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Observations: Literary lessons from N F Simpson - an absurdly good playwright

Sat, 26 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Tomorrow, London's Royal Court Theatre will hold a celebration of the life and work of Britain's greatest absurdist playwright, N F Simpson (1919 -2011). And I imagine we will hear much talk of the lunatic imagination that could summon up a suburban man teaching 500 speak-your-weight machines to sing the Hallelujah chorus, or a world where, if your wife says, "There's a man outside wanting you to form a government," you reply: "At this time of night?"

The London 2012 Festival: The greatest show of a great year

Sat, 26 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

You have to hand it to the London 2012 Festival team. When they call it "a once in a lifetime experience", I rather think they mean it. In an "age of austerity", this almighty splurge is not to be sniffed at. More than 25,000 performers and 12,000 events are involved, with every corner of the country, more or less, becoming part of it. Heaps of it is free at the point of use. And if the full programme is... well, a little confusing, perhaps it could scarcely be otherwise, given the sheer scale of the bonanza.

Laura Wade: Queen of theatre's brat pack

Tue, 22 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

You might not expect the playwright of the incendiary and savage Posh, to look like the elfin 34-year old, Laura Wade. With her long blonde hair, bright eyes and gentle laugh, Wade's amiable demeanour doesn't reflect any of the darkness that lurks at the centre of her most famous play. A self-confessed theatre geek, she is constantly watching plays that are not of her own creation. The only thing that tears her away from the theatre is her very English hobby of bird-watching. In all, not what you would expect from a angry young writer at the Royal Court.

Pop and pregnancy as a solo star gets back in the groove

Mon, 21 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Sadie Frost, 46, is curled up on a sofa while rehearsing her new one-woman show, Touched...Like a Virgin.

Agenda: Hand-printed Bauhaus tights; Queen of Hearts; Cinemagram;

Sun, 20 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Fashion: Be haus proud

Observations One to Watch: Carmen Giannattasio, Opera singer

Sat, 19 May 2012 00:00:41 +0100

Cultural Life: Arnold Wesker, Playwright

Sat, 19 May 2012 00:00:12 +0100

A tale of two Zionists: Ze'ev Jabotinsky, David Ben Gurion and the dramatic origins of Israel

Wed, 16 May 2012 09:30:01 +0100

Two charismatic men born in Eastern Europe meet in 1934, first in a London hotel room and then in a Golders Green flat, in an effort to resolve their political differences in the shadow of Nazism’s rise. Within 15 years one of them, who more than once interrupts the electrifying argument by reciting his own translation into Hebrew of Edgar Allen Poe’s darkly mysterious poem The Raven, will have died in exile; and the other will be the founding Prime Minister of Israel.

Swan Lake: A leap into the future

Tue, 15 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

It's the unforgettable concluding image of Billy Elliot: our hero blossoms into adulthood in Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake, taking an elemental leap onto the stage. Now, the choreographer's famed and radical reinterpretation of the ballet is leaping, complete, into cinemas internationally as a 3D film. It is a landmark moment for a production that has enjoyed phenomenal success since it first took wing back in 1995, becoming the longest-running ballet on Broadway and in the West End. The big-screen release arrives just in time for the 25th anniversary of Bourne's dance company, New Adventures.

The curtain rises on London's brave new world

Mon, 14 May 2012 09:00:01 +0100

World Stages London is the first time a group of London theatres have worked together.

Heads up: Crow

Sun, 13 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

What are we talking about? A new theatrical version of Ted Hughes's poetry collection Crow, part of the Greenwich+Docklands International Festival (GDIF) and London 2012.

Must see: Abigail's Party, Wyndham's Theatre, London WC2

Sat, 12 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Since the fabled 1977 television version, Mike Leigh's stage play has pitched camp as a classic of excruciatingly comic social embarrassment. It's a case of Who's Afraid of Beverly Moss?, not just in the "get the guests" format, but in the preoccupation with having and not having children.

Dance show of the week: Wings of Desire, Victoria Square, Birmingham

Sat, 12 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Angels gather on rooftops and Victoria Square comes alive with acrobatics and dance in this free event, inspired by the Wim Wenders film.

