News: 2021-22 shows at the National Theatre
News: National Theatre adds new productions to streaming platform NT at Home
The National Theatre has announced the latest productions to be made available on its National Theatre at Home streaming platform. Launching today, the Young Vic and Joshua Andrews’ production of Tennessee Williams’ timeless masterpiece A Streetcar Named Desire featuring Gillian Anderson as Blanche DuBois, Ben Foster as Stanley and Vanessa Kirby as Stella, the NT’s recent production of Dylan Thomas’ Under Milk Wood with Michael Sheen and Nadia Fall’s verbatim play Home that explores homelessness in the UK featuring Michaela Coel. New productions are added each month and since launching in December 2020, there are now 31 productions available to stream on the platform.
It is also announced today some of the productions that audiences can expect to see on the platform in the coming months. Those productions are confirmed to include Antony & Cleopatra with Ralph Fiennes and Sophie Okonedo in the title roles; Hedda Gabler with Ruth Wilson in the title role; Caryl Churchill’s Top Girls in the Lyttelton theatre from 2019; Sally Cookson’s 2017 production of Peter Pan; Yaël Farber’s Salomé and James Graham’s political drama This House, alongside current NT productions; Kae Tempest’s Paradise with Lesley Sharp and Winsome Pinnock’s Rockets and Blue Lights. Ian McKellen on Stage will also join the platform this autumn for audiences outside the UK and Ireland. It is currently available in the UK and Ireland for Amazon Prime subscribers. Continue reading “News: National Theatre adds new productions to streaming platform NT at Home”
Review: Paradise, National Theatre
Kae Tempest makes a stirring National Theatre debut with Sophocles adaptation Paradise, starring a superb Lesley Sharp
“If I don’t make it back and they ask what happened, make it a better story than it was“
Tales of the Greeks are seemingly never far from any stage but in adapting Sophocles’ Philoctetes, Kae Tempest has at least tended towards one of the lesser known (at least for me). Paradise pleasingly sees the Olivier Theatre remain in the round and Ian Rickson’s production strikes gold with its all-female cast, catapulting leads Lesley Sharp, Gloria Obianyo and Anastasia Hille towards the divine.
Sharp plays Philoctetes, a renowned warrior abandoned years ago by Odysseus (Hille) after suffering an injury but now finding himself back in demand to help win another war. But years as a hermit have soured the traumatised hero and Odysseus and sidekick Neoptolemus (Obianyo) have their work cut out, trying to bring their former compatriot and his illustrious bow back into the fold. Continue reading “Review: Paradise, National Theatre”
News: National Theatre On Sale, July 2021 – January 2022
The National Theatre will return to performances with full capacity audiences from later this month. Additional seating will now be available for performances of After Life from 27 July alongside the previously-announced productions Rockets and Blue Lights in the Dorfman theatre and Paradise in the Olivier theatre, with extra tickets going on sale to the public from Monday 19 July.
Tickets for The Normal Heart, East is East, Manor and Hex on sale to the public from Friday 30 July. Continue reading “News: National Theatre On Sale, July 2021 – January 2022”
News: The National Theatre announces 2021-22 programming and launches National Theatre Together
The National Theatre announces new programming and launches a major new campaign for its future, National Theatre Together
The National Theatre has announced its programming until the start of next year with productions on all three South Bank stages as well as three major UK tours, two productions on Broadway, a return to cinemas, and a new feature film to be broadcast on television this autumn. In the week the theatre reopened for audiences again, six new productions were announced, and five productions halted by the pandemic were confirmed to return to the South Bank.
