Theatre review: Mephisto [A Rhapsody]

Deconstructing itself as it goes along, Samuel Gallet's Mephisto [A Rhapsody] is based on a novel by Klaus Mann which was banned for decades – as argued successfully in court by his family, the real-life target of his satire was all-too-easily identifiable. That target was a German actor whose liberal principles went out the window when he realised the Nazis could be good for his career, and ended up performing Faust for Hitler. Gallet transposes the action to present-day France, and the actor making a deal with a metaphorical devil is Aymeric (Leo Bill,) a company member in a provincial rep. They tour Chekhov around a region with poor transport links to the rest of the country, which leaves it a financial and cultural backwater, and a centre for the rise of neo-fascism. Aymeric, along with colleagues Luca (Elizabeth Chan) and Nicole (Subika Anwar-Khan) urge the artistic director Eva (Tamzin Griffin) to ditch the classics in favour of more urgent work addressing the current political crisis.

Theatre review: The Encounter

Simon McBurney writes, co-directs (with Kirsty Housley) and stars in The Encounter, an adaptation of Petru Popescu's book Amazon Burning, about a photographer whose search for a lost tribe ended up a lot more immersive than he'd planned. Loren McIntyre went into the rainforest with his camera in 1969, making sure to mark his way so he could get back again at the end of each day. That's until the day he actually spotted a member of the tribe, his caution left him and he ended up needing to put himself at their mercy for food and shelter. Having experienced only death and destruction at the hands of white men before, most of the tribe are hostile to him, but one man seems friendly and, despite their lack of a common language, McIntyre becomes convinced they're communicating telepathically.