by Gregory Forrest
When you think of women in the 19th Century, you probably think of drawing rooms and tea parlours; you might even think of the early suffrage movement. You probably don’t think about boxing rings.
review
People Like Us, Union Theatre
by Amy Toledano
When the results of the referendum came through in 2016, a big percentage of Londoners were shocked. Many people who had grown up here and made the UK their home suddenly felt unwelcome, and those feelings have only grown in the years since the announcement of Brexit.
Woman of the Year, The Space
by Amy Toledano
Anna Nicholson’s Woman of the Year is a comedy cabaret that hits all the solo show marks. Incredibly high energy, brilliantly timed with some lovely audience banter and a charming concept, this is a show that brings together all the elements that make character sketch comedy great.
Chicago, Phoenix Theatre
by Lara Alier
Enter a club, where the dim lights make it hard to know if it’s you dancing, or you’re just touching someone else’s limbs. Behind the bar there’s a tall man, with broad shoulders and strong arms, his black beard defining a perfect jaw. He doesn’t ask because he knows exactly what you need. That cocktail is Chicago.
Pinter One and Pinter Two, Harold Pinter Theatre
by Gregory Forrest
A whole day of Pinter. “Christ,” my landlord said, “I couldn’t think of anything worse.”
Jamie Lloyd is embarking on an epic project: to stage every single one of the influential
playwright Harold Pinter’s short plays over a six month period, at the theatre which bears his name. Pinter at the Pinter. Pretty neat huh?
A Kettle of Fish, Yard Theatre
By Laura Kressly
Lisa is on a work trip with two colleagues. Things at home are a bit stressful and she normally isn’t included at this level of project management, but she’s fine. Not long into the flight, an attendant asks to have a word with her at the front of the plane. The devastating news she receives sets off a chain reaction of grief, anger and meltdowns. As Lisa tries to hold it together in front of the other passengers, reality slips from her grasp.
Poet in da Corner, Royal Court
by Laura Kressly
At the start of the millennium, Deborah is a teenager living on the edge of East London with her silent father and zealous Mormon mother. She feels suffocated by religion when she starts secondary school. But as she gets stuck into this new world, she meets Vyper and discovers Dizzee Rascal. Once her mind and her talent are unlocked by these two forces, her life is irrevocably changed for better and worse.
Drip Feed, Soho Theatre
by Maeve Campbell
Karen Cogan begins her one-woman show floppy and lifeless looking, slumped over a grubby sofa bed. This is an uncomfortable image to pre-show chat in front of and it sets the mood for the proceeding work. Drip Feed is Brenda’s story, a ‘youngish’ queer woman living in Cork, inhabited by insular, parochial and judgemental residents. Brenda, though, is ‘part of the furniture’ of the city, but seems both in love with and restricted by it.
Fagin’s Twist, The Place
By Laura Kressly
Charles Dickens’ story of the orphan boy who nicely asked for more dinner in an orphanage before training to become a pickpocket is here refocused on the older ringleader of Victorian London’s underworld, Fagin. In the musical and film, little is shared of Fagin’s backstory. But it is the beginning of this contemporary dance piece in two acts.
Adam, Battersea Arts Centre
By Laura Kressly
Adam Kashmiry is a man that was born in Egypt in a woman’s body. From a young age, he knew his soul didn’t align with the gender he was assigned at birth, but it wasn’t until he discovered the internet as a teenager that he found a word for this.
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