Dame Monica Mason: 'The life of a dancer is incredibly tough. Sometimes we have to question what we ask of them'

Mon, 07 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

More than half a century ago, when Dame Monica Mason started dancing at the Royal Ballet, she had no idea that some of her colleagues suffered from eating disorders. She would see her fellow dancers drinking black coffee, smoking cigarettes and eating nothing but the occasional lettuce leaf but never quite made the connection. Today, as the company's vastly respected artistic director, it's the kind of topic she has to be thoroughly aware of. "Eating disorders weren't talked about," she says. "Today, the issue is much more in the open. But that doesn't make it less complicated."

Observations One To Watch: Beatriz Stix-Brunell, Ballerina, 19

Sat, 05 May 2012 00:00:48 +0100

The Royal Ballet's Beatrix Stix-Brunell replaced an injured Marianela Nuñez as Alice in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

Must See: Breakin' Convention, various venues

Sat, 05 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Now in its ninth year, the Sadler's Wells hip-hop festival celebrates the range of hip-hop dance, from international headline acts to local crews, from onstage dazzle to freestyle sessions in the foyers.

Play of the Week: Enquirer, The Hub, Glasgow

Sat, 05 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

"Journalism is a sexy profession full of ugly people," laughs a character in this new dissection of today's newspaper industry from the National Theatre of Scotland.

A flood of plays by Middle-Eastern writers are revealing the dark side of the Arab Spring

Sat, 05 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

A new wave of plays by Arab writers is hitting the British stage. Some are being seen first at Glasgow's Òran Mór and then at Edinburgh's Traverse Theatre as part of this month's One Day in Spring festival.

Talking about her generation: Laura Poliakoff's debut play shows she has a voice all of her own

Thu, 03 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Let's start with the similarities. They share the same surname, obviously. And quite a lot of genetic material. And they're both writers. Apart from that, Stephen Poliakoff and Laura Poliakoff don't appear to have an awful lot in common. As Stephen, 59, puts the finishing touches to his first BBC television series, Dancing on the Edge, a typically sumptuous, polished period affair following the fortunes of a black jazz band in 1930s London, his daughter, Laura, 27, is preparing to bring her first play – a sweary, dystopian black comedy set in a grimy old people's home in 2065 – to the stage.

Cymbeline: From war-ravaged South Sudan to the Globe Theatre

Wed, 02 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

As part of the Cultural Olympiad, London's Globe Theatre this month plays host to 37 Shakespeare plays in 37 languages. Each has its own compelling story to tell. But of all the players from war-torn, drowned and oppressed countries, few can have made such an extraordinary journey as the South Sudan Theatre Company, which presents Cymbeline tonight and tomorrow.

Rupert Friend: 'There is no other way of acting than to become the person'

Tue, 01 May 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Rupert Friend asks to meet me at a farm café in Dalston, east London, near to where he lives. There are chickens on the roof laying eggs, which are used in the sandwiches. We sit in a greenhouse, surrounded by wild flowers, while it pours with torrential rain. There are thunder claps and lightning strikes. "It's so peaceful," says Friend, 30, wearing a Beanie hat. "I grew up in the Oxfordshire countryside so this café is as close as it gets."

Visit the seaside for electric cucumbers, nudity and more!

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Take a trip to the seaside in May, and there's no telling where or when you might find yourself in the midst of a theatrical event.

Heads up: Macbeth

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

What are we talking about? A staging of Shakespeare's Macbeth by National Theatre of Scotland, with a twist... It's set in a psychiatric unit, full of CCTV cameras, where a patient relives the story of Macbeth's reign.

Every body's welcome to this perfect storm

Wed, 25 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

In the opening scene of The Impending Storm, a bold new production which is receiving its world premiere at the International Dance Festival Birmingham next month, an integrated company of able-bodied and disabled dancers are writhing on the floor, thrashing it with pillows. It is a strange, yet strangely mesmerising sight. The seven performers are simultaneously whipping up a storm and strong emotions within me.

Sea Odyssey: Giant hopes for Liverpool

Sat, 21 Apr 2012 12:00:57 +0100

Something is happening in Liverpool. Radio Merseyside has been broadcasting the sound of snoring in the background of its programme all morning, there is a giant deep-sea diver’s helmet, just visible above the surface of the Mersey, some electricity pylons have moved and there are a lot more French people here than usual.

In pictures: Giants come to Liverpool for Sea Odyssey spectacular

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 12:52:29 +0100

Giants walk the streets of Liverpool today, as an estimated 250,000 people line the streets for puppet theatre on a grand scale.

