Theatre review: Sideways

When the St James Theatre announced it would be running without an Artistic Director, I couldn't help but be cynical about the claim that they wanted to work with lots of different producers for purely creative reasons; in the case of Sideways, it feels suspiciously like the show was programmed by the California Tourist Board, whose ads cover every surface of the hotel-like lobby and various video screens, while brochures get handed out by the ushers after the performance. Rex Pickett adapts his own novel about CaliforniaCOME TO CALIFORNIAwine country and David Grindley has staged it with Daniel Weyman as Miles, the failed writer and relentless wine pseud, who's about to be best man at his friend's wedding. It may be Jack's (Simon Harrison) stag do, but Miles has actually chosen his own favourite activity, and is taking Jack on a wine tasting tour.

Theatre review: The American Plan

It's always nice when a play caters to my interests right from the start, like The American Plan does by opening with Luke Allen-Gale climbing out of a lake in bathing trunks, soaking wet. He eventually puts his clothes back on but Richard Greenberg's play soon compensates in other ways. It's July 1960 and Nick (Allen-Gale) is the son of an old wealthy New York family, holidaying with friends in the Catskills. Finding the resort's full schedule of "fun" oppressive, he swims across the lake to an odd-looking house owned by Eva (Diana Quick,) a Jewish refugee who escaped Germany on the last ship out, before her husband came up with a useful but unexciting invention that made their fortune. Nick is captivated by Eva's daughter Lili (Emily Taaffe,) a compulsive fantasist who enjoys teasing him with lies like how her late father's mysterious invention was a reversible condom.

Theatre review: Our Boys

Director David Grindley scored a hit with his revival of Journey's End, which most recently popped up in the West End last year. His latest production sticks with the army theme but moves on both in time - to the mid '80s - and to a point after the front line, looking at the damage done to soldiers and what kind of life they can expect afterwards. Jonathan Lewis' Our Boys is set in a grim military hospital in Woolwich, where a trainee officer has been sent for a routine operation. Because of a shortage of private rooms, Potential Officer Menzies (Jolyon Coy) ends up in a ward with three regular squaddies, who resent having a "Rupert" in their midst. Ian (Lewis Reeves) has had severe head injuries in a bomb blast, and is in the middle of lengthy rehabilitation to get him walking and talking normally again. Northern Irish Meatloaf fan Keith (Cian Barry) is increasingly losing all feeling in his right leg for reasons, whether physical or psychological, that the doctors can't figure out. And Joe (Laurence Fox,) who seems the most mobile of the lot, is there for reasons that aren't revealed until later in the play.