Theatre review: The Brightening Air

Playwright and director Conor McPherson recently received a massive tax bill - at least that's the most obvious explanation for the frantic flurry of activity he's got planned for this year, when he'll be writing new shows, directing some of his old ones and, to start with, doing both: His new play The Brightening Air gets its debut production at the Old Vic, with the playwright himself directing and, to be honest, not doing much to dissuade me from my general rule of thumb that this is A Bad Idea. With nods to Chekhov that are acknowledged when one character jokingly refers to another by a Russian patronymic, the play sees a family reunite a few times at a remote family home - in this case a dilapidated farmhouse in Ireland. Middle child Stephen (Brian Gleeson) lives there with his Nonspecifically Neurodivergent little sister Billie (Rosie Sheehy,) who finds as much comfort in the familiar place as she does in discussing her wide range of fixations.

Theatre review: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

In a Young Vic production that, for the first time, skips the Young Vic entirely and goes straight to the West End (and its prices,) the theatre follows up Benedict Andrews’ revolving Streetcar Named Desire with another of the most famous Tennessee Williams plays, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. We’re still in a sweltering part of the American South (Tennessee itself, this time,) but unlike most Williams characters nobody here is strapped for cash: Big Daddy (Colm Meaney) owns the largest plantation in the state, and his whole family have gathered to celebrate his 65th birthday. What most of the family knows but he doesn’t is that this is his last birthday: The tests he was told came back negative actually revealed he has terminal cancer and very little time left. We see the action from the perspective of alcoholic younger son Brick (Jack O’Connell) and his wife Maggie (Sienna Miller.)

Theatre review: Queers Part 1

It hasn't been marked quite as ubiquitously on stage as the centenary of the First World War, the 4th centenary of Shakespeare's death or even the King James Bible were, but theatres are now starting to step up the events commemorating the 50th anniversary of the partial decriminalisation of homosexuality. The Old Vic has paired up with the BBC, whose Queer Britain season includes the upcoming Queers on BBC4, eight monologues curated by Mark Gatiss giving snapshots of gay life before and after decriminalisation, to give each one of the short plays a one-off live performance. About half of the performers from the TV version have been able to reprise their roles, with the rest recast, and Gatiss shares directing duties with Joe Murphy on Part 1 as well as writing the first of the four stories in this first collection.

Theatre review: The Night Alive

Rounding off the latest invasion of Irish plays in London is Conor McPherson's newest work. The Night Alive follows the hit revival of his best-known play The Weir at the Donmar Warehouse, in a production directed by McPherson himself. Part character study, part grubby thriller, The Night Alive takes place in the back room of a house in Dublin, roughly kitted out into a filthy bedsit. He was once the owner of a reasonably successful company but it went down with the rest of the Irish economy, and now Tommy (Ciarán Hinds) scrapes a living as an odd-job man and dodgy wheeler-dealer. Estranged from his wife and children, Tommy lives in this flat in his uncle Maurice's (Jim Norton) house. His friend Doc (Michael McElhatton,) slow-witted but prone to the occasional profundity, sometimes works for him for peanuts, and frequently crashes at the flat when he has nowhere else to stay.