The Diary: Damien Hirst; Cate Blanchett; Granta magazine; Assassination Diaries; Bram Stoker

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Stop making an exhibition of yourself

The unhappiest time of his life: David Hare on dramatising his school days

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

If, 30 years ago, you had said that Sir David Hare, scourge of the establishment and intellectual leftie given to cracking scornful jokes, would one day open a new public school play in the West End on a double-bill with a dusty old classic, The Browning Version, by Terence Rattigan – and, what is more, in a theatre re-named for the resolutely non-knighted Harold Pinter – you might have been told to go away, or whistle, or have your head examined.

Keeffe's Barbarians tip up in Tooting bringing 'astonishing relevance'

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 16:17:21 +0100

A revival of a drama written in 1977 with “astonishing relevance” to contemporary Britain opened in South London this week. Barrie Keeffe’s Barbarians is a trilogy of plays about disaffected youth amid record youth unemployment.

Poetry in motion as South Africans tackle Shakespeare

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

The opening performance that will kick off the Globe Theatre's pre-Olympic Shakespeare festival on Saturday is taking shape just a stone's throw from South Africa's parliament and President Zuma's Cape Town office. South Africa's contribution is a home-made adaptation of Venus and Adonis, Shakespeare's epic poem.

The Iron Lady takes centre stage once again

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

"As a portrait of Thatcherism... it feels about as reliable as an MP's expenses claim." The Independent's Anthony Quinn's verdict on The Iron Lady summed up the general sense of antipathy towards a film that hardly brushed Margaret Thatcher's seismic political legacy. Where film had its chance to define her and failed, it falls to a new generation of young theatre-makers to assess the legacy of a woman whose rule they weren't old enough to influence with their vote.

Larry! Dear Larry! Not the Olivier Awards

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

The chaperone

Ann Widdecombe: 'I don't act... I have a talent to amuse'

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

She can't sing, she can't act, God knows she can't dance, and she struggles with basic O-level French. So what on earth is Ann Widdecombe, the hard-line Tory ex-minister of legend, doing appearing this week in a French language opera? At the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden?

Simon Callow: What the Dickens? Well, William Shakespeare was the greatest after all...

Fri, 13 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Acolytes of Charles Dickens were a little miffed when the Cultural Olympics committee announced that the chosen poster boy for British culture was to be William Shakespeare – a calculated rebuff for Dickens, we felt, on his 200th birthday. But Dickens would have been the first person to acknowledge the supremacy of Shakespeare, who, in the brief but ceaselessly productive 25 years of his writing career, gave as complete and as sublimely expressed an account of what it is to be human as anyone who ever wrote. How or why this should be is the subject of more thought, research, speculation and sheer fantasy than surrounds any other writer. But what has never been in doubt is the power, beauty and depth of the work.

The Diary: Enquirer; Peter Adjaye; RSC's Julius Caesar; Morena Baccarin; Jessica Pare

Fri, 13 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Hack attack

All the world's a stage: Introducing the biggest Shakespeare festival ever

Fri, 13 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

In less than two weeks, Britain's theatres, galleries and museums will undergo a dramatic transformation. They will be turned into dedicated stages to celebrate the works of a certain 16th-century playwright. If all the world's a stage, then William Shakespeare is about to feature as its central player. A million tickets are on sale; hundreds of international artists are making their way to Britain; almost 70 productions are ready to roll.

Manfred Karge: The playwright who grapples with the underclass

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

It must have been in late 1986 that word reached me of an extraordinary new one-woman play by the great East German director and playwright Manfred Karge. I managed to get hold of the script and was blown away. I directed the British premiere of Man to Man with Tilda Swinton at the Traverse Theatre during the Edinburgh Festival of the following year, and it moved to the Royal Court in January 1988. And then, later that year, I worked with Alan Cumming, Ewen Bremmer and a stellar Scottish cast on Karge's second play, The Conquest of the South Pole, which also went on to a sold-out season at the Royal Court. Both plays then became films.

Naked truths: the drama of the strip club

Tue, 10 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

When award-winning poet and playwright Sabrina Mahfouz wrote her debut one-woman show, Dry Ice, based on her time waitressing in a strip club while she was at university, little did she know that David Schwimmer would end up directing it. "When Dry Ice was written I didn't have a director, it was just me talking and sitting on a chair. Since I started writing two-and-a-half years ago David has read all my work and he said he wanted to get involved. He made me feel more comfortable embodying the characters rather than performing them just through speech," recalls 28-year-old, London-based Mahfouz of the actor she first met through her friend, Zoe Buckman.

