Theatre review: A Christmas Carol (Old Red Lion)

Charles Dickens' novella A Christmas Carol is not only one of his best-loved stories, it's even credited with forming much of the modern idea of how Christmas should be celebrated. The story of miser Ebenezer Scrooge (Alexander McMorran,) visited on Christmas Eve by a series of ghosts who teach him how to save his soul by embracing the spirit of the season, is one most people will have come across a number of times. So Metal Rabbit's production managing to make it feel fresh and new is quite an achievement. An early indicator that this isn't your usual family fare is in the show's scheduling: Playing at the Old Red Lion after the main show Charming, a 9:30pm start time clearly isn't aimed at getting a big kiddie audience in. Instead this version reveals A Christmas Carol as an all-too-contemporary story by stripping it back to its original political message.

Theatre review: The Picture of John Gray

Gay-themed theatre is being well-served in London at the moment with My Night With Reg getting revived, while at the Old Red Lion a new play looks at one of the best-known "inverts" in history from a different angle. Oscar Wilde never actually appears in C.J. Wilmann's The Picture of John Gray but the characters we do see are at the mercy of the celebrated writer; or rather of his wildly variable levels of popularity. Rozanna Vize's design is of an artist's studio, reflecting The Vale, the scene of much of the action. It's the much-loved home of Charles Ricketts (Oliver Allan) and Charles Shannon (Jordan McCurrach,) a popular pair at the heart of Wilde's circle, thinly-veiled versions of whom appeared in his controversial novel The Picture of Dorian Gray. Even less concealed is the identity of the real Dorian himself, and when we first meet John Gray (Patrick Walshe McBride) he's reveling in his position not just as the object of Wilde's affection, but also as the inspiration for the beautiful protagonist.