piece. It explores the human desire for change whilst posing important questions about the significance of protests and martyrdom. Dramaturgically, Fritz’s proves himself to be a vital voice yet this production does not hit its full potential.

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Curtain Call, White Bear Theatre

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The backstage comedy has been around for what feels like as long as theatre itself, and it’s difficult to improve upon or innovate it. Simon Bradbury’s attempted dark comedy Curtain Call takes a different direction, instead using the genre to look at ageing, failure and unrequited love. The overwritten script needs significant cutting and dramaturgical streamlining, but it has a dynamic premise that looks at an often-ignored demographic.

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Snow White and Rose Red, Battersea Arts Centre

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Battersea Arts Centre’s family Christmas show for people aged 5 and up is far from the Disney version of Snow White. The children’s show by RashDash, creators of naked, feminist, Edinburgh hit Two Man Show, is also far from conventional kids’ theatre. Combining their woman-led, political ethos with the use of live music, the company reclaims femininity and appropriates the traditionally patriarchal adventure of fairytales in this spirited show for all ages.

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Goats, Royal Court

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by guest critic Gregory Forrest

You have goat to be kidding me: the Royal Court’s latest experiment is a tonally-confused take on the Syrian conflict, fake news, and livestock management.

The bleating heart of Liwaa Yazji’s narrative is fascinating. For every son martyred in the ongoing war, local government will provide their grieving family with a goat. Children replaced by milk-laden mammals – it is a compensation scheme of twisted proportions. Local party leader Abu al-Tayyib goes as far as to declare ‘Our vision is for every house in the nation to have its own goat.’

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Good Girl, Old Red Lion

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by guest critic Joanna Trainor

“This is for people who burst at the seams.”

How do you cope with anxiety when you’re too young to know what it is? This initially appears to be what Good Girl is going to be about – how as children it is so instilled in us  to please others, that the pressure completely warps our sense of self and creates huge problems within our relationships.

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Wild Bore, Soho Theatre

It’s rare that I’m intimidated by a show. But as three bare bottoms on the edge of a trestle table ridicule the negative reviews the attached bodies have received, I can’t help but feel vulnerable with my pen in hand and notebook on my lap. Though comedians Zoe Coombs Marr, Ursula Martinez and Adrienne Truscott are the owners of the brazen bums, it’s us critics left with our pants down in this cleverly constructed, meta-meta-theatrical work.

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Ordinary Days, Drayton Arms Theatre

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by guest critic Gregory Forrest

A single piano backs this tongue-in- cheek trip into the lives of four ordinary New Yorkers living out ordinary days. In just 75 minutes we traverse heartbreaks, five-year plans, and the elaborate traffic network which swirls around the Metropolitan Museum of Art. A distinctly American musical about Central Park, Broadway, and groceries from Gristedes, Ordinary Days doesn’t shake up the twenty-first century, but this is certainly a solid production.

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Inside Pussy Riot, Saatchi Gallery

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by guest critic Maeve Campbell

The performance begins on entering the Saatchi Gallery, and we are asked to fill out questionnaires on preferences of social action. These are then used to tailor our experiences of the performance. We are led into a clinical waiting room, briefed and provided with balaclavas and protest signs. From there we are taken on a journey through Pussy Riot’s experience of the Russian judicial system and labour camps they were subjected to after they stormed Christ the Saviour Cathedral in Moscow in 2012.

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