by Meredith Jones Russell
Kirsty is a sixteen-year-old girl growing up in ‘00s Brentwood. She likes blue WKDs, Elton John and pie and mash. She’s also desperate to hook up with ‘Sexy Ricky’, but has a secret she doesn’t want to share.
review
Velvet, Vault Festival
by Gregory Forrest
A red velvet chaise-lounge is a telling symbol. Positioned in the middle of the stage, the piece of furniture manages to evokes tacky luxury, softcore porn, and casting couch culture all at once. It is just one example of how smart Tom Ratcliffe’s one man show Velvet is.
The Orchestra, Clapham Omnibus
by Laura Kressly
Decked in their finest formal wear, a chamber orchestra entertains the punters in a post-war Parisian cafe. During their songs, they are a picture of beautiful unity. In between? Not so much. The absurd and darkly comic backstabbing and in-fighting builds to a crescendo that ends in tragedy, but the production is ultimately unsatisfying.
Kicking All the Boxes, Vault Festival
by Christina Bulford
When it comes to boxes, would you rather be ticking them, or kicking them? What if when faced with your future, you kick it in the head?
Inside Voices, VAULT Festival
by Joanna Trainor
“Humans should fuck the men they want, move on, no hurt feelings.”
I recently went to a play written by a white man, with an entirely white, three quarters male cast and the audience was pretty reflective of that. Well, here’s a piece by a female South East Asian writer, starring three Asian women and the room looks like we’re actually sat in London.
Juniper and Jules, Vaults Festival
by Laura Kressly
I can’t stop smiling at the memory of the audience almost entirely composed of lesbian couples. Though not a rare thing to see a fringe theatre audience made up mainly of women, the hand holding and cuddling happening around the room indicates there’s something special about this play.
Welcome to the UK, Bunker Theatre
by Laura Kressly
It seems like the Bunker has been transformed into a small-scale, DIY circus, setting the mood for a playful and uplifting story. Instead, an ensemble of 16 enacts a series of grotesque and infuriating sketches depicting refugees’ and asylum seekers’ experiences navigating the UK’s racist and classist ‘Hostile Environment’.
Séance, VAULT Festival
by Joanna Trainor
Séance is one of two productions that Darkfield have brought to the VAULT Festival this year, and this sensory explosion is not one for the faint-hearted.
Thomas, Vault Festival
by Louis Train
Thomas is, in the words of its creator, “a story that’s as much for those on the spectrum as it is for people who aren’t.” The spectrum in this case is the Autistic Spectrum, and Thomas is an honest, open, and confident look at what life can be like for people who experience the world a bit differently.
Lola, Vault Festival
by Christina Bulford
Using Nabokov’s 1955 Lolita as a springboard, Hannah Nixon’s new play Lola asks questions of our era and the threats it poses to young women. This Lola however, born out of the 21st century and not the mid-twentieth, gets to answer back. And she doesn’t just answer, she roars.
The Play's The Thing UK 