Theatre review: Much Ado About Nothing(National Theatre)

The year's third major Much Ado About Nothing is the starriest, courtesy of John Heffernan and Future Dame Katherine Parkinson as Benedick and Beatrice at the Lyttelton. The National's go-to Shakespeare director Simon Godwin was best-known for directing new work when the RSC hired him to give a fresh eye to The Two Gentlemen of Verona nearly a decade ago, and while that was the start of a major change of direction for his career, he's still bringing that outsider's attitude to one of the most beloved comedies of all. Dialogue has been cut, moved, assigned to different characters, and while it's all Shakespeare's work it doesn't all necessarily originate in this play (there's even the best part of a sonnet bulking up Hero's role.) At heart the play - and its most famous couple - remain the same, but the irreverent treatment of the text yields results in making many of the plotlines and characters less problematic.

Stage-to-screen review: Lights Up - Sitting

Future Dame Katherine Parkinson's Sitting was staged at the Arcola two years ago. Although the credits acknowledge that it's based on Sarah Bedi's original production, and keeps one of the original cast members in Mark Weinman, this film for the BBC's Lights Up strand is a new production from Jeremy Herrin, with the playwright now also taking on one of the roles: Parkinson plays Mary, a recently-divorced mother of one with some unresolved feelings about her dead sister. Luke (Weinman) is unemployed and soon to be a father; though he keeps insisting he hates his pregnant wife, the way he talks about her suggests otherwise. Cassandra (Alex Jarrett) is an aspiring actress and seemingly a compulsive liar. Their monologues are interspersed with each other, each of them speaking to an artist, John (briefly seen played by Paul Jesson,) who's painting their portraits.

Theatre review: Home, I'm Darling

Laura Wade’s new play opens with a cheesy domestic scene straight out of a 1950s sitcom, as perfectly-coiffed housewife Judy (Future Dame Katherine Parkinson) floats around her kitchen making breakfast for her estate agent husband Johnny (Richard Harrington,) making sure he’s got everything ready so he’s not late for work. But before she can get on with the cleaning and tidying she needs to look up a couple of housekeeping tips on the internet, because Home, I’m Darling takes place in the present day. Having met through their shared love of all things ‘50s, the couple have decked out their house in authentic period designs and goods – even if that means a fridge that only works when it feels like it – decanting all their groceries into period-appropriate containers and, when Judy was made redundant three years ago, decided to take the experiment further by living their daily lives as if it was sixty years earlier, right down to the traditional gender roles.

Theatre review: Dead Funny

Comedians Benny Hill and Frankie Howerd died within days of each other; it's during that week in 1992 that Dead Funny takes place, so it's no surprise that 2016, with its bloodbath of the national treasures, would be a good time for Terry Johnson to revive his play. It's a pretty extreme comedy-drama that looks at an imploding marriage through the prism of the silliest kind of classic British comedy. Richard (Rufus Jones) and Ellie (Katherine Parkinson) haven't had sex in 18 months because Richard says he's lost all interest in it. They're seeing a couples therapist who's prescribed an hour every other night of them gradually getting used to touching each other again, even if it's in a non-sexual way, but even this seems to make Richard uncomfortable. What he's much more enthusiastic about is his love of classic comedy, and his position as chairman of the Dead Funny Society, who share his passion. When the news of Benny Hill's death is announced, they plan a tribute party.

Theatre review: Before the Party

The scene is set a couple of years after the War, and food rationing is still in place, leaving the more privileged classes a bit tetchy about their lack of options for dinner. But the Skinner family will soon find plenty more to worry about in Rodney Ackland's Before the Party, which Matthew Dunster revives at the Almeida. Anna Fleischle's set is framed as a 1940s cinema (a conceit extended to the ushers' outfits,) a nod to the salacious movies lawyer Aubrey Skinner (Michael Thomas) disapproves of, filled with stories of crimes of passion the likes of which are about to be reenacted in his own country home as the screen pulls back to reveal the bedroom of his eldest daughter, the recently-widowed Laura (Katherine Parkinson.) Less than a year after her husband's death she's planning to remarry, to David (Alex Price,) two years her junior and with no apparent financial prospects.

Theatre review: Absent Friends

Alan Ayckbourn's latest play is due to arrive in That London soon but first there's another revival from his huge back catalogue. We're back in the '70s for Absent Friends, one of his bleak comedies of awkwardness and middle-class disappointment. Designer Tom Scutt doesn't get to do one of his more expressionistic sets this time but he's just as adept at bringing the decade taste forgot back to life in all its orange, brown and queasy green glory. The well-off middle-class living room is dominated by a garish wall clock as well as lots of other nice touches - the crocodile seemed particularly true to the time period to me. This is the home of Di (Katherine Parkinson) and Paul (Steffan Rhodri,) on a Saturday afternoon when they're about to have a tea party. Di's holding it to cheer up Colin (Reece Shearsmith,) a friend they haven't seen for a while, whose fiancée recently drowned. But Paul has been having an affair with the monosyllabic Evelyn (Kara Tointon,) wife of jittery John (David Armand.) And with Marge (Elizabeth Berrington) fretting over her accident-prone husband who keeps phoning her from his sick-bed, Colin might be the one in least need of cheering up.

The comedy isn't uproarious but it's sharp and the cast work well together to show us this disparate group of clearly-defined characters who've ended up in each others' lives largely by default (though why the stone-cold Evelyn ever ended up married to loser John is a mystery.) Among the strong ensemble Parkinson is good as the smiling hostess permanently on the verge of hysteria, Armand often quietly steals the scene as his character, with his phobia of talking about death (an unfortunate condition given why they're there,) starts to get the shakes, while Berrington's Marge constantly putting her foot in it is also funny. Having been outside of the group for a while Colin's proclamations about his friends' personalities are comically wide of the mark while containing the odd accidental grain of truth. The rather bleak conclusion has to be that Colin's the happiest in his relationship, as his fiancée died before things could sour between them and he remembers her as perfect. Ayckbourn's wry observations remain apt and as that clocks ticks off the minutes in real time Jeremy Herrin's production captures the uncomfortable comedy.

Absent Friends by Alan Ayckbourn is booking until the 14th of April at the Harold Pinter Theatre.

Running time: 2 hours 5 minutes including interval.