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Critics’ Circle Awards 2022: the winners in full

Best new play
Best of Enemies, Young Vic Theatre, London

Best musical
Spring Awakening, Almeida Theatre, London

Best actor
Ben Daniels for The Normal Heart, National Theatre, London

Best actress
Jessie Buckley for Cabaret, Playhouse Theatre, London

Best Shakespearean performance
Cush Jumbo for Hamlet, Young Vic Theatre, London

Best director
Rebecca Frecknall for Cabaret, Playhouse Theatre, London

Best designer 
Tom Scutt for Cabaret, Playhouse Theatre, London

Most promising playwright
Zadie Smith for The Wife of Willesden, Kiln Theatre, London
Igor Memic for Old Bridge, Bush Theatre, London

Most promising newcomer
Stuart Thompson for Spring Awakening, Almeida Theatre, London
Samuel Creasey for The Book of Dust: La Belle Sauvage, Bridge Theatre, London

Commendations for exceptional theatremaking during lockdown
National Theatre
Jermyn Street Theatre
Original Theatre Company
Old Vic Theatre
Nica Burns 

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2021 BroadwayWorld UK Awards Shortlist

Best Leading Performer in a New Production of a Musical
Arinzé Kene, Get Up, Stand Up! The Bob Marley Musical, Lyric Theatre
Beverley Knight, The Drifters Girl, Garrick Theatre
Carrie Hope Fletcher, Cinderella, Gillian Lynne Theatre
Dianne Pilkington, Bedknobs and Broomsticks, UK Tour
Eddie Redmayne, Cabaret, Playhouse Theatre
Ivano Turco, Cinderella, Gillian Lynne Theatre
Jessie Buckley, Cabaret, Playhouse Theatre
Julian Ovenden, South Pacific, Chichester Festival Theatre
Olly Dobson, Back to the Future: The Musical, Adelphi Theatre
Stephanie McKeon, Frozen, Theatre Royal Drury Lane
Sutton Foster, Anything Goes, Barbican
Tom Francis, Rent, Hope Mill Theatre, Manchester Continue reading “2021 BroadwayWorld UK Awards Shortlist”

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News: Exeunt – The Stage Door Project book announced

In 2020, for the first time in centuries, heavy red curtains swept closed on stages across the West End; all theatres were closed. Two actors – Lloyd McDonagh and Salvatore Scarpa- keenly feeling the loss of their theatre homes, turned to a form of art that could still thrive over the following months, and set about photographing the stage doors of the deserted city.

An extraordinary collaborative project almost two years in the making, Exeunt – The Stage Door Project collects together these moving images, alongside anecdotes from some of the world’s leading luminaries who have trodden the boards of the pictured theatres. Continue reading “News: Exeunt – The Stage Door Project book announced”

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Review: Best of Enemies, Young Vic

David Harewood and Charles Edwards lead James Graham’s new play Best of Enemies with real excitement in this Young Vic / Headlong co-production

“A man should never turn down two things. Sex, and appearing on television”

James Graham seems to have an unerringly great hit rate (recent gigs include Quiz and an episode of The Crown) and his return to the theatre is no exception with this exciting new play at the Young Vic, Best of Enemies. On the face of it, you woudn’t be sure some 1968 US TV debates would have much to say to us but Graham’s instinct is naturally assured and thus their impact of so much of the shape of public discourse, even today, is explored.

The debates were between the conservative William F Buckley Jr and the liberal Gore Vidal, put together by the ABC network in order to galvanise TV audiences during the 1968 US presidential elections. And Graham combines verbatim reconstructions of the debates with a fictionalised account of the world around them, as they unexpectedly birth a news format and polarised commentariat that endures, like the worst of barnacles, to this very day. Continue reading “Review: Best of Enemies, Young Vic”

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Plays update November 2021

Casting updates for the Young Vic’s Best of Enemies, Hampstead Theatre’s Peggy For You, audio drama Ghost Walk and the Royal Court’s A Fight Against…

The Young Vic has revealed the complete cast and creative team for James Graham’s bold new play Best of Enemies, directed by Jeremy Herrin, in a co-production with Headlong.

