Theatre review: Foxfinder

Last seen in London in 2011 when it was the Papatango award winner, Dawn King's Foxfinder is, on the face of it, a canny revival for 2018 when its paranoia and scapegoating can be repackaged as a Brexit play. But something's gone wrong in the execution of Rachel O'Riordan's production, and it’s left a play that can be genuinely creepy and atmospheric floundering. Samuel (Paul Nicholls) and Judith Covey (Heida Reed) own a farm somewhere in a dystopian England where food is scarce, so farmers like them are under immense pressure to live up to – seemingly quite unrealistic – crop quotas. Some months earlier, the couple’s four-year-old son drowned, and Samuel retreated into a long depression. Between this and bad weather they’re struggling to live up to their targets so the government has sent an investigator to determine if they’ve mismanaged the farm, or worse: If there’s a fox on their land.

Theatre review: Scarlet

Sam H. Freeman's Scarlet could be called a monologue for four actors: Lucy Kilpatrick, Jade Ogugua, Heida Reed and Asha Reid all play Scarlet, a girl who's always enjoyed sex and a couple of years into her university course has already chalked up lovers in double figures. The four women's costumes and attitudes suggest slightly different aspects to her personality - Reed's Scarlet is slightly prim and proper, in a 1940s-inspired outfit, Reid's a no-nonsense punky one, and the other two very much 21st century girls in more revealing outfits - but they are all pretty much in sync with each other, presenting Scarlet as a confident and fun woman with a united front. Things get a lot more out of her control though after a fellow student lies about sleeping with her, and she calls him out on it, inadvertently making him a laughing stock.