Alison Steadman: 'A gang of lads saw me and shouted "Pamela!" It really gave me a thrill'

Sun, 08 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

I was proud to be involved in the first lesbian kiss on TV It was in 1974 in a BBC play called Girl, with Myra Frances, and it got a lot of reaction at the time. Then, when Brookside came on years later, people said "Ooh, Anna Friel did this kiss with another woman, and it was the first time on TV." And I'm like, no, actually it was me!

Sam West: 'I'm cheap and available – tell your friends!'

Sun, 08 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

On the most cursory of glances, it seems an unlikely fit. Actor-director Samuel West, owner of some of the nicest vowel sounds on our stage and Oxford-educated scion of famous acting parents, is off to Newcastle to direct Alan Plater's fierce modern classic about mining, Close the Coalhouse Door. Yet after just a few minutes' conversation, West, eloquent and personable, leaves one in no doubt as to his passionately held political and ideological convictions. He's clear what he would say to any who question his suitability for this job. "Their point would be? That I'm not authentic? I didn't believe in talking mice either, but I was still allowed to be in Narnia [as King Caspian in the television adaptation of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader]. You can't tell the story of mines without believing that most of the time progress was made at the expense of the people who were at the bottom and got paid the least. I believe that, so that means I'm allowed to direct the play!"

Nature takes a curtain call in The Silence of Bees

Fri, 06 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

The collapse of bee populations and the devastating effects this might have on the planet's ecology have become mainstream knowledge in recent years, but new research indicates that man-made insecticides may be partly to blame. It's this finding that informs Stef Smith's new play, The Silence of Bees.

Avon Calling: A night at the theatre from the comfort of your own sitting room

Wed, 04 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

The stage is set. I've pushed back the coffee table, dragged the dining room chairs into the sitting room and whisked my housemate's socks off the radiator. The audience (nine of my friends) is gathering in the bar (my kitchen) drinking white wine, chilled to a degree unheard of in most stalls bars. They're here because, for one night only, I have converted my flat in Brixton – some five miles from the ritz and glitz of the West End and as yet undiscovered as a hub for the dramatic arts – into a theatre. On the bill is Avon Calling, an "intimate Avon party with a theatrical twist" by Louise Platt, a 32-year old actress from Birmingham, who travels the country performing in ticket-holders' homes for audiences of 10 people at a time.

J M Barrie: The man who wouldn't grow up

Mon, 02 Apr 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Alfred Hitchcock had a lifelong obsession with Mary Rose, the haunting and achingly strange 1920 play by J M Barrie, and in the 1960s he commissioned a screenplay that opened it up but retained much of the original dialogue.

What To Do, See & Buy: Circusfest; Platter app; Acne; Aram Store; Bluebell Walks

Sat, 31 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Roll up, roll up

Mark Ronson - Pop's top producer jumps at the ballet

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 00:00:14 +0100

Mark Ronson emerges, cradling an alien copper-coloured box with protruding wires. It's a Theremin-style synthesiser, he tells me, a belated wedding gift from a friend, the XL Recordings boss Richard Russell, for when Ronson married the French actress and singer Josephine de la Baume, in Aix en Provence in September.

Cultural Life: Sarah Lamb, ballerina

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0100

Dance: I saw the Nederlands Dans Theater 2 at Sadler's Wells, which was fantastic. The dancers are all aged between 17 and 23, and the final work in the triple bill was Paul Lightfoot's 'Passe-Partout'. The quality of movement was amazing, showing the fluidity, grace and capabilities of human bodies. Modern dance at its best.

A Warsaw Melody: From Russia with Love

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0100

The first ever UK staging of one of Russia's most frequently performed plays A Warsaw Melody opens in London this week. Written by Leonid Zorin in 1967, it was staged some 4,000 times in its first year. "It's almost a contemporary Romeo and Juliet," says its London-based Russian director Oleg Mirochnikov, who is also a top Russian dialogue coach, who worked with the cast of X-Men: First Class and World War Z. "I think a lot of British theatre companies don't look beyond Chekov. Maybe its a lack of curiosity."

The Diary: Timothy Spall; The Big Chill; Fargo; The King's Speech; Christian Marclay's The Clock

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0100

A Spall victory

The King's Speech play: At last, my crowning moment...