1968 – a year of protest that divided America. As two men fight to become the next President, all eyes are on the battle between two others: the cunningly conservative William F Buckley Jr., and the iconoclastic liberal Gore Vidal. Beliefs are challenged and slurs slung as these political idols feud nightly in a new television format, debating the moral landscape of a shattered nation. Little do they know they’re about to open up a new frontier in American politics, and transform television news forever…

Charles Edwards plays Gore Vidal and David Harewood plays William F. Buckley Jr. The complete cast also includes Margo Cargill, Emilio Doorgasingh, Clare Foster, Tom Godwin, John Hodgkinson, Justina Kehinde, Syrus Lowe, Kevin McMonagle and Sam Otto. Continue reading “Plays update November 2021”

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Get a vaccine and get the ‘Rhythm of Life’

Ours is not to reason why but Josie Rourke has made a star-studded video, written by herself and James Graham, of Sweet Charity’s ‘The Rhythm of Life’ in order to encourages COVID-19 vaccination take-up ahead of the NHS’s 73rd birthday.

Nicola Roberts and Sandra Marvin do the lion’s share of the singing of Cy Coleman and Dorothy Fields’ iconic song, with the likes of David Walliams, Asa Butterfield, Derek Jacobi, Don Warrington and Russell Tovey adding in their own tuppence-worth to persuade naysayers to get the jab. Continue reading “Get a vaccine and get the ‘Rhythm of Life’”

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News: Young Vic and Old Vic announce new programmes

Theatre returns at both end of The Cut – programmes announced for both the Old Vic and the Young

  • Queers Curated by Mark Gatiss, 2 Jun, 30 Jun
  • Home? Curated by Noma Dumezweni, 14-20 Jun
  • The Dumb Waiter by Harold Pinter, 7-10 Jul
    Directed by Jeremy Herrin and starring Daniel Mays and David Thewlis
  • Bagdad Cafe by Percy and Eleonore Adlon, adapted by Emma Rice, 19 Jul-21 Aug, streamed 25-28 Aug
    Starring Patrycja Kujawska, Le Gateau Chocolat and Sandra Marvin
  • Camp Siegfried by Bess Wohl, 7 Sep-30 Oct
    Directed by Katy Rudd and starring Patsy Ferran and Luke Thallon
  • A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, adapted by Jack Thorne, 13 Nov-8 Jan
    Directed by Matthew Warchus
  • A Number by Caryl Churchill, 24 Jan-19 Mar 
    Directed by Lyndsey Turner  and starring Lennie James and Paapa Essiedu
  • Into the Woods – Music & lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, book by James Lapine, 16 Apr-9 Jul
    Co-directed Terry Gilliam and Leah Hausman

  • Changing Destiny by Ben Okri, 9 Jul-21 Aug
    Directed by Kwame Kwei-Armah
  • Klippies by Jessica Siân, 4–13 Aug
    Directed by Diyan Zora
  • AI developed by Chinonyerem Odimba and Nina Segal, written alongside GPT-3 OpenAI technology, 23–25 Aug
    Created by Jennifer Tang and Company
  • Hamlet by William Shakespeare, 25 Sep-13 Nov
    Directed by Greg Hersov and starring Cush Jumbo
  • Best of Enemies by James Graham, 2 Dec-22 Jan
    Directed by Jeremy Herrin
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News: Nottingham Playhouse reveals a Spring Loaded season of 23 events

Nottingham Playhouse has announced a season of live and digital productions that celebrate local stories and support East Midlands’ talent. The shows and events range from dance, music, drama, and Bollywood to horror, comedy and romance. Most the productions will be available to rent for On Demand viewing over five days, with others livestreamed. Prices start from just a small suggested donation to its Curtain Up appeal, to £20 per household. Bookings for live events will go on general sale on Tuesday 23 March. On Demand productions will steadily become available for rental from 16 March 2021 through to June 2021. Continue reading “News: Nottingham Playhouse reveals a Spring Loaded season of 23 events”

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News: NT Public Acts reveal We Begin Again

Written by the Olivier award winner James Graham and produced by the Guardian in partnership with the National Theatre, this short musical film is a unifying song for the country to take stock of the extraordinary year gone by and reset for the year ahead.

 

A multi-generational cast reflects on their lives and the impact 2020 has had on them, while a supporting company of 100 community members from the National Theatre’s Public Acts programme in Doncaster and London sings a hopeful chorus encouraging everyone to ‘begin again’. Filmed on location and remotely, this online musical is a clear product of these unique times