Radio review: Love and Information

Back to my occasional reviews of radio adaptations of stage work, where BBC Radio 3's recent production of Love and Information is the first audio adaptation, and 12 years seems like a surprisingly long time to wait to give it that treatment: After all, Caryl Churchill's 2012 play is an experiment in form that requires all kinds of resources for a live revival, that are a lot easier to get around on radio, where sketch shows are common. And that's essentially the format Churchill used for this play, whose cast very quickly run their way through more than a hundred characters in over fifty scenes that are rarely as long as two minutes, and can be as short as a single sneeze. As an audience member, one advantage this has is that I was able to focus entirely on the scenes and not the staging - I remember the original production at the Royal Court as being brilliant, but it was impossible not to be slightly distracted by the impressively slick scene changes.

Theatre review: Seven Methods of Killing Kylie Jenner

One of the advantages of middle age is being able to more or less ignore anything to do with the Kardashians, but it's impossible to be online and not osmose some things about them. Funnily enough, one of those things is the specific headline that kicks off the events of Jasmine Lee-Jones' Seven Methods of Killing Kylie Jenner: The preposterous statement that the titular enemy of the gays* was the youngest-ever "self-made" billionaire, as if the wealth, privilege and profile she was born into weren't a factor. For student Cleo (Danielle Vitalis) this is more than just ridiculous but also a slap in the face, as she considers Jenner's personal brand to be built on appropriating black looks and culture, something which has been particularly on her mind both as the subject of her dissertation; and because her ex just dumped her for a white woman with a Jenner-like tendency to appropriate black style.

Theatre review: Don Juan in Soho

Having heard there was a stage left in London without one of his shows on it, Patrick Marber directs a revival of his Don Juan in Soho at Wyndham's. A modern relocation of Molière's Don Juan, it does stick to blank verse and a sometimes stylised turn of phrase in among the text speak and swearing. David Tennant plays DJ, heir to an earldom who, with no real demands on his time, chooses to spend all of it chasing after sex. Although he's happy enough to pay for it, he takes particular pleasure in pursuit and corruption, and in the opening scene has just returned from honeymoon: Having pursued the virginal Elvira (Danielle Vitalis) for two years and married her just to get her into bed, he's now got what he wanted and has cheerfully broken her heart, telling her he wants a divorce after a fortnight.