Category: Southwark Playhouse
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Is it possible to adapt a complex, time-hopping novel with aliens for the stage? This production of Kurt Vonnegut’s 1968 anti-war novel Slaughterhouse-Five started life at Brockley Jack Studio and has now transferred to the Southwark Playhouse, and there is plenty that is inventive and slick in how it is staged. It’s the life story…
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The Grim is an omen, a symbol of death, and one Harry Potter fans at least will be familiar with – so best hope you don’t see one. For undertaker Shaun (Edmund Morris) and his assistant Robert (Louis Davison), death is their work: sprucing up corpses so they look their best for their funeral. It’s…
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How much should we care about prisoners, particularly those serving sentences for serious crimes? And how much care should they receive? This is the overarching theme of Lifers at the Southwark Playhouse, a prison-set drama that follows the story of Lenny (Peter Wight), a prisoner in his 70s serving a life sentence. He uses a…
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The Animator, Southwark Playhouse. Photo: Luisa De la Concha Montes Akimbo Theatre's The Animator tells the fascinating story of German Lotte Reiniger (Lexie Baker), who, 10 years before Disney, created a feature-length animated film. Lotte's film, The Adventures of Prince Achmed, is a fairy tale made using silhouettes and an innovative new style of camera.…
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Max Runham (plays Simon Parkes) and Tendai Sitima (plays Johnny Lawes) in Brixton Calling, Southwark Playhouse. Photo: Danny Kaan I spent many an hour toe-tapping and sometimes jumping up and down at guitar-heavy gigs at the Brixton Academy in my younger years, but I didn't know anything about how the venue came to be an…
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Actor and writer Jack Holden had a huge hit with Cruise in 2022, and I think he might have done it again with Kenrex, which has transferred to the Southwark Playhouse from Sheffield. Based on a true story in the small isolated town of Skidmore, Missouri, Ken Rex McElroy is a piece of work. He's…
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Valerie Antwi, Emma McDonald and Christopher York in Foreverland, Southwark Playhouse Photo: Charlie Lyne If medical science made it possible to live forever, frozen at the age you have the procedure, would you do it? The ability to stay young and live way beyond what is normal is the premise of Emma Hemingford's play Foreverland…
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Victor Hugo and James Nicholson in Afterglow, Southwark Playhouse, Jan 2024. Photo: The Other Richard Afterglow at the Southwark Playhouse is a modern love story and a modern family story. Married couple Alex (Victor Hugo) and Josh (Peter McPherson) have an open relationship within certain boundaries. The play opens with them having a steamy threesome…
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Simon Scardifield, Mark Down, Isobel Griffiths and Dale Wylde perform The Sex Lives of Puppets, Southwark Playhouse January 2024. Photo. Nigel Bewly Puppets manipulated by humans talking about sex could be viewed as some sort of weird voyeurism, fetish or even an odd fantasy reenactment. But in Blind Summit's The Sex Lives of Puppets at…
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What inspired theatre co-writers/directors Mark Down and Ben Keaton to create The Sex Lives of Puppets? I sat down with Mark and Ben ahead of the opening night at the Southwark Playhouse to find out more about Blind Summit's latest production and their theatre work. Here's what they had to say (edited), and you can…