Michael Sheen is remarkable in the National Theatre’s Nye
There could not be a better time for this story of Aneurin “Nye” Bevan, the Welsh Labour MP and arch-creator…
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Thomas Ostermeier’s An Enemy of the People: Ibsen for the Amazon age
The director’s world-famous adaptation, now premiering in English in the West End, is a scorching, punk-inflected take on the 1882…
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Sarah Snook’s one-woman The Picture of Dorian Gray is gimmicky and shallow
Technical bravura, camera trickery and a high-wire, high-energy performance are not enough to make this show enjoyable or meaningful.
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Live Aid musical Just For One Day: sanctimony and second-rate songs
Here are pop stars as cherubim and seraphim. Here is Ultravox belted out as if it was the Hallelulah chorus.
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50 years of Manon
In this Royal Opera House revival, Kenneth MacMillan’s masterful ballet still has the power to bring audiences to their feet.
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David Tennant is refreshingly vile in the Donmar’s Macbeth
The actor has a manic, eye-rolling energy and a real bitchiness in this production. But do we need the headphones?
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A nonconforming take on The Nutcracker
The Southbank Centre puts a refreshing new twist on the most established of theatrical traditions.
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Kenneth Branagh’s King Lear is camp, callow and utterly unmoving
Rarely have I been less touched by a production than this one – when Gloucester was blinded, the audience laughed.
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Don Quixote brought to life
Carlos Acosta’s playful and fiery take on the 1869 ballet is a joyful marriage of movement and music.
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Can Danny Boyle pull off a hip-hop dance version of The Matrix?
Free Your Mind is a spectacle – but for a show about man and machine, it lacks the human touch.
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Andrew Scott is superhuman in Vanya
Playing eight roles in this one-man Chekhov adaptation, the actor is utterly convincing.
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Dear England and the English Question
In his new play about Gareth Southgate, James Graham uses football to explore a contested national identity.
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Ruth Wilson’s The Second Woman is a mesmerising feat of endurance
Over 24 hours, as Wilson played the same scene with 100 different actors, the repetition became addictive – and profound.
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A Little Life is absurdly, tediously, pointlessly bleak
This four-hour self-harm horror-show is schadenfreude dressed up as empathy.
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The magical realism of My Neighbour Totoro
The RSC production of the Hayao Miyazaki film – which has deservedly won six Olivier Awards – combines enchanting stagecraft with…
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Medea at Soho Place: a stunning production that rains down on the patriarchy
Sophie Okonedo’s formidable Medea will go down as a legend in theatre history.
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Dom: The Play is nowhere near as clever as it thinks it is
This twee, smug, lowest-common-denominator political satire is not just bad: it’s mindless.
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A new musical proves it – Sylvia Pankhurst is the feminist icon we need
While her mother Emmeline has traditionally been the most famous Pankhurst, the Old Vic’s new show is just the latest…
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After a visit to the theatre I feel more of a Brightonian than I did the day before
I’d never been to the Theatre Royal before, but its a delightful, old-school place.
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Jews. In their Own Words is a sharp illustration of how the oldest hatred is still with us
Jonathan Freedland’s play considers the prejudicial myths fuelling anti-Semitism today, and how the Royal Court became complicit.
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