Theatre review: Islands

Before the current creative team at the Bush got into the pretty good run they've enjoyed for the last couple of years, there was a very shaky six months or so. For me, the only redeeming quality of that time came from Caroline Horton's charming one-woman show You're Not Like the Others Girls Chrissy, so the prospect of Horton and director Omar Elerian teaming up again at the venue was one I'd been looking forward to. Of course, I don't expect writers to do the same thing in every show nor would I want them to, but if Islands is trying to be radically different it succeeds a bit too well - in that her last show was actually good. Horton plays Mary, a self-proclaimed god who, along with sidekicks Agent (John Biddle) and Swill (Seiriol Davies) form a holy trinity who launch a floating island, so they can stay away from the stinking Shitworld below, and keep all their cherries for themselves.

Theatre review: Encounters

The Bush's new regime introduces two of its new Associate Artists, by pairing their existing one-woman shows in a double bill they're calling Encounters. Both shows originated in Edinburgh and have subsequently toured, and first up is Dry Ice, written and performed by Sabrina Mahfouz and directed by David Schwimmer (in a Q&A afterwards, Omar Elerian made reference to Schwimmer having directed it via Skype, a claim Mahfouz denied - I couldn't quite figure out if it was an inside joke or if Elerian had genuinely been told the show was directed via Skype.) Inspired by her time working as a waitress at a strip club, Mahfouz plays Nina, a lap dancer who narrates incidents from her life, stories about the other girls she works with and the "types" of men who come to watch them.