Reviews

Date: 19th February 2024 Seat: N2 (Stalls) Rating: 2 Stars  Two directors and two actors walk into a room… it sounds like the beginning of a joke, but it’s actually the setup for John Logan’s Double Feature, currently playing at Hampstead Theatre. And whereas a joke would be funny (ideally, at least), Double Feature is a serious look… Read more

Date: 9th February 2024 Seat: Unallocated (Front Row) Rating: 4 Stars  Before After has the potential to be a complex and befuddling musical, but in the gentle hands of writers Stuart Matthew Price (music and lyrics) and Timothy Knapman (book and additional lyrics), director Georgie Rankcom, and performers Grace Mouat and Jacob Fowler, it instead becomes… Read more

Date: 31st January 2024 Seat: M6 (Stalls) Rating: 3 Stars  Adapting older movies into musicals seems to be a trend these days, some with better results than others, and Bronco Billy, with a book by Dennis Hackin and music and lyrics by Chip Rosenbloom and John Torres (with additional lyrics by Michele Brourman), is one of… Read more

Date: 12th January 2024 Seat: A8 (Circle) Rating: 3 Stars  What does Kim’s Convenience have in store for audiences? A lot of laughs, heart, and a story that everyone can understand, no matter what language they happen to speak.  Kim’s Convenience was originally written in 2011 by Ins Choi, and thanks to how well the one-act… Read more

Date: 9th December 2023  Seat: L3 (Stalls) Rating: 5 Stars  You can’t get much more classic than Sleeping Beauty when it comes to the annual panto, and at The Hawth in Crawley this year, it’s this story that takes centre stage – but don’t worry if you think you’ve seen it all before; there are some fantastic… Read more

Date: 5th December 2023  Seat: A6 (Circle) Rating 5 Stars  You think you know H G Wells’ classic The Time Machine? You might well do, actually, but the characters in Original Theatre’s side-splitting production, aptly named The Time Machine – A Comedy, might not know it quite as well, and their attempt to turn the novel into… Read more

Date: 30th November 2023  Seat: G16 Rating: 3 Stars  Sherlock Holmes is a wonderful character, and Dickens’ A Christmas Carol is a fantastic story, so combining these two things should work. And it almost does in A Sherlock Carol. But not quite well enough to be completely satisfying, and the weak points that slow everything down and get… Read more

Date: 1st December 2023  Seat: E7 Rating: 4 Stars  I love many things about Christmas, but there’s one thing that stands out – predictability. It’s the same thing (with perhaps just a few small tweaks) every year, from the same food, the same rush (and panic) to buy gifts, the same twinkling lights, and the… Read more

Date: 22nd November 2023 Seat: L20 Rating: 5 Stars  A Christmas Carol at the Old Vic isn’t just a Yuletide play, and it’s not just a new tradition (there’s been a version of the same play running at the theatre since 2017); it’s an experience. Arriving at the theatre, the front is lit up in green… Read more

Date: 13th November 2023  Seat: R12 Rating: 4 Stars It might be a hard-knock life for the orphans at the New York Municipal Orphanage, but it’s certainly no hardship for the audience to enjoy this magnificent version of the all-time classic, Annie.  So, what is it about this particular production of Annie that works so well? One thing… Read more