Tue, 27 Mar 2012 12:00:01 +0100

"Oh you can't always get what you want/ No, you can't always get what you want/ But if you try sometimes you just might find/ You get what you need." So sang Sir Mick and his Perambulating Pebbles. I should've paid attention. Should've listened.

Heads up: Big and Small

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

What are we talking about? An Australian production of a translation of German writer Botho Strauss's 1978 play Gross und Klein arrives as part of the Olympic London 2012 Festival: an episodic comedy of alienation, with an Alice in Wonderland-esque sense of the surreal.

The Diary: Mike Daisey; Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark; Francis Ford Coppola; Liam Thomas; Chortle Awards

Fri, 23 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Oopsy Daisey

Cultural Life: Jonathan Miller, theatre director

Fri, 23 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Books: I read all the time. I recently read a big book on the nature of seeing and believing by Pylyshyn. I've also been re-reading a book that has been an influence on me: 'Frame Analysis' by Erving Goffman, about how we make sense of things. There's also a whole series of philosophical books by Donald Davidson – particularly 'Essays on Actions and Events' (1980). It's difficult and you need to read it again and again to get it straight. Hand movements are something I'm always thinking about when directing an opera or theatre production. I also read a very good new translation of 'Madame Bovary' by Lydia Davis.

Heads up: Royal Ballet triple bill

Sun, 18 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

What are we talking about? A triple bill from The Royal Ballet, comprising two new works and a revival of Polyphonia.

What To Do, See & Buy: The Pirate Project; Franco Manca pizzeria; Juan Muñoz; Percival; K3 kettle

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Play fight

Independent Podcast: Caroline O'Connor and Paul Kerryson discuss Gypsy

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 14:02:35 +0000

The Diary: Stanley Donwood; The Royal Court; Headhunters; Boom Nails

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

The king of T-shirts

Binge Britain in the spotlight

Wed, 14 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Last summer, the performance artist Bryony Kimmings locked herself in a warehouse in Bethnal Green, east London and got drunk for a week. Not for fun, you understand, but in the name of art: her aim was to explore the links between intoxication and creativity, or to find out whether she was a better artist when she was drunk.

Olivia Poulet: From Tory tough nut to a taste for the wild side

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

When I delicately suggest to Olivia Poulet, the actress who is best known for playing Emma Messinger in the hit BBC Four series The Thick of It, that she is typecast as a Tory ball-breaker, she balks for a few moments and looks slightly peeved, before saying: "Well, I'm definitely not a Tory! But I've had a lot of fun playing one."

The Diary: Punchdrunk's Sleep No More; Sweethearts; Jack Whitehall; Anish Kapoor's cannon; Spike Jonze

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Punchdrunk love

The visionaries who are taking a leap in the dark

Wed, 07 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Shakespeare and Beckett are the great dramatists of light, dark and blindness, but only one theatre company, Sound&Fury, which sculptures light and sound, is devoted exclusively to the philosophy of sensory deprivation. Its latest work, Going Dark, written by Hattie Naylor, is the story of an astronomer losing his sight in a planetarium.

Jude Kelly: 'This isn't about pointing fingers at men. It's about institutions'

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

I got a lot of signals when I was starting out that being a female theatre director wasn't going to be easy It was a constant theme in the 1970s: there were no role models, just a feeling of having to prove to critics and employers that a play would be in just as good hands with a woman as it would with a man. The conversation about equality between the sexes is one that still needs to be had vigorously and positively, and it's why I set up the Women of the World festival – to acknowledge that women are doing extraordinary things, and to look at how to release even more of that potential.

The Diary: A Walk on Part; Tomas Alfredson; Gilbert & George; After Miss Julie; Piff the Magic Dragon

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Political recognition

The Lady from the Sea: The drama that signalled a sea change for Ibsen

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Ask most people for their image of Ibsen and the caricature will come back of a Scandinavian dramatist steeped in remorseless gloom. So it may come as a surprise to come across a play by Ibsen with a very different atmosphere. The Lady from the Sea (1888) takes place over a few days towards the end of a long summer. Most of the action – in essence, three counterpointed love stories – is set outdoors and the dialogue has a conversational, almost Chekhovian quality to it. What's more, the play has a positive ending. The English novelist and Ibsen champion Edmund Gosse remarked: "After so many tragedies, this is a comedy... The tone is quite unusually sunny, and without a trace of pessimism."

