Theatre review: Reasons to be Happy

Reasons to be Happy is Neil LaBute’s sequel to Reasons to be Pretty, which was itself part of a loose trilogy about body image with The Shape of Things and Fat Pig. Director Michael Attenborough returns to the four characters from the first play and brings a lot with him, including Soutra Gilmour's unusual shipping container set, a soundtrack inexplicably dominated by Queen songs (except this time there's an equally baffling diversion into Genesis,) and the leading man, Tom Burke, who once again plays Greg, now a substitute English teacher. The venue has changed though - Attenborough no longer runs the Almeida so has returned to Hampstead - and so have the rest of the cast, playing the man and two women closest to Greg, as he discovers the pitfalls of dating within a small circle of friends.

Theatre review: Luna Gale

An uneven play but one with a lot of positives at Hampstead Theatre, where Michael Attenborough directs Rebecca Gilman's drama Luna Gale. Caroline (Sharon Small) is a social worker in an Iowa district still recovering from a scandal in which her former boss managed to lose the records of dozens of at-risk children. Caroline herself was not implicated, but it has meant her department now has to pass all decisions by state-appointed supervisor Cliff (Ed Hughes.) It means her decades' worth of experience is still being questioned when she deals with the case of Luna, the baby of teenage parents who recently and unexpectedly developed a meth habit. While Karlie (Rachel Redford) and Peter (Alexander Arnold) undergo counselling and wait for a rehab slot to become available, Luna is to be cared for by her grandmother Cindy (Caroline Faber.)

Theatre review: Filumena

Once a prostitute, Filumena was taken from the brothel by Domenico and put up in a little flat as his mistress. But even after his wife died, he still only kept her there, refusing to marry her and carrying on with other women. Now in her forties, Filumena is on her deathbed and convinces Domenico to marry her - at which point she makes a "miraculous" recovery, just in time to stop him marrying his new girlfriend. Set in the bright, sunny courtyard of the wealthy Domenico's house in 1940s Naples, Filumena is largely concerned with the other big secret the title character has been keeping: Her three grown-up sons by different fathers (one of whom is Domenico) who live in town with no idea of who their real mother is. Robert Jones' set effectively evokes the warm, sunny mood of Eduardo De Filippo's play, but despite a great cast led by the always-watchable Samantha Spiro, Michael Attenborough's production at the Almeida fails to come to life.