Bonkers or Go Bananas
Partenope
by George Frideric Handel, libretto by Silvio Stampiglia
The English National Opera at the London Coliseum until 6th December 2025
I was expecting this revival of Partenope to be joyful and uplifting, and it did not disappoint. A co-production between the ENO and Opera Australia, under the direction of Christopher Alden, this is a modernist, surreal performance that repeatedly takes us to the absurd and back again in the company of some impressive vocal and musical talent.
Sometimes described as an operatic ‘rom-com’, Partenope was composed by Handel to Silvio Stampiglia’s Italian libretto originally written in 1699. This version has been updated and translated into English by Amanda Holden (not that one), and it is a very contemporary adaptation. Modern slang, some sly references, and occasional use of the ‘f bomb’ bring laughs from the audience throughout.
Read more…Cow on a Shot Thin Roof
Possum Trot
by Kathy Rucker
Kevin Nolan at The Theatre at the Tabard, Chiswick until 29thNovember
Review by Andrew Lawston
A flickering “Bud Light” sign, plain wooden walls, a string of fairy lights, and half a dozen bottles behind the bar. It’s a wonderfully detailed set, and we could be in any 1970s America diner as Kathy Rucker’s new play Possum Trot opens.
Dennis Hopper might have drunk a beer there in Easy Rider, or Lieutenant Columbo could be sitting at the bar eating a bowl of chili. But within minutes, a young girl talks about having long Covid, and her potential career as a social media content creator, and we realise that this play is set in the modern day, or as close as makes no difference. The contrast between the set and the dialogue conveys that this diner is in desperate need of renovation, and implies a group of characters clinging to the past.
Read more…Who Dares
Bomber’s Moon
byWilliam Ivory
Teddington Theatre Club at The Noël Coward Studio at the Hampton Hill Theatre until 15th November
Review by Heather Moulson
Written by Made in Dagenham author, William Ivory, Bomber’s Moon is a significant play to put on on Armistice Day, and eighty years since the end of the Second World War.
In an apt studio design by director Wesley Henderson Roe, the avenue set has the authenticity of a detailed living area. Surrounded by bookcases, obsolete cameras, and other personal possessions, and with a working kitchen area, it nicely creates an atmosphere of a housebound elderly man in a residential care home.
However he is one who had had a powerful past. He is Jimmy, who had been a rear gunner in a bombing crew during the Second World War.
Read more…And the Devil in the Detail
The Deep Blue Sea
by Terence Rattigan
Putney Theatre Company at the Putney Arts Theatre until 15th November
Review by Mark Aspen
Terrence Rattigan has long been regarded as a pre-eminent master of the well-made play (the technically well constructed play that Wilkie Collins so succinctly categorised as, “make ’em laugh; make ’em weep; make ’em wait”). Certainly his depictions of controlled frustrations in a reticent world, a world now past, is crafted with consummate ease, yet with an emotional intensity.
To successfully portray those emotions, balanced between inner turmoil and stiff–upper-lip demeanour, requires skilful acting and direction. Putney Theatre Company’s production is an exquisite example of honed theatre-craft.
Read more…Opera That Cuts to the Bone
Dead Man Walking
by Jake Heggie, libretto by Terence McNally
English National Opera at the London Coliseum until 18th November
Review by Helen Astrid
Rarely has a performance moved me so deeply that I left the opera house utterly speechless. Dead Man Walking at English National Opera, in Annilese Miskimmon’s gripping new production, was exceptional from start to finish. To say I was mesmerised for nearly three hours feels like an understatement. I was astonished to learn this landmark work is now celebrating its 25th anniversary.
With music by Jake Heggie and a libretto by Terence McNally, the opera cuts straight to the heart, succeeding where so many contemporary pieces struggle; it tells a clear, compelling story and moves its audience profoundly. It is impossible to leave unscathed.
