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Reviews
Review: The Brightening Air
Redemption has long been a McPherson theme. Here, you have to dig as deep as that well, and bring in a lot of muck. Drinking it off isn’t always best-timed. Or by the right people. McPherson is haunted and haunter.
Review: Eugenia and Quentin Russell Recital St Nicholas Church, Brighton
Niche but nicely judged and worth 53 minutes of a lunchtime away from the burly world
Review: Murder on the Orient Express
Even if you don’t like Christie it’s worth seeing not just for an exceptional – and exceptionally-acted – production, but for moral questions that now, as in 1934, need answers in the face of dictators.
Review: Heisenberg
If flawed it’s a fascinating, intimate piece given new life and with luck a new performing tradition. The most compelling two-hander now playing.
Review: Wilko: Love and Death and Rock and Roll
Wilko Johnson of Dr Feelgood - a roaring show with sensitive undertones - enthralling!
Review: The Inseparables
A transfixingly beautiful production, with often superb acting, especially from Lara Manela
Review: Tending
Essential theatre, essential witness and mandatory for anyone who wants to know how human we have to be, from beginning to end.
Review: Rocky Horror Show
An excellent revival. The strength of this cast led with a special wit by Clune makes it absolutely worth seeing however many times you have. Otherwise, just see it!
Review: The Beauty Queen of Leenane
This is stark theatre. Some will hate Martin McDonagh, and some already love him. I’d say you must see this, where it all started.
Review: All the Happy Things
It’s impossible to believe Sienna doesn’t believe Emily’s not part of this at some level, and by the end, you’ll think so too.
Review: Louis Viktor Bak Piano Recital St Nicholas, Brighton
As the final pages romp home we feel secure in the hands of a young master pianist with enormous surging power in his precision, and limitless depth of tome and interpretive fathom.
Review: The Shark is Broken
Essential theatre for anyone who enjoys new plays with more wit than several comedies. A must-see.
Review: Lula Mebrahtu I Am – OommoO
Everything you’ve heard is true. Lula Mebrahtu is memserising, and I Am – OommoO like its creator has vast potential.
Review: The Importance of Being Oscar
Alastair Whatley takes the joy of the sorrow, and makes it his own. Unmissable if you can squeeze in.
Review: Gobbling Market
A visceral exploration of Victorian Britain set against the exploitation, through the Opium Wars, of China, served with a less than delicious meal.
Review: Jersey the Devil
Provocative music presented live and through video which challenges our voyeurism.
Review: Anna Brikciusova Solo Cello Recital St Nicholas Church, Brighton
One of the most musicianly traversals of cello writing I've heard in a while.
Review: Calamity Jane
See this for the onstage musicians and above all Carrie Hope Fletcher giving Calamity soul as well as heart. Highly recommended.
Review: The Secret Garden/Bleak Expectations
Deliciously wholesome satire, this is a deliriously-paced, superbly-acted production.
Review: The Kelton Hill Fair
A mix of a brutal Brigadoon and the whimsy of the Wonderful World of Dissocia, this is a keen addition to the development of Scottish narrative.
Review: Dr Strangelove
Steve Coogan reigns supreme, and a cast like John Hopkins then Giles Terera are a gift to both Coogan and the show.
Review: Pam Cragg and Maggie Grimsdell Piano Recital St Nicholas Church, Brighton
What a difference this recital makes. It would be very good indeed to see this duo here again.
Review: Double Act
Death & Co. The Laurel and Hardy of Suicide, the Little and Large of it Do see this timely, painfully funny, and absorbing new play.
Review: Dear England
With its nimbus of inevitability as national storytelling, it’s still groundbreaking.
Review: Playhouse Creatures
When Doll Common claims “Life’s like a storm. Don’t get in its way” one thinks of the stoicism of those in the eye of it, and their audience. A consummate revival.
Review: Men’s Business
A quietly phenomenal, ground-breaking play, blistering in sumps of silence. See it.
Review: Chef
Brim full of ingredients, this is a one-woman show that tends to leave a confused memory upon the metaphorical palette.
Review: The Testament of Gideon Mack
A rollicking good ride, which holds onto the big questions while offering plenty of laughs along the way
Review: Flutter-Bye
Since this play and Allison Ferns have a lot of legs, it’ll be worth coming back to see it run.
Review: Cry-Baby
Easily the most joyous musical we’ll see this side midsummer, Cry-Baby in this production blazes fit to set another fire in Dalston
Review: Jane Upton (the) Woman
A ground-breaking play, fully deserving of its London run. Catch it there.
Review: Perfect Arrangement
There’s never been a more urgent time for this gem of a work: a small hybrid classic that’s never been produced in the UK before. See it now.
