Everything Theatre Reviews, interviews and news for theatre lovers, London and beyond

Declaration provides an entertaining and educational insight into life with ADHD. Well worth watching if you want to gain a better understanding of the condition – a must see for people working in caring professions.

Pros:  The lighting director, Simeon Miller, should stand up and take a bow. The same goes for newcomer Alice Dillon. Cons:  The writing lets everything else down. Gaman translates as “enduring the seemingly unbearable with patience and dignity”. Watching The Art of Gaman at Theatre503 certainly felt like an act of endurance at times, but like a good audience member I endured, politely watching as my confusion grew and my patience was severely tested. The Art of Gaman isn’t a ...

Pros: Beautiful music and singing, hilariously relatable moments. Cons: A space simply not suited to a musical. Little by Little, performed by Three Barks and a Bite theatre company, is a three handed musical about ‘mates, dates and love triangles’. As such it’s hard to see that the story is really doing anything we haven’t seen many times before. The basic plot follows three childhood friends, two girls and one guy, who, stumbling blindly into the confusing world of adolescence, complicate the friendship ...

Pros: An exhilarating performance that barely uses words, but takes your breath away and makes you feel so much.   Cons: You have to interpret and feel the show, rather than be given all the answers. In 2015, Battersea Arts Centre’s Grand Hall was engulfed by flames. With perseverance and hard work by the firefighters and theatre team, the front of the building was opened 26 hours later. With the support of over 6,000 people, they raised funds, re-housed shows and ...

An imperfect production of a promising text.

Pros: This personal drama stands out for its political message. Cons: Zimmerman’s notes on production indicate that the woman is determined not to be a victim, but during the play we see her entirely losing her clarity of mind with a nearly-irreversible fallout. Working as a teacher in a United States school, a woman (Polly Frame) develops a compulsive fear of falling victim to a shooting. She knows it’s only a matter of time before this happens in her establishment ...

Pros: Painfully autobiographical. Cons: This show is not for those seeking entertainment. Have you ever wondered what happens inside the head of a person diagnosed with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder? How many times have you made jokes about ‘having OCD’ after lining up the pens on your desk or organising your wardrobe in chromatic order? I did this many times, and attending Sam Ross’s devised performance Can’t Stop Can’t Stop gave me a rare insight of how debilitating the actual condition ...

Pros: The storyline is genius! Cons: Considering the quirky talents of the performers, the show could be enriched. The Edinburgh Festival Fringe programme is brimming with thousands of solo-shows, which are particularly suitable for their limited budget and less demanding venue requirements. Inspired by this phenomenon, USA comedy-duo, Patrick Romano and Benjamin Behrend devised Two-Man, One-Man- a goofy play about two performers and their one-man shows, who find themselves sharing the limelight, or to be more precise, taking turns in it. ...

Pros: Playful and inventive acrobatics from award winning circus company Cons: Transitions between set pieces were sometimes meandering, and spoken text got lost in the large tent space. Award-winning circus company Barely Methodical Troupe’s latest show has a cool, other-worldly feel about it. Four performers, dressed in blue, manipulate what looks like a long tension-band (also blue), as the soundtrack of drips and static reinforces the dreamy, unstable atmosphere. The tension-band was fascinating to watch – catching acrobats like spiders ...

Pros: Soaring harmonies, immersive set design, and some truly terrific choreography throughout Cons: Several questionable directorial decisions plague the production Based on the novel by Jules Verne, Phil Willmott’s adaptation brings a musical theatre version of the Victorian classic to Union Theatre – sewn together by the talent of a young and aspiring cast. This reworking, which sees the addition of a variety of song and dance numbers to keep things interesting, stays true to the original in other respects, ...