845 stories by "Friends"
This is an adapted version of a piece I wrote for The Times on 19 January. Following Joanna Carrick's funeral on Friday, it seems right to put it up here, because theatre pioneers and projec…
SLY USEFUL OBSERVATION…MARRIAGE OF EQUALS Noel Coward was a lad of 18 when he finished this very adult portrait of a marriage in trouble, invalided out of the army, nervous and tuber…
A VERY GREAT TALENT TO AMUSE     Rival psychopathies emerge from the first moments of "Cornley Drama Society" as Chris (Daniel Fraser) and Robert (Henry Lewis) face off a…
OH DEAR…   Event theatre! New from NY!   It got Tony and Pulitzer nominations, and smart Broadway people called it "heartwarming: and "best crafted and exacting…
UNDER AN ALIEN TREE   The suffering and the pity of Gaza affects us all: bitter division on the streets, hysterical demonstrations feeding a violently rising antisemitism. And…
   "The woods are lovely, dark and deep…" " They certainly are when designed by Tom Scutt . And Jordan Fein's glorious new production will, I think, conver…
DRINK DEEP OF GLORIUMPTIOUS FROBSCOTTLE      The RSC holiday season show offers a rising generation some proper theatrical wonder, away from banal screen CGI and a…
CINDERELLA AND THE MATZO BALL.     JW3. , Finchley Rd L'CHAIM ! TO LIFE, AND PANTOMIME JOKES   It's not often that you get to hiss and boo Prince Ch…
JUST FOR KIDS? CONTRARIWISE! WE ARE ALL ALICE    In a fleeting moment of meta-theatre when the monstrous crow (well, umbrella) had the house shouting "Behind you!", Tweedl…
 HELLO AGAIN SAILORS   This is one of ENO's beloved triumphs, the one which got some of us through the latter Covid years in frivolous merriment. For back in gloryIn 2021…
A GHOSTLESS DICKENS TREAT FOR CHRISTMAS This is wonderful: a three-hander adaptation by Abigail Pickard Price, with the Guildford Shakespeare Company. They're well up to the new-…
LADIES WHO LURCH The Lord Chamberlain took a bit of handling to let this play's louche presumptions of extramarital liaisons be flaunted onstage: and one public morality campaigner shout…
 A BEAR WHO DESERVES HIS STATION   This could have been awful , a desecration of the children's favourite which became a national icon of reassurance when he sat down to tea …
GRIEF, GUILT, CONSCIENCE    A great bright disc of moon overhangs the old tree in the storm, as it falls in the tumult of sound that could be war.  It's 1948: Arthur Mille…
ABSURD, TRANSCENDENT, JOYFUL     Forget Ancient Greece and the films inspired by the suitors of royal Parthenope, this is Handel in comic-opera mood (one can't always be writi…
  A VERY CIVIL CRIME Meet Robert, a retired barrister, working in a charity shop as we meet him, cautiously sniffing trousers and appreciating candelabras. Nothing unusual there i…
AN INNOCENCE OF WITCHES     A brand-new musical always stirs hope, especially when we're promised voices like Gabrielle Brooks (magnetically magnificent as Rita in Ge…
NOT AT ALL A DRAG… Candy-coloured prettiness frames a 1890s world, of bored girls in flounces longing for escape from guardians, lovesick young men not averse to heiresses, a…
INNOCENCE, WICKEDNESS , RAGE   Ti Green's set is ,at first, a gilded wonder of dignified curves and arches, palatially spectacular when filled with the red robes of the Duke and sena…
EVERYONE'S CALIFORNIAN NOW..    When the Old Vic had Jonathan Spector's play in 2022 it was the first time after lockdowns that I had the joy of beng in a space with a thousand ot…
EDWARDIANA FOR A FEMINIST AGE   It looks wonderful. Designer Colin Richmond has been set loose, with Oliver Fenwick's lighting, to create both the the raftered, big-windowed Edwar…
A FAMILY SAGA , A MEMORABLE AUNT    Bit early for an onstage Christmas-tree, but this comedy-drama by Richard Greenberg ran months on Broadway twelve years ago, and it suits …
OLD FAITH IN A MODERN CITY    Anna Ziegler's play was an off-Broadway sellout, glimmering with insights into Jewish-American family conflicts, traditions and rebellions.Å
CHAOS IN FRAYING CHINTZ Catching up after a break away I nipped in to check whether after 60 years Joe Orton can still get people gasping with shock.  Peter McIntosh's set alone is a…
A BRILLIANT ECHO    Shouldn't be surprised that this is a cracking play:  Katherine Moar's 90-minute debut FARM HALL , about 1940s nuclear scientists, sparked cheers and a…