Edinburgh's Forest Fringe branches out

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

The Forest Fringe is putting down roots in London with a residency at the Gate. The tiny, not-for-profit hub started life in 2007, churning out free, round-the-clock experimental theatre in the Forest Café, just off Bristo Square at the heart of the Edinburgh Fringe. Over five years it has become a crucial stop-off for anyone looking for the next big thing from new work by Bryony Kimmings to Kindle's play/ dinner party held in the back of a van. Last year, Daniel Kitson performed a midnight gig at the cafe that went on until dawn.

The Diary: Andrew Scott; Eric Cantona; Art on the Underground; Jessica Hynes; Martha Marcy May Marlene

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Moriarty returns

Cultural Life: David Haig, actor

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Theatre: I recently went to see a reading of a new play called 'Coalition'. It was a political satire about the present coalition government. Written by Tom Salinsky and Robert Khan, it was witty, fast moving and hugely enjoyable. It started me wondering about the nature of great satirical comedy. I immediately thought of 'The Thick of It' and 'Yes Minister' and realised that one of the features of both is the paradoxical ability to be specific and non-specific at the same time. Subliminally one is constantly aware of contemporary resonances, but the resonances are never specific enough to give history the chance to overtake the comedy and render it redundant. That was my one reservation about 'Coalition'. It was so particularly about Clegg's Lib Dems that there is a danger that history will creep up and date it overnight. I hope not, because it was a terrific script.

Still making a big noise: A season of Michael Frayn plays is set to reaffirm the brilliance of his work

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

If there is one thing that is certain to be bursting out all over in the early spring, it is the theatrical mastery of Michael Frayn. In March, Sheffield Theatres unveil a mighty Michael Frayn season, masterminded by artistic director, Daniel Evans, and his associate, Paul Miller. In addition to a programme of rehearsed readings, it will consist of major revivals of a trio of key plays from the past three decades – Benefactors (1984), Copenhagen (1998) and Democracy (2003). There can be no better way of assessing how these works throw light on each other than by catching them at this cannily constructed festival where, on certain days, they will be playing across three auditoria.

Simon Annand: Behind closed doors

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Mark Rylance, on a brief breather from playing Johnny "Rooster" Byron in Jerusalem at the Apollo Theatre, stands with his chest puffed out in his dressing room, which is plastered with pictures of roosters. Benedict Cumberbatch looks all-consumed with concentration just 15 minutes before the curtain goes up on Frankenstein at the National Theatre. Dominic West checks that his hands are grubby enough for his Donmar debut playing Segismundo in Life Is a Dream.

Keep calm and carry on singing, Hollywood style

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Blockbuster films will be alive with the sound of music, as Hollywood this year brings a bumper crop of musicals to the big screen. Studios are rushing to release titles familiar to theatre audiences – along with remakes of existing film musicals and original scripts – and A-list actors are lining up to show off their singing talents.

Mother's story makes waves at Southbank's Women of the World festival

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

We took the last bus, the last bus of the evening, so no-one would see us." So begins Beside the Sea, an extraordinary, intense novella by the French playwright Véronique Olmi that the young Irish actress Lisa Dwan is translating to the stage in a solo performance as part of the Southbank's Women of the World festival.

Cultural Life: Dennis Kelly, playwright

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Theatre: The last play I saw was Arnold Wesker's 'The Kitchen', at the National Theatre. Watching such a physical, and yet realistic, production, I couldn't help thinking about how far theatre has come in recent years. I also saw Christoph Schlingensief's 'Mea Culpa' at the Burgtheater in Vienna. Written on his death bed, it was really profound and visually quite amazing. Sandy McDade gave an incredibly committed performance in Lucy Kirkwood and Ed Hime's 'Small Hours', at Hampstead Theatre.

Mad, bad and delightful to know: How Lord Byron became a cultural superstar

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Riots and protests by the disaffected poor, with the looming spectre of "mob rule", have often troubled MPs and lords at Westminster. No lawmaker, though, has ever raised his voice on behalf of the mutinous have-nots as boldly as one 24-year-old peer did during his maiden speech in the House of Lords on 27 February 1812. Over the previous nine months, the Luddite revolt against new technology in the weaving trades that boosted profits but eliminated jobs had spread through the villages of the young lord's native Nottinghamshire. Under cover of darkness, unemployed stocking-weavers moved from workshop to workshop, smashing the "wide frames" that had wrecked their livelihoods and starved their families.