Read more…Rapture of Remorse
Breaking the Rules
by Clare Norburn
The Telling at St Mary Magdalene Church, Richmond 8th November, then on tour until 28th November
Review by Eleanor Marsh
A full house eagerly awaited The Telling’s performance of Clare Norburn’s Breaking the Rules.
Norburn cleverly interlinks music and drama in all of her biographical plays, often introducing her audience to little known music in the process. Breaking the Rules tells the story of Carlo Gesualdo, 17th century nobleman and — most importantly for Norburn — composer. Gesualdo had an eventful and somewhat tragic life, which included murdering his first wife and her lover, beating his second wife and witnessing the death of his mother at the age of seven. We meet him on the last day of his life, a tortured wreck of a human who has for several years employed a servant whose sole duty is to whip his master. Gesualdo is now forced to come to terms with his own inevitable demise.
Read more…Cable Ties
Lightning Beneath the Waves
by David Hovatter and Company
Questors Theatre at the Questors Studio, Ealing, until 15th November
Review by Andrew Lawston
From transport to communications, advances in technology have made our world feel ever smaller, at the same time as highlighting the huge distances between us. In the middle of the 19th century, the telegraph enabled almost instantaneous communications between Europe and America – but only after a mammoth effort to lay tonnes of copper cable under several thousand miles of the Atlantic Ocean.
Following A Real Race Around the World, David Hovatter and Company return to the Studio at The Questor’s Theatre with another chronicle of 19th century achievement in Lightning Beneath the Waves, bringing out the human story behind a global undertaking.
Read more…Dark Lady Shines
Emilia
by Morgan Lloyd Malcolm
Questors Productions at the Judi Dench Playhouse, Ealing, until 8th November
Review by Claire Alexander
‘There is volume in our silence’ is a phrase that has resonated with me and is repeated throughout Morgan Lloyd Malcolm‘s text of Emilia, presented at Questors theatre this week. It is a part fact, part fiction account of the life of Emilia Bassano, a woman born in 1569 in Elizabethan London, and a poet and trailblazer for what women could achieve, at a time when they had no say and were more often restricted to a life governed in every possible way by men. The phrase speaks volumes indeed and this play shows us in an accessible and sympathetic way how women had no power, however talented or and abused. Emilia’s own mission is to have her talent and poetry noticed and published, and the play nicely contrasts Shakespeare’s success versus Emilia’s invisibility.
Read more…Where the Art Is
Home
by David Storey
Rhinoceros Theatre Company at the Coward Studio, Hampton Hill Theatre until 8th November
Review by Steve Mackrell
Where are we? And what’s happening? That’s the confusing conundrum facing the audience at the start of David Storey’s absorbing 1970 play Home, presented by the adventurous Rhinoceros Theatre Company at the Hampton Hill Theatre.
To begin with, a simple garden set with a white metal table and two matching chairs, aided by back projection of moving clouds. Enter two trilby-hatted gentlemen, elderly and elegant, who engage in casual conversation. Seemingly just a couple of old men with time on their hands, idly passing the time of day with small talk, of this and that, the weather, their work, their wives, their schooldays, their memories and dreams. Articulate and comfortable and yet, something is not quite right. Perhaps we’re in Samuel Beckett or Harold Pinter territory, complete with abstract musings, ambiguous narratives and obligatory long pauses.
Read more…Countdown
And Then There Were None
byAgatha Christie
YAT at The Hampton Hill Theatre until 31st October
Review by Heather Moulson
In this classic Agatha Christie play put on by the polished YAT company, we encountered an authentic set of a thirties living room, and a generous-looking cocktail cabinet. The backdrop of French doors opening onto a balustrade and sea view were cleverly gauzed, immediately setting the scene, a small island off the Devon coast, isolated of course in true Christie style.
The vibrant and articulate secretary Vera smoothly instigated the introductions of the ten guests, each of whom has received an unexpected invitation, all ripe for the unravelling of the plot.
Read more…
Mark Aspen 