Theatre review: The BFG

As regular readers will both know, Roald Dahl's children's fiction was never part of my childhood (I mainly knew him for Tales of the Unexpected and as Britain's second favourite comedy bigot after Alf Garnett,) so going to Stratford-upon-Avon for The RSC BFG at the RST wasn't particularly on my to-do list until it turned out Tom Wells was on writing duty. And while he doesn't give the Big Friendly Giant quite the level of double entendre filth he used to bring to the Lyric Hammersmith pantos, there's still a trademark wit - I did like a small girl wearily accepting her fate as a giant's dinner with "well, I'm eight, I've had a good innings." Sophie (Martha Bailey Vine, Elsie Laslett or Ellemie Shivers) and Kimberley (Maisy Lee, Charlotte Jones or Uma Patel) live together in an orphanage until the former is abducted by a giant.

Theatre review: Born With Teeth

After a quiet start to his time as half the Artistic Director of the RSC Daniel Evans is having a busier second year, following up his role as a Christopher Marlowe lead by directing a play about the man himself. Liz Duffy Adams' Born With Teeth takes as its premise an academic theory that Marlowe might have contributed to Shakespeare's early Henry VI plays, as well as from the persistent rumours that he was murdered for his work as a spy. In a private back room in a pub we see the two playwrights - aware of each other but not yet acquainted - meet for the first time after being asked to complete an unfinished draft of the play that is now known as Part I. Kit Marlowe (Ncuti Gatwa) is the established, bad-boy superstar of Elizabethan theatre, and plays up to this image to the somewhat star-struck Will Shakespeare (Edward Bluemel,) dominating the conversation and making sure he reserves all the best scenes from the outline for himself.

Theatre review: Edward II

After half the RSC Artistic Director made her debut in the role last summer, the other half also opts to do so in the Swan - although after mostly directing for the last couple of decades, Daniel Evans returns to acting in the company where he first launched his career. Christopher Marlowe's Edward II begins with the funeral of Edward I, and Daniel Raggett's production has the Stalls audience file respectfully past the old king's coffin lying in state before the new King Edward II (Evans) is crowned. But even before the funeral is over Edward is busy reversing one of his father's decrees: The banishment of Gaveston (Eloka Ivo,) his closest friend and lover. Not only does he immediately bring Gaveston back, he showers him with honours and positions of power (to such a ridiculous extent there's even a Mitchell & Webb sketch making fun of it,) and the assembled barons aren't happy about it.

Theatre review: BLACK SUPERHERO

A rescheduled trip to a show I was meant to see a couple of weeks ago: Actor Danny Lee Wynter was also starring in his playwrighting debut BLACK SUPERHERO, but had to drop out mid-run for personal reasons, leading to a week of cancelled performances. Lewis Brown, who's performing with script in hand but rarely needing to consult it at this point, has replaced him as David, a black, gay actor whose career isn't exactly going the way he planned: He lives with his younger sister Syd (Rochenda Sandall) and works with her as the entertainment at children's parties. His avoidance of drink and drugs, and references to his therapy sessions, hint at some past trauma that's holding him back, but he blames his career problems firmly on not being attractive or masculine enough: His very buff friend Raheem (Eloka Ivo) is also black and gay, but he's doing well enough to be accepted on a celebrity-only dating app.

Stage-to-screen review: Flowers for Mrs Harris

My latest virtual visit to a regional theatre is to one I've been to before in person, although not for a couple of years: Chichester Festival Theatre, and Daniel Evans' production of Flowers for Mrs Harris, which he transferred there in 2018 after a run at his previous job in Sheffield. Rachel Wagstaff (book) and Richard Taylor's (music & lyrics) musical is based on a novella by American author Paul Gallico better known as Mrs. 'Arris Goes to Paris, which is perhaps a helpful indicator of the kind of salt-of-the-earth working-class image of a London charlady Ada Harris (Clare Burt) is. Widowed in the Second World War and childless, she has little in her life except making ends meet through the various ungrateful clients whose houses she cleans. She ploughs through stoically until one day she covers a friend's shift cleaning for a deluded minor aristocrat (Joanna Riding,) where she spots a Christian Dior dress and becomes determined to own one some day.

Theatre review: Quiz

My policy on making theatre trips to Chichester changed from "never" to "three times this year" in part thanks to each of the three shows feeling like they completed some kind of set: The decider was the chance to bookend a decade with different Ian McKellen performances of King Lear, but Sweet Bird of Youth made for a double bill of Tennesse Williams plays starring Brian J. Smith, and now the final show in Daniel Evans' first season in charge concludes a trio of new James Graham plays in 2017. Quiz is less obviously political than most of Graham's plays but you don't have to scratch too deep to find some of the wider themes that often come up in the playwright's work, particularly Privacy, about transparency in personal life, politics and the law; and whether the tendency towards leaving nothing secret in the name of full disclosure is in fact harming the chance of fair treatment behind closed doors. The reason this comes up is that Graham's creating a fictionalised version of a legal case considered to have become trial by media.

Theatre review: Show Boat

Before Rodgers and Hammerstein were a thing there was Kern and Hammerstein, Oscar Hammerstein II writing book and lyrics for a number of shows with music by Jerome Kern, although of these only Show Boat is particularly remembered and revived - and indeed credited with creating the 20th century American musical. Daniel Evans' production from Sheffield has been quite rightly praised as it moves to London, although however stellar the production and performances are they can only go so far in papering over the many problematic elements. Starting in the 1880s and spanning approximately 40 years, Show Boat follows Magnolia "Nola" Hawks (Gina Beck) from her time as a teenager on the steamboat run by her father Cap'n Andy (Malcolm Sinclair,) which goes up and down the Mississippi every summer, stopping off at small towns and playing from their repertoire of melodrama. Nola's mother Parthy (Lucy Briers) would never hear of her daughter taking to the stage herself, but when their leading lady is chased out of town for being secretly mixed-race, she gets her chance.

Theatre review: American Buffalo

I don't really get what everyone sees in Damian Lewis, whose last stage appearance irritated me greatly, but I wasn't going to miss the chance to see John Goodman on stage - especially after his turn as one of the season villains on Damages. David Mamet's 1975 classic American Buffalo is what brings Goodman to London, to play Don, owner of a chaotic junk store. A few days earlier a customer paid him $90 for a rare buffalo-head nickel, and upon discovering that the man was a coin collector Don is convinced he got a lot less than its true worth for it. He has another buyer in mind but first he needs the buffalo back, and he plans to send in Bobby (Tom Sturridge,) a junkie he has a sort of fatherly care for, to burgle it from the man's house. Bobby's been casing the joint, and has seen the target leave with bags for what looks like a weekend trip away, so all seems to be ready.

Theatre review: The Full Monty

PREVIEW DISCLAIMER: The press get invited in tomorrow.

"Oh, I've seen that film, pure fantasy! People aren't unemployed, there's no such place as Sheffield, and anyway, you don't even get to see their cocks at the end!" The thoughts of Shirley Bassey (via Matt Lucas) on The Full Monty, the 1997 film comedy that permanently changed the meaning of the title phrase: "The full monty" used to be a generic expression similar to "the whole hog" or "all the way," but now it exclusively means full-frontal nudity. And I just can't imagine why that sort of thing would be of interest here. There's already been a (not very highly-regarded) musical adaptation, which may explain why it took until 2013 for another attempt to stage it. But Daniel Evans went back to original screenwriter Simon Beaufoy for his Sheffield production last year, which then toured the UK; and that's the version that's now made it to the West End.