Theatre review: Miss Myrtle's Garden

Next Bush Artistic Director Taio Lawson directs the first in his predecessor's final season of shows, and Miss Myrtle's Garden suggests we might get a continuation of some of the themes Lynette Linton's established: Not just stories that foreground queer people of colour, but also ones that take quite a literal approach to the theatre's horticultural name. Danny James King's play takes place entirely in the titular South East London garden, the pride and joy of Jamaican-born Myrtle (Diveen Henry,) but one she can't look after on her own as she gets older, with husband Melrose (Mensah Bediako) and old friend Eddie (Gary Lilburn) tending to the plants under her watchful, and generally judgmental eye. When her grandson Rudy (Michael Ahomka-Lindsay) visits and mentions that his rent is being raised again, she invites him to move into the top floor she no longer uses.

Theatre review: The Rink

Does Southwark Playhouse have an ultimate goal of staging Starlight Express some day? They seem to have cornered the market in shows involving roller-skates (who knew that was even a market to be cornered?) and after Xanadu and punkplay comes Kander and Ebb’s 1984 musical The Rink. It takes a while for anyone to actually get their skates on though, as the rink in question is one that’s seen better days and has fallen into disrepair. Anna (Caroline O’Connor) inherited it from her father-in-law, and for many years it was a main attraction of the boardwalk in an East Coast town. With the economy closing most of the businesses on the boardwalk, Anna has sold off the rink to developers who plan to knock it down. The demolition crew are already there helping her clear everything out, but so is someone she didn’t expect: Her daughter Angel (Gemma Sutton) is co-owner of the rink, and Anna forged her signature to make the sale.