If you’ll forgive the ad pitch, flowers suit nearly every occasion. A loving declaration, celebratory congratulations, or a sorrowful consolation. Living things that bloom and die, flowers represent beauty and sorrow, life and death. In Funeral Flowers they represent something else – the chance at something new. Funeral Flowers is a powerfully personal, utterly involving tale of a girl’s struggle to achieve her dream. Written and performed by Emma Dennis-Edwards, Funeral Flowers tells the story of Angelique, a 17-year-old whose ...

Emily Hutt’s tell-all cabaret on the 1930’s limelight icon Mae West follows almost pedantically the chronology of her life events, to the detriment of a sought-after dramatic climax. West – embodied by the talented Bella Bevan – takes centre stage with the accompaniment of pianist Kieran Stallard, and alternates tales from her past with some of her most recognisable songs. A promising opening scene involves some of the biting one-liners that made the artist famous, smattered with sexual innuendos and ...

On the cusp of the 20th century, Anna Edson Taylor hit the headlines as the first woman to descend the Niagara Falls and survive. Trained as a physical education teacher and widowed soon after marriage, she found herself heavily indebted and resorted to the daring deed as a way to escape poverty, with a promise for future fame and recognition. Already attempted unsuccessfully by several men and women, her ride was negotiated inside a bespoke pickle barrel, made of oak ...

I really wanted to enjoy So It Goes Theatre’s The Fatal Eggs. I really really did. Having thoroughly enjoyed their reworking of Dante’s Divine Comedy at the same venue previously, I was hopeful that returning again would give witness to another piece of creative theatre. And yes, much like Divine Comedy, they make use of the compact space available, incorporating some lovely visual trickery and some rather subversive direction in an attempt to bring the story to life. But it just doesn’t ...

A rapid return to the Old Red Lion in Islington is always a welcome diversion. A delicious moo pie and pint set me up nicely for Little Potatoes, a tale of matchmaking mums at the Shanghai marraige market, as they aim to get their children hitched. Liuyang (Sarah Curwen) is a teacher and striving to get her daughter Meihua married off. Family Planning Officer Hong (Michelle Wen Lee) has a game-obsessed son who dreams of being an artist. The two ...

Taking place at company Sedos’ own residence at Bridewell Theatre on the edge of the City, the not-so-amateur collective brings their rendering of Terence Rattigan’s inter-war drama, After the Dance, to life. The play was written on the eve of the Second World War, and suffered as a result – the looming declaration of the war caused audiences to fizzle out after its debut, and it took a 90s BBC TV adaptation to reanimate it, and a prominent 2010 revival ...

“Cigarette, dear?”“No thank you, dear.”“I think I might have a cigarette, dear.”“No you won’t, dear.”“Very well, dear.” And so the scene is set: in two inflatable armchairs, presided over by a goldfish on a gold pedestal, sit Mr and Mrs Fox. She – in a luminous, captivating performance by Alice Marshall – is domineering, supercilious, wilfully mispronouncing words and oblivious to the feelings of those around her; he – a foppish, Wooster-like Jack J Fairley – is an ineffectual, waistcoated ...

At a time when Westminster, it seems, can’t look as far as next week with any confidence, asking a group of fifteen young people from Deptford to look fifty years into the future feels a timely political act. Indeed, WOW Everything is Amazing is a headliner of Battersea Arts Centre’s Homegrown: Occupy Festival which focuses on under-represented communities. So far so worthy. It seems, however, the ‘worthy memo’ didn’t quite reach the show’s diverse ensemble (aged 12-21) who devised the performance as ...

Mischief Theatre’s third West End production is three years old tonight. From the team that brought us The Play That Goes Wrong and Peter Pan Goes Wrong comes another huge hit in the form of a farcical American crime caper. When two felons hatch a plan to break out of the British Columbia Penitentiary in an attempt to steal a prized diamond, it seems that everyone wants a piece of the action and to come along for the ride. Like ...

The Pitchfork Disney, Philip Ridley’s debut 1991 play, aims to do two things. Firstly, to disturb the audience (it was credited with introducing “in-yer-face” theatre following its 1991 debut) and secondly, to leave you questioning what it was all about.  Somna Theatre Company, clearly working on a shoestring budget, make a good effort to do both in the small confines of the Upstairs Theatre at Oval House. From the moment we enter our two siblings, Presley and Haley Stray (Pip ...