Theatre review: Paddington

To say that Michael Bond's Paddington Bear has had a resurgence since the 2014 film would be an understatement, as would be to say a musical adaptation could be a huge risk: The slightest hint of a shameless cash-in on such a beloved character could have gone very badly. Fortunately Paddington the Musical is in very safe hands with Tom Fletcher (music and lyrics,) Jessica Swale (book) and director Luke Sheppard. When an elderly bear, Aunt Lucy (voiced by Brenda Edwards) can no longer look after her orphaned nephew, she sends him from Darkest Peru to London, where she hopes he'll find the explorer who was kind to her years before. Instead he finds Mrs Brown (Amy Ellen Richardson) and her son Jonathan (Jasper Rowse, alternating with Joseph Bramley, Leo Collon and Stevie Hare.) Against the wishes of Mr Brown (Adrian Der Gregorian) and permanently embarrassed teenager Judy (Delilah Bennett-Cardy) they invite him home.

Re-review: Nell Gwynn

Jessica Swale's Nell Gwynn, which I put at number 4 in my Top Ten productions of 2015, has made it to the West End for a deserved wider audience; you can read myoriginal review of Christopher Luscombe's production here, from its run at Shakespeare's Globe. With Hugh Durrant's design recreating a slightly smaller version of the Globe's stage for the Apollo, much of my original review stands (except for Sarah Woodward nicking someone in the audience's drink; harder to do on a pros arch.) Of course, one major change is in the lead, Gugu Mbatha-Raw having had filming commitments. But you couldn't have asked for a better replacement than Gemma Arterton, who has just the right kind of charisma - much of it consisting of a wicked sense of fun - to bring both the steely determination of the first-ever female star actor, and her warmth to life. (And we already knew from her turn in Made in Dagenham that Arterton could handle Nell's bawdy songs.)

Theatre review: Nell Gwynn

One bonus of blogging my thoughts about every show I see is that when I spot future talent, I can go back and be smug about it when I'm right. It's not just actors* - it's a pretty quick turnaround since I saw Jessica Swale's Nell Gwynn being premiered at LAMDA, and said the play deserved to be picked up by a professional company. A year later and it has been, by Shakespeare's Globe where Swale's playwrighting debut Blue Stockings was also staged. Christopher Luscombe directs the first professional production, and the venue's unique dynamic is a great match for a play that not only concerns itself with theatre behind the scenes, but is also positively meta about it. Because although Nell Gwynn's remembered mostly as the King's mistress, this is if anything the "B" plot of the play.

Theatre review: Nell Gwynn

This was a drama school production so technically an amateur performance; as usual I'll try to treat it the same as a professional show, since that's what the cast will be hoping to be in next.

Already one of my favourite directors, Jessica Swale made for a promising playwright as well with Blue Stockings, so her latest look at a trailblazing woman from history had to be worth checking out. Swale has been working with some of the LAMDA students around whom she's written Nell Gwynn, about the woman best remembered as Charles II's (in)famous mistress. This does, of course, feature in the play, but its larger concern is with the high profile that got the King's attention in the first place, and Gwynn's place in theatre history as the first woman to act on the Drury Lane stage. A former prostitute who moved on to the barely-more-respectable profession of orange-seller, Nell's (Bathsheba Piepe) confident sales pitch catches the eye of actor Charles Hart (Donal Gallery.) When a rival theatre company makes headlines with an actual female Desdemona (whose topless death scene is completely integral to the plot) Hart convinces impresario Killigrew (Adam Scott-Rowley) that Nell should be their own first "actoress."

Theatre review: Blue Stockings

An accomplished director, Jessica Swale's clearly been learning a thing or two in the rehearsal room about what makes plays tick, because her debut as a playwright is an assured one. Having worked at Shakespeare's Globe before, this becomes the venue for the premiere of Blue Stockings, and having championed the work of trailblazing women in her choice of plays to direct, she finds another group of them in Cambridge at the end of the 19th century. For a few decades, women had been allowed to study there at colleges like Girton, but any achievements they made had to go unrecognised: At the time we join the bluestockings (Swale takes her play's title from the sneery nicknmae given to female students) they are trying to secure a historic vote that would allow them to graduate.

Theatre review: The School for Scandal

I really didn't plan for this to be a year when I went to a lot of new theatres (I have too many to keep up with already) but the newly-opened Park Theatre's main house is hosting a production of Richard Brinsley Sheridan's The School for Scandal directed by Jessica Swale. And as Swale's productions of Restoration comedy are a perennial favourite of mine, with last year's The Busy Body making my annual Top Ten, I couldn't let this slip through the net. The Surface brothers have very different reputations: Joseph (Tom Berish) has carefully cultivated a good name for himself and is well thought-of in society, while his brother Charles (Harry Kerr) is a drunkard, rumoured to be trying to seduce the newly-married Lady Teazle (Kirsty Besterman.) When their wealthy benefactor Sir Oliver (Timothy Speyer) returns from India, he has a suspicion that things are very different beneath the surface, and sets about tricking his nephews into revealing their true selves.

Re-review: The Busy Body

A quick note about my return visit to Susanna Centlivre's The Busy Body (the second show this year at Southwark Playhouse that I felt I couldn't let close without a second viewing - talk about a theatre punching above its weight.) I wondered in my original review two weeks ago if I might squeeze in the final performance, and the frantic comedy was something I thought might appeal to Evil Alex, who's pretty hard to match to shows (he says he's pretty open to anything, as long at it involves puppets having sex, and a song about racism; so he's been trickier to cater for ever since Avenue Q closed.) So I dragged Alex along, and when there bumped into my Twitter friend Rob, also seeing it for a second time, and also bringing someone along, another Twitter friend, Emma. So there was a decent group of us taking our place in (of course) the front row, and enough other opinions to confirm that I wasn't mistaken the first time in how uproariously funny Jessica Swale's production is.

Theatre review: The Busy Body

Southwark Playhouse seems to be on an absolute roll for its final season before moving house, a record they can hopefully continue to build on. But if there's one thing I hope comes along to their new venue it's Jessica Swale's annual production of a Restoration Comedy (the programme note that The Busy Body is "part of a series exploring the 'lost' female wits" makes me optimistic about there being more to come.) This year a couple of cast members from The Rivals and The Belle's Stratagem return with the director for a story by another early female playwright, Susanna Centlivre, with a few adaptations by Swale herself: The play's original prologue quickly gets ditched in favour of a new one, in the form of a song celebrating Britain's female playwrights from Aphra Behn to Polly Stenham and - a handy plug for coming attractions at the same venue - Anya Reiss.

Theatre review: Someone Who'll Watch Over Me

PREVIEW DISCLAIMER: Southwark Playhouse doesn't specify preview periods for its shows, but this review is of the second public performance.

When Jessica Swale comes to Southwark Playhouse it's usually to put her very distinctive stamp on Restoration comedy. This time though she returns for a darker theme, a 20th anniversary revival of Frank McGuinness' hostage drama Someone Who'll Watch Over Me. Simon Kenny's thrust set stabs out into the audience, and as we enter a triangle of black curtain shields the small basement room where American doctor Adam (Joseph Timms) and Irish journalist Edward (Billy Carter) are being held hostage in Lebanon. Soon they're joined by English university lecturer Michael (Robin Soans) and the three men build a friendship that rallies their spirits against their unseen captors.