It has also announced the public launch of National Theatre Together, a new campaign with people at its heart, highlighting the importance of creativity and collaboration with theatre-makers and communities, for young people and audiences. The campaign cements the NT’s commitment to the people of this country and will raise vital funds for the theatre’s ambitious recovery post-pandemic. Continue reading “News: The National Theatre announces 2021-22 programming and launches National Theatre Together”
Review: Richard II, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse
Adjoa Andoh excels in an all-women-of-colour production of Richard II at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse
“No matter where; of comfort no man speak”
Just a quickie for this as I’ve left it very late in the run. Co-directed by Adjoa Andoh and Lynette Linton, this is billed as the first professional production of Richard II by a company of women of colour and when you look at the talent onstage, you wonder how on earth it has taken this long. (And then acknowledge that the answer is far too obvious.)
In the atmospheric space of the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, it is clear that the creative decisions behind this production are drawing on a wealth of experience far beyond white Anglo-Saxon traditions. Rajha Shakiry’s design and Rianna Azoro’s costumes speak of the cultural backgrounds of the company, so too the influences of Dominique Le Gendre’s music under Midori Jaeger’s musical supervision. Continue reading “Review: Richard II, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse”
Theatre news round-up
I’d thought I didn’t need to see Richard II again for a good while but Michelle Terry’s tenure at the Globe is most certainly testing that resolve. The forthcoming production there is to be staged by the first-ever company of women of colour in a Shakespeare play on a major UK stage. Co-directed by Adjoa Andoh and Lynette Linton, Adjoa will also play the titular role. Continue reading “Theatre news round-up”
Review: The Country Wife, Southwark Playhouse
Visually striking, an anarchic take on The Country Wife at the Southwark Playhouse
“Write as I bid you, or I will write ‘whore’ on your face”
A swift run through The Country Wife as it is finishing its residency at the Southwark Playhouse this weekend and I’m not too sure I got on with it all too well. Luke Fredericks’ vibrant production for Morphic Graffiti certainly has a muscular visual appeal but I’m not convinced it offers a case for a revival of William Wycherley’s play.
Originally a Restoration comedy, it has been updated to the world of the Bright Young Things of the 1920s. And in it, randy upper class people chase other randy upper class people and… well, that’s about it. Whether through the shift in era or something more deliberate, the women of the story find themselves front and centre, particularly pleasing as it is about them asserting their sexuality.
Continue reading “Review: The Country Wife, Southwark Playhouse”
Casting announced for All The President’s Men?
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| Photo: Gage Skidmore |
All The President’s Men? is a singular theatrical experience for the politically engaged on 24 April, 7.30pm at the Vaudeville Theatre.
A staged reading edited and directed by Nicolas Kent and presented by the National Theatre, London and The Public Theater, New York, it features scenes from the U.S. Senate’s Confirmation Hearings
In January, one week before the president’s inauguration a fierce fight erupted in the Senate between Republicans and Democrats over the confirmation of the key figures for President Trump’s cabinet. These four powerful men lead the Trump administration’s policy on Russia, the Middle East, Iran and North Korea, on human rights worldwide, on the Paris Climate control agreement, as well as on the civil rights and the health of millions of Americans. Continue reading “Casting announced for All The President’s Men?”
Review: Snow in Midsummer, Swan Theatre
“Why do you silence me?”
A break from the old routine for the RSC here, with a play from the 13th century. Not only that, Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig’s Snow in Midsummer is an adaptation of Yuan dynasty drama The Injustice Done to Dou E by Guan Hanqing, marking a key milestone in the venerable institution’s avowed change of policy after the The Orphan of Zhao debacle in 2012. Transplanting the narrative into contemporary China, Cowhig and director Justin Audibert smash the ancient and the modern together to startling effect.
Dou Yi (Katie Leung) was a young widow executed for murder in the industrial town of New Harmony, proclaiming her innocence all the while and cursing the community in her final moments. The play starts properly three years later with her curse having come to pass, drought has devastated the area and local factories are on the brink of closure, Dou Yi’s spirit restlessly haunting them all, determinedly awaiting exoneration. A newly arrived businesswoman (Wendy Kweh) scents a takeover but as her young daughter’s dreams take a disturbing turn, she can’t help but get sucked into this world. Continue reading “Review: Snow in Midsummer, Swan Theatre”