Rev Stan's Theatre Blog

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  • Off-West End: London theatre on a budget without compromising the view

    There are cheaper theatre ticket options at the box office (Photo taken at the Young Vic)

    Theatre ticket prices for West End plays and musicals have gone up and up, but there is more to London’s theatre scene – and cheaper options for getting your stagey fix.

    I call them off-West End theatres. They aren’t far from the centre of London but deliver quality productions with ticket prices that are more affordable.

    And as these theatres are smaller than those in the West End, you get a much more intimate viewing experience even in the cheapest seats – no squinting at the actors from up in the gods.

    Sometimes productions that start out at these theatres end up in the West End, so if you’ve already seen it, you can feel smug that you paid less and probably got a better view.

    And if you want to try something new, rather than a revival of a classic, these smaller theatres tend to produce some brand new plays and musicals in their programmes.

    Almeida Theatre

    A powerhouse that is a 10-minute walk from Angel or Highbury & Islington tube stations, the Almeida attracts notable acting names and seems to be a breeding ground for West End transfers.

    Most recently, 1536 and A Streetcar Named Desire, starring Paul Mescal and Patsy Ferran. Andrew Scott’s Hamlet also started at the Almeida before moving to the West End.

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  • Review: The Hungry Ghost, Bush Theatre

    l-r Mei Mac and Isabella Wei in The Hungry Ghost at Bush Theatre. Photo: Corinne Cumming

    You should always listen to your mum; that’s the lesson from the spooky rom-com The Hungry Ghost, which is Mei Leng Yew’s debut play.

    British Chinese ‘Girl’ (Mei Mac) is excited and nervous to be moving in with her Scottish girlfriend, Naomi, except she hasn’t told her parents.

    In a rush to leave, she ignores her mum’s plea to take extra care as it’s the first night of the Hungry Ghost Festival, and in so doing sets herself on a collision course with an obsessive ghost (Isabella Wei).

    This ghost has a plan, now that it is free to wander, which involves living out the desires that went unfulfilled in life.

    As the ghost now straddles two worlds, so does Girl. She is part of her traditional, superstitious Chinese mother’s world and also that of work, relationships and social politics.

    She tries to keep the two compartmentalised; it’s a little bit of cowardice mixed with denial.

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  • Review: Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Soho Place

    Gillian Anderson and Billy Crudup are a terrifying and terrific pairing in Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf at Soho Place.

    The play is set at an after-party early in the morning at Martha (Anderson) and university professor George’s (Crudup) house, with a young married couple, Nick (Josh Dillon) and Honey (Phoebe Horn).

    But for Martha and George, conversation is a duel. Their words become weapons delivered as probes, pushes and outright attacks.

    There is intimacy in the fighting. They know each other so well they know just how far to go, the lines to reach and sometimes cross.

    They live within a fantasy, a series of games or illusions of their own invention that are about survival just as much as cruelty.

    At the start of the play, their interactions hint at flirtation, suggesting it’s necessary to their love. It’s what keeps them going.

    Gillian Anderson is feisty but contained compared to what is to come.

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  • Review: Darkling, Bush Theatre

    Linnea Berthelsen in Darkling, Bush Theatre. Photo: Alex Brenner

    A happy childhood in a play is like having a Chekhov’s gun: you are waiting for it to go off, for something to go wrong and Darkling at the Bush Theatre is no different.

    I confess I knew nothing of Bhopal, where the play is set, and so my thoughts were going in all different directions about what might unfold, but nothing prepared me.

    She (Linnea Berthelsen) lives with her father and sister and is a bubbly, happy child despite the poverty.

    A solo performance, it is a beautiful portrayal bringing to life a childlike energy, innocence, honesty and vivid imagination.

    When construction begins on a large factory, She describes it as creature-like, looming over the community, which in turn is excited, seeing it as a source of optimism and excitement for the potential jobs it will bring.

    She is a dreamer. She is ambitious. She wants to run the factory. She wants more than marriage and to live with her sister somewhere different. She will get her extraordinary life, but it isn’t one she imagined.

    There is a stay with a relative that doesn’t end well, and all the time I’m waiting for whatever the play is building towards to happen, but this isn’t it.

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  • Review: Golden Boy, Almeida Theatre

    Poster from the play Golden Boy at the Almeida Theatre. It shows a man standing looking up slightly. The light is picking him out but he looks lost.

    What a cast, what performances; everyone was at the top of their game in Golden Boy at the Almeida Theatre.

    It was pin-drop theatre from start to finish.

    Josh O’Connor is lean and muscular, a lost young man torn between pursuing music, which fulfils him and a desire for money and status, which he could get through boxing.

    But he can’t do both; throwing himself fully into boxing means he’ll likely damage his hands so he can no longer play the violin.

