Bloody Elle is a joyous experience – engaging, funny and warm-hearted. At its core, it is a fairly slight story of first love, but writer and performer Lauryn Redding gives it substance with a lesbian theme and a message about the importance of authenticity in a challenging world. But I’d hazard that it wasn’t the … More Bloody Elle – Royal Exchange Theatre
Seventeen year old Jack is a boy with Potential. His devoted, liberal parents, Di and David, have brought him up ‘properly’, sent him to a ‘good school’ and are confident of the bright future that lies ahead for him. They then discover that a sex video of Jack with his girlfriend, Cara, has appeared online … More Four Minutes Twelve Seconds – Oldham Coliseum
Shangri-La is the wonderfully ironic name of a faded seaside boarding house, where the lights don’t work properly, breakfast is a ham and beetroot sandwich, and the landlady boosts revenue by telling fortunes and hosting swingers’ parties at the weekends. The three permanent residents are as jaded as the wallpaper but a new guest arrives … More Welcome to Shangri-La – Hope Mill Theatre
Everybody loves a good musical at Christmas, and the Royal Exchange seasonal production is always eagerly anticipated. In 2017, we saw the wonderful Guys and Dolls given a jazzy Harlem twist, and in 2018 we were treated to The Producers – that delicious celebration of irony and bad taste. This year the Exchange has gone … More Gypsy – Royal Exchange
Lady of Jazz showcases Michaela Bennison, who holds the stage for nearly ninety minutes as fictional American jazz singer, Honey Grey. Her story starts in 1920, just as membership of the Klu Klux Klan rises to 100,000, and is a deeply personal story of a deeply troubled time. The narrative is punctuated by songs, both … More Lady of Jazz – Hope Mill Theatre
An alcoholic mother (Christine) narrates her own death and, in her final moments, wants only to know where and how her three grown-up children are. Playwright Simon Stephens grants her this wish, and, in this gentle and understated drama, transports her and the audience briefly into the lives of daughters Jess and Ashe, son Steven, … More Light Falls – Royal Exchange
Depression is an invisible but brutal and debilitating illness. Often accompanied by profound shame, it can generate a level of hopelessness and despair which makes the mundane business of normal life feel simply impossible and/or intolerable. Author Matt Haig knows all this only too well, having himself been plunged into depression at the age … More Reasons to Stay Alive – HOME
“To be a Luddite in 1812 was to resist the kind of progress that wanted to dash you against a cliff face.” (James Yeatman and Lauren Mooney – creators of There Is A Light That Never Goes Out) The term ‘Luddite’ has typically been used as colloquial shorthand for ‘backward-looking’; for stubborn and pointless resistance … More There is a Light That Never Goes Out: Scenes from the Luddite Rebellion – Royal Exchange
The Hired Man is billed as “A serious musical” and is certainly a far cry from the lavish, feel-good offerings of Andrew Lloyd Weber, with their opulent sets, casts and orchestras. In tone and feel it’s more akin to its contemporary, Les Miserables, though the scale and ambition of both the storyline and its theatrical … More The Hired Man – Oldham Coliseum
Written in 1888, August Strindberg’s Miss Julie is a searing portrayal of the psychological and emotional contortions demanded by 19th century social expectations. As a narrative, it is simple enough – an inappropriate sexual liaison between an aristocratic woman and a servant has tragic consequences. But what is utterly compelling is the raw struggle between … More Miss Julie – Hope Mill Theatre