The Wicker Man: The pagan players are ready to set the stage on fire

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

There are certain roles so associated with a single actor that they just aren't worth trying to make your own - and Greg Hemphill knows it. "If somebody had come to me and said, 'We'd like you to be Lord Summerisle in our production of The Wicker Man, I'd have told them I thought they were barking up the wrong tree," says the actor best known for his cult Scottish television comedy two-handers, Chewin' the Fat and Still Game.

Heads Up: Michael Frayn Season

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

What are we talking about?

A festival of work by playwright Michael Frayn, across Sheffield's three theatres (the Crucible, Lyceum and Studio). The programme includes major revivals of Copenhagen, Benefactors and Democracy, rehearsed readings of The Sneeze, Here and Wild Honey, plus readings from his columns and novels.

What To Do, See & Buy: Mr Lawrence; Jerwood Gallery; Mia Hamborg; Alexander McCall Smith; Khodorkovsky

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Move it!

The Diary: Laura Poliakoff; Joe Penhall; Black Pond; Dominic West; Damien Hirst

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Laura's launch

Once a Redgrave: Joely Richardson on playing the role made famous by her mother and sister

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Joely Richardson has managed to walk into Carluccio's in Kingston upon Thames at the height of the lunch buzz and sit at a window seat, her voice raised above the hum, without causing fans to clamber or heads to turn. No one has rushed over with a camera phone or a napkin to sign. Perhaps they're being very English and taking furtive glances over their menus instead, though you get the feeling that her low-key presence is a carefully learnt skill which must be perfected if you are a scion of Britain's biggest acting dynasty and want to nip out for a bite to eat.

Louise Rennison: The teen queen who never grew up

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

From the sanctuary of one's 20s and 30s, it is easy to regard our teenage years as a gauche wasteland of hormonal-fuelled angst best airbrushed from history. In author Louise Rennison's world, that brief hiatus between the demise of childhood and the onset of adulthood is instead hilarious and rather tender.

Zach Braff: Medicine man has the last laugh

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

"Cereal and no coffee for breakfast at my house. Never a cappuccino or a latte – that was splurging. Then two slices of pizza and a Snapple for lunch. And a falafel sandwich or maybe a burrito for dinner." Zach Braff, star of Scrubs, indie darling of Hollywood and latterly toast of Broadway, is explaining, in some detail, how he used to live on $10 a day, back when he was a fledgling actor. Though it's hard to remember a time when his hapless hospital alter-ego J.D. wasn't wall-to-wall on E4, it was not really all that long ago. In 2000, aged 25, with a sprinkling of plays and small films under his belt and $300 in the bank, he was still waiting tables at a French-Vietnamese restaurant in Beverley Hills. People would come in for dinner straight from the arthouse cinema opposite. "And they would do a double take and say, 'We just saw your movie. We really liked it'. And I'd say, 'Oh, thank you. Now let me tell you about our specials...'"

Heads Up: Shakespeare with Wainwright

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

What are we talking about? A Shakespeare-inspired evening at the Barbican, featuring the UK premiere of singer-songwriter Rufus Wainwright's musical setting of five Shakespeare sonnets.

Acting dynasties: There's no business like family business

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Overqualified and under-employed – that is the lot of most young actors. But not if mummy or daddy is already treading the boards. Meet the new generation of me-toos following their parents on to the stage, and in some cases starring alongside them. While in other professions it might be called nepotism, in theatrical circles, the correct term is "acting dynasty", a phrase traditionally seen next to the name Redgrave or Fox.

What To Do, See & Buy: Niki & The Dove; Mary Shelley; The Forgetting of Proper Names; Shipping Forecast; Fish, Recipes from the Sea

Sat, 04 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Flying high

The Diary: Yayoi Kusama; Stephen Unwin; Charles Dickens; Other Cinema; Julian Barnes

Fri, 03 Feb 2012 00:00:01 +0000

Spot the difference

Brendan Cowell: An exclusive interview with the co-writer of The Slap

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 12:33:01 +0000

Brendan Cowell, angry young man of Australian fringe theatre, co-writer of gritty TV drama The Slap, wants to talk Sex and the City.

Heads Up: The Leisure Society

Sun, 29 Jan 2012 00:00:01 +0000

What are we talking about?

A starry new West End production of François Archambault's satire, a dark comedy in which a yuppie dinner party spirals out of control.