    Joe’s inner turmoil is matched by an external tussle for his commitment. His gentle, loving father (Stanley Townsend) believes in his talent and that he can lead a satisfying, if not lucrative, life as a musician.

    And boxing manager Tom Moody (Daniel Mays) sees a glittering and financially rewarding career for Joe (and himself) if only he could unlock the block that makes him pull his punches.

    Throw into the mix Joe’s growing feelings for Tom’s girlfriend and soon-to-be wife, Lorna (Hayley Squires), and you have an angry and confused man perpetually searching for that ‘something’.

    Music comes from a string quartet closeted behind a screen. It infiltrates the stage and Joe’s life; he lets it in by pulling back the screen for the musicians to play. It’s a simple but effective device.

    In the second half, the internal and external pressure on Joe mounts.

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  • Review: Tilda Swinton in Man to Man, Royal Court

    Video transcript: Did Tilda Swinton live up to expectations in Man to Man at the Royal Court Theatre?

    I confess that she was on my bucket list of screen actors that I would love to see on stage, and I never thought that she actually would, so of course I was going to buy tickets

    And it’s a very expansive play. It’s a solo performance, playing lots of different roles.

    But it’s also expansive in that it follows a woman’s life from 1930s Germany through to the 1980s. There’s a lot of history, a lot of references in there, which I really enjoyed.

    Tilda Swinton is Ella, a wife whose husband dies, and to survive economically, she dresses up in her husband Max’s clothes and poses as him to take over his job.

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  • Video review: The Children, Lyric Hammersmith

    Video transcript: On Instagram, I wrote that I thought The Children [Lyric Hammersmith] was underwhelming, and by that I mean it was okay.

    It didn’t wow me. It didn’t make me go: ‘That was amazing.’ It was all right.

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  • Review: The Story, National Theatre

    The Story by Tracey Scott Wilson is about finding and telling a story and where the truth of it lies.

    Set in a newspaper office, it’s based loosely on the case of a Washington Post journalist who won and subsequently gave up a prestigious award for an article they had written when its origins were questioned.

    In the play, the story that sparks ‘the story’ is about a middle-class white couple who get lost while driving to a restaurant in a less affluent part of the city.

    The husband gets shot and killed, and the wife identifies the shooter as a black male, but the police struggle to find the perpetrator.

    At the local newspaper, the Vanguard section, headed by Pat (Lorraine Toussaint), is investigating.

    Reporter Neil (Ashley Thomas) is digging into the background of the widow, and ambitious rookie Yvonne (Letitia Wright), tired of being assigned what she deems mundane stories, unearths an explosive lead.

    Unbeknownst to Pat and Neil, Yvonne also happens to be in a relationship with white trust-fund newspaper heir Jeff (Will Scolding), who is the news editor and whom she hopes will promote her.

    To what lengths will Yvonne go to get the story that could catapult her career? And where will Neil, Pat and Jeff draw the line when personal and newspaper reputations are on the line?

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  • Rev. Stan: Some theatre likes and dislikes

    Rev. Stan outside the National Theatre
    Outside the National Theatre

    While I’ve introduced myself in my About Me section, I haven’t said much about my theatre likes and dislikes.

    My tastes are born out of a lot of testing. I’ve been going to the theatre regularly for 16 years.

    At the moment, I have the capacity to see one or two plays a week – I have a day job which pays the bills and limits the time I have to review, so I have to keep it manageable.

    The plays the thing

    I like plays, not musicals. I have tried musicals, but I just don’t get on with them.

    The main problem is that I don’t like songs as a form of storytelling. It’s usually a case of: I got the point in the first verse and chorus; can we move on now?

    I’ll see most plays, but interactive theatre makes me nervous. I don’t want to participate, so if a production is described as interactive, it’ll be a ‘no thanks’ from me.

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  • Review: Best Wishes, Kind Regards, Bread and Roses Theatre

    Best Wishes, Kind Regards, Bread and Roses Theatre

    What is in your heart that you would really like to say to your partner but don’t? That’s the premise of Rhiannon Ella Tomes’ play Best Wishes, Kind Regards at the Bread and Roses Theatre.

    Her (Danielle Horton) and Him (George Wright) are in a relationship that is slowly going south.

    They don’t argue, there is love in the relationship (and good chemistry between the performers).

    But there is an underlying frustration and tension in the fact that they don’t truly understand each other because of a lack of honesty about how they feel.

    We hear that frustration through personified inner voices: Her Wolf (Ellie Gallimore) and His Wolf (Tommy Tancock).

    The Wolf dialogue is at times funny but also emotionally raw. It exposes the painful truth of their relationship: the yearning, unmet desire and unfulfilled dreams.

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