Review: The Solid Life of Sugar Water
What theatre can do, how it can change us, how completely different it is from any other experience, has few examples that come close to this.
Genre: Drama
Review: Noises Off
An outstanding must-see, even for those who might have seen Noises Off more than once before.
Review: The Crucible
A Crucible of searing relevance; by grounding it in its time, it scorches with clarity.
Review: Short Plays 2022 New Venture Theatre, Brighton
Absorbing and a small feast of theme, acting and writing style.
Review: Lost in the Willows
As a definitive staged version of Kenneth Grahame’s life, it will certainly hold the stage in its subsequent tour.
Review: Dracula
Robert Hamilton’s novel stage version of Dracula should be published and used widely
Review: The Revlon Girl
The Revlon Girl is a masterpiece of displacement as ritual. Tess Gill’s directed many fine shows for BLT, but she’s never bettered this.
Review: Love All
Another first-rank revival from JST, specialists in rediscoveries: a fitting end to Tom Littler’s tenure.
Review: Yellowman
Phenomenal. It’s Aaron Anthony’s and Nadine Higgin’s phenomenal performances that own the Orange Tree’s stripped-back space, and fill it and Yellowman with complexity, heart and utter conviction
Review: Silence
More of a scattering of earth, ashes and love than simply groundbreaking. But caveats aside, groundbreaking it is.
Review: The Doctor
A triumph for all concerned. Juliet Stevenson even gains in stature. Robert Icke’s revival could hardly go better than this.
Review: I, Joan
The title role goes to Isobel Thom, making their professional debut: the greatest I’ve ever seen.
Review: A Sudden Violent Burst of Rain
A powerful story with mythical qualities about life in the hostile environment
Review: Up Her Sleeve
An insightful journey of a young girl from childhood to adult through a number of difficult periods
Review: I Don’t Like Mondays
A fascinating insight into one of the most controversial political topics in the US which confounds us in the UK
Review: Ghislaine/Gabler
A spell binding multi layered exploration of privilege, entitlement, and the desire to control…
Review: Tinted
A drama about blurred lines of consent as a young visually impaired woman negotiates sex and relationships.
Review: One of Two
Wry, poetic and just plain angry - a comedy drama from a young Scot about him, his twin and why life has treated them differently.
Review: Winston and David
A beautifully told story of the truest of friendships, cultivated in unlikely circumstances
Review: The Last Return
A highly entertaining ensemble performance that is a masterclass in characterisation and comedic timing
Review: Triple Bypass: Three Ten Minute Plays About Living for Death and Dying for Life
Three great wee plays performed with a degree of skill
Review: Truth’s a Dog that must to Kennel
'Stand up meets metaverse' - Bravo, Tim Crouch, the Fool we need to interpret our sad, new world.
Review: The Kettling
Highly effective piece of youth theatre drama ostensibly covering climate change but including a whole lot more
Review: Beneath
A highly interesting absurdist environmental performance with an intense message given air from under the ocean
Review: 9 Circles
A monster play of words and ideas that leaves you speechless. Astute, political and personal.
Review: Admiral
A compelling and important subject brought to life by the charismatic Christopher Tajah
Review: Far Gone
Emotional honesty, physical dexterity and an engrossing story fuel this extraordinary coming of age story
Review: Jesus, Jane, Mother & Me
A Brilliant Fringe Acting Debut in a Scintillating and Ultimately Shocking Play.
Review: All Of Us
As Ken Tynan once said of another debut, I don’t think I could love someone who doesn’t love this play.
Review: The Poison Belt
So what could a Sussex-based sci-fi tale of 1913 by Conan Doyle – a space-borne poison belt of gas that hits the earth – possibly have to do with the week of the greatest temperatures known in the UK?
Review: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
An exciting sense of being at the cusp of a new generation. There’s no knowing where this Dream might end.
Review: Shake the City
A real play bursting out of its hour-plus length; with complex interaction, uncertain journeys, each character developing a crisis of isolation only resolved by sisterhood
Review: Julius Caesar
If you’re a habitual groundling, go before this production vanishes back on tour
Review: King Lear
Rarely has a Cordelia and Fool scaled such equal terms with such a Lear, rendering a kind of infinity.
Review: That Is Not Who I Am
Lucy Kirkwood prophesies what’s in store with savage fury, and no-one’s exempt, least of all her.