Review: Sussex Musicians SMC Chapel Royal March 8th 2025
Teeming variety and accomplishment. A superb evening.
Review: Macbeth
ETT’s gallimaufry stimulates, frustrates, occasionally fascinates. A more selective through-line would have revealed a mineral gleam, a new earth of tyranny.
Review: Alterations
We must be grateful for this compelling revival, and wait for more from the National’s Black archive.
Review: Peter James Picture You Dead
Twists are delicious. If you enjoy Peter James, or thrillers with a light touch, don’t hesitate. Solidly recommended.
Review: One Day When We Were Young
This grips anyone who can’t let first love go, anyone who stares homeward even now, wild with all regret. Unmissable.
Review: Teatro dei Gordi: Pandora
It begs questions: what couldn’t we do, if placed outside our own comfort station in life? Essential theatre. essential questions. A gem.
Review: Son of a Bitch
Anna Morris heightens tragedy and misogyny with gags, humour and farcical horror. Do catch this fleeting gem, running for just two more weeks before it touches down
Review: Khawla Ibraheem A Knock on the Roof
What and who can you choose is something more people are forced to decide as the century rolls. But Mariam’s plight is specific, ongoing, now far worse and essential viewing.
Review: Ronojit Bhuyan Piano Recital St Nicholas Church, Brighton
A superbly probing recital. Bhuyan has immense promise. Very highly recommended.
Review: Confessions of a Shinagawa Monkey
An astonishing theatrical vision blended with a fascinating story that combines into an exceptional evening of theatre.
Review: Chekhov Three Sisters
There’s a rapt self-communing in this production of Three Sisters. A must-see, it glows long after you’ve left it.
Review: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Brighton Theatre Group is a chocolate factory all on its own. Nothing in Wonka is as magical as the vision, reach and grasp of this company. It’s perhaps their finest production yet.
Review: Vaughan Williams, J.M. Synge Riders to the Sea
Betteridge’s prologue is certainly worth seeing even if you know the work, and won’t need persuading. And after the opera, the rest is surf, and silence.
Review: Outlying Islands
A first rate-revival of a small classic. Do seek out this rare, dream-like play.
Review: The Last Laugh
This is a must-see. Never outstaying its welcome, you can leave this show after 85 minutes, but stay for that Q&A. I envy everyone the night I won’t be there for it.
Review: Sussex Musicians Club SMC Chapel Royal
A very brief night, lasting under 40 minutes, but an invigorating snapshot of tomorrow’s musicians
Review: Goner
A radical vision of horror which challenges from the beginning right through to the end.
Review: Birdsong
If you think on peace in these distracted times, love theatre, can absorb it at its most epic, then this will thrill and overwhelm you. A must-see.
Review: World’s Evolution
A vibrant piece of dance theatre which enthrals asking fundamental questions in a theatrically fascinating manner.
Review: Dan O’Brien The Voyage of the Carcass; Emily Jenkins Bobby & Amy
Dan O’Brien’s piece is for dedicated farceurs. By itself outstanding, it’s hoped by several Emily Jenkins’ Bobby & Amy have a postlude of its own, with this team and these two young actors pitched at this moment in their careers.
Review: The Gift
How far you’d go to pursue either vengeance or to resolve one, asks just such questions of how we choose to box up our lives. The Gift is for all of us.
Review: Mark Tournoff: A Word With the Bird
Mark Tournoff’s an engaging and modest MC. The talent he promotes remains and makes visits worthwhile.
Review: We Will Hear The Angels
A hauntingly beautiful reflection on melancholy and the healing power of sad music
Review: Macbeth
A bold imagining of the Scottish play in a Scottish venue deep in the heart of theatricality.
Review: Macbeth
It’s still a phenomenal feat and even if you know Macbeth, it’s still a must-see for how a quintessence can be dusted off.
Review: Cymbeline
One of the most uneven of late plays, its heights have to be seen; and though there’s pitfalls, this absorbing production surmounts most. A feat.
Review: James Pusey and Marc Clayton Sitar/Tabla Recital St Nicholas Church, Brighton
The brevity of this review, which can’t translate the subtle shifts of Indian classical music in the way classical music is transmitted, certainly doesn’t reflect its quality. Highly recommended.
Review: A Good House
A play deeper than the satire which propels it. And subtly layered enough to brush the epic. A stunning smack between the eyes and a must-see.
Review: Hotel Otori Skin-Okubo
A highly innovative and enticing piece of theatre which examines our relationship not only to our families, but to the way in which the emergence of new ideas and dawns should be embraced.
Review: Good Grief
A contemplation upon the ideal of grief and whether it benefits you in the long run.
