Theatre review: Deaf Republic

Deaf Republic takes its cue from poetry, in a variety of forms: The source material is Ukrainian-American poet Ilya Kaminsky's book of the same name, while the play itself is co-written by its directors Bush Moukarzel and Ben Kidd, aka Dead Centre, and BSL poet Zoë McWhinney. In a fictional Eastern European town occupied by enemy soldiers, a child is watching a puppet show when a soldier commands the crowd to disperse. But the child is Deaf and when he fails to obey the order he's shot dead. The next morning the entire town has also become profoundly Deaf in protest, communicating in their own mix of British and Ukrainian sign language designed in part to add an extra level of inscrutability for their enemies. The soldiers brutally try to break the protest and prove the people are only pretending, but meet with a wall of silence.

Theatre review: Elektra

My second star-led Sophocles in the space of a week provides some interesting points to compare and contrast with Oedipus: Both revivals use translations that stick pretty closely to the rules, format and structure of the original conventions. But where that show was dominated by its visuals, this one is all about the sounds. And while anyone unfamiliar with Greek mythology will get a pretty clear telling of the story South of the river, they'll probably find themselves in somewhat muddier waters in the West End. Celebrity Dairy Product Brie Larson leads Daniel Fish's production of Elektra as the daughter of Agamemnon who's in mourning for her father, murdered by her mother Clytemnestra (Stockard Channing) and her lover Aegisthus (Greg Hicks.) This is the part of the myth that's covered in the middle play of the Oresteia, but here it's entirely told from Elektra's point of view, and she's leaving out some fairly important details.

Theatre review: Snowflake

Mike Bartlett's already on his second Brexit play (third, if you count Love, Love, Love as foreshadowing, which next year's revival will almost certainly feel like.) Like Albion (also returning in 2020) his latest puts the UK's breaking up into factions in microcosm, and Snowflake manages both to create a metaphor and play it literally as a widower longs to reunite with his estranged daughter at Christmas. The play's first act is a monologue until its closing moments, and Bartlett plays with the concept of the unreliable narrator: In an empty church hall on Christmas Eve, Andy (Elliot Levey) rehearses for how he wants to greet his daughter Maya (Ellen Robertson) when he sees her for the first time in three years. Their relationship went sour after her mother died suddenly, and one argument in particular saw her walk out and break off all contact. She's now back in Oxford and Andy's hired out this hall as a neutral space for them to try and restart their relationship.

Theatre review: Blue/Orange

I've been waiting a long time to see Blue/Orange; I missed the National Theatre's original 2000 production, and subsequently the play has gained a reputation as a modern classic - any time a lacklustre new Joe Penhall play premieres, I hear people say he owes his career to this one big hit. A three-hander taking in mental illness, racial stereotyping and professional backstabbing, it takes place in a generic meeting room in a psychiatric hospital. Chris (Daniel Kaluuya) has been sectioned after a public incident involving an orange, but his 28 days of observation are up and it's time to decide if he's well enough to be released, or if he's a danger to himself and others. The diagnosis is that he has Borderline Personality Disorder, but his doctor, Bruce (Luke Norris,) believes he's actually schizophrenic, and calls in a consultant for a second opinion.

Theatre review: Blackta

PREVIEW DISCLAIMER: Blackta invites the official critics in next week.

Nathaniel Martello-White, who was a rather good Lysander at the RSC last year, is a black actor - or, as the title of his playwrighting debut has it, a Blackta. He paints a pretty bleak picture of it as a profession in this play, which follows four black actors who are friends, but a friendship tinged with aggression and professional rivalry, often going up against each other for the same roles and trying to make their rivals nervous: They're constantly coming up with new gym regimes and diets to give them an edge, and fretting over just how black is too black to appeal to a casting director. The latter fact also gives the characters their names: There's the fiery Brown (Anthony Welsh,) laid-back Yellow (Howard Charles,) apparently indestructible Black (Daniel Francis,) and the butt of their jokes, the fantasist Dull Brown (Javone Prince.) For all the difficulties they face getting jobs now, an even grimmer fate seems in store for them with age, as in the background sits Older Black (Leo Wringer,) permanently waiting for a callback that never comes.