Review: The Southbury Child
Perfectly freighted; each character pitched with just enough choice to make us wonder what life, not Stephen Beresford will do with them. Outstanding.
Review: The False Servant
It’s not just gender-swerving but role-swerving that threatens sexual and social order. Surprises light up even the last fade.
Review: Cancelling Socrates
Howard Brenton touching eighty is at the height of his powers. Tom Littler has assembled a pitch-perfect cast, reuniting two from his outstanding All’s Well. This too.
Review: Consent
Raine balances articulate ferocity with its opposite: a broken plea. Scott Roberts’ revival improves on the NT premiere. In his hands Consent’s a small classic.
Review: The Father and the Assassin
There’s no finer dramatisation of India’s internal conflicts. Shubham Saraf’s Gandhi-killer Godse stands out in this thrilling ensemble and storms it too.
Review: Straight Line Crazy
Danny Webb gives the performance of his life. Ralph Fiennes is coiled majesty. Two-and-a-half hours of such material have rarely been so thrilling.
Review: Airswimming
Superb revival of Charlotte Jones’s play about two women incarcerated for fifty years for bring different. With a standing ovation of such force that convention had to be broken with the actors forced back on stage.
Review: Cock
A superb revival of Bartlett’s warmest, most ground-breaking, perhaps most enduring play so far.
Review: A Very Great Mischief
Winner of the Rialto New Writing Scratch 2020. Look out for this play when it returns.
Review: God of Carnage
Acting here is tighter than any version I’ve seen. This revival of a modern classic has to be the best of the Fringe so far.
Review: Accidental Birth of an Anarchist
A thoroughly absorbing play whose polemical agency is none the less tempered by the people it’s refracted through.
Review: Cocky and the Tardigrades
Bonkers brilliance. Cocky couldn’t have been premiered with two more stunning actors, and the author’s flawless stepping-in remains remarkable.
Review: Anne Boleyn
If it’s drama you’re after in Brighton Fringe, this is one of the two or three essential stops. Thrilling, authoritative, with Greene the jewel in a sparkling ensemble.
Review: The Homecoming
Simply put: go see this if you’ve any feeling for postwar drama. It’s theatre on the rack and do we need it!
Review: The Misfortune of the English
Pamela Carter’s schoolboys embody human connectedness, warmth, a final camaraderie before the chill of history. Unmissable.
Review: For Black Boys Who Have Considered Suicide When the Hue Gets Too Heavy
Turns the bleakness of six young men into a celebration of – for now – coming through
Review: The Corn is Green
There’s many reasons to see Williams’ finest play. To realise our potential it’s not enough to have dreams, but for someone to show us what those dreams could be.
Review: Hangmen
Assured, idiomatic performances. And Martin McDonagh’s distinction resonates in a manner peculiar to him alone.
Review: The Rise and Fall of Little Voice
The Rise and Fall of Little Voice sings out of damage into heartbreak and redemption. Those who don’t know the play or its outcome should see this, even those who have.
Review: Tom Fool
Pitch-perfect and compelling. Sometimes knowing your prison walls too much can drive you mad.
Review: The Marriage of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein
Such exquisite works find their time; speak to it again and again and again.
Review: The Merchant of Venice
A reading of Adrian Schiller’s Shylock as probing as other great productions of the past decade; and of Sophie Melville’s nearly-rounded, brittle Portia.
Review: When We Dead Awaken
Ibsen’s elusive masterpiece is so rarely performed seeing it is an imperative. Played with such authority as here, in Norwegian and English, it’s not a luxury but a must-see.
Review: Unsanctioned/Measure 2 Measure
You must see this intriguing, ingenious and superbly acted double bill.
Review: An Hour and a Half Late
Don’t miss this authentic, touching, devastatingly comic anatomy of a marriage as soufflé, supremely served by Rhys-Jones and Dee.
Review: THE STRANGE CASE OF DR JEKYLL & MR HYDE
A highly charged reframing of the age-old mystery and horror of the pursuit of pleasure.
Review: Dark Sublime
Sublime acting, light-filled production. Do see this quirky, off-beat play given its finest outing so far.
Review: The Da Vinci Code
Actually improves on Brown with theatrical humour and bold gestures; with a set that tells the story almost as much as the strong cast.
Review: Two Billion Beats
Two Billion Beats was bursting with promise before. Now it delivers with a visceral yes.
