Theatre review: Then, Now & Next

With the new Elephant venue already feeling well-established, it feels like ages since I went back to the Borough building that's been Southwark Playhouse's home for the last decade (I can only take so many Macbeths, OK?) But not all the new musicals have been shipped to the new venue, and The Large premieres Then, Now & Next, a first venture into writing for current Phantom Jon Robyns, and fellow musical theatre actor Christopher J Orton (book, music and lyrics.) It is, needless to say, a lockdown project, the two actors having decided to make a more serious attempt at an idea they'd toyed with when they were in Spamalot together. The result is a low-key chamber musical about Alex (Alice Fearn) and the most serious relationships of her twenties and thirties. We meet her with Peter (Peter Hannah,) with whom she has a young son.

Theatre review: Waitress

Jessie Nelson (book) and Sara Bareilles’ (music and lyrics) musical tragicomedy Waitress, based on Adrienne Shelly’s film and currently entering its fourth year on Broadway, comes to the West End with one of its former New York leading ladies, Katharine McPhee, in the title role. Jenna is one of the waitresses at a small-town diner that specialises in pies, but she’s also the cook who bakes them, and comes up with a new flavour invention every day to be the daily special. She themes these around her moods and preoccupations of the day, so ends up with flavours like blueberry and bacon, or marshmallow and mermaid (?) pie that have become the diner’s signature dish. At the start of the show she’s devastated to discover that she’s pregnant – and that it is her husband Earl’s (Peter Hannah) baby.

Theatre review: The Greater Game

Another football-related First World War play doesn't look, this time, at amateur kickabouts in No Man's Land, but at professional players who were the predecessors of the kind of superstar footballers you get today. Michael Head's The Greater Game sees lifelong friends Mac (Peter Hannah) and Jonas (Will Howard) playing semi-professional football in Newcastle as well as working down a mine, when they're given the opportunity to turn professional with a transfer to Clapton Orient. It means uprooting their wives to London, and although the women take a long time to settle there the men quickly become beloved members of the team, Mac as the star player while the female fans inundate Jonas with love letters. But there's a war on, and while the official line is that it'll be over by Christmas, there's also an increasing voice that sportsmen should be leaving their games behind and joining the troops.

Theatre review: Four Play

The cliché about gay relationships is that everyone is cheerfully shagging around, so anyone in a more old-fashioned, monogamous pairing might well feel like they're missing out on something. Jake Brunger's Four Play looks at two gay couples in their twenties, a generation that's always had the option of civil partnerships and now marriage, for whom a traditional relationship is as much of an expected option as something a bit kinkier. Rafe (Cai Brigden) and Pete (Michael Gilbert) met at university, came out together and have been a monogamous couple for seven (and a half - it's an important distinction to Rafe) years. It means neither of them has ever slept with anyone else and, although they still insist everything is fine between them, they think a one-off with someone else might be the thing the shake off any seven-year-itch.

Theatre review: One Arm

Tennessee Williams' prolific career means that however many Streetcars get produced, there's always a wealth of lesser-known works to draw from as well. His occasional attempts to get something more controversial past the censors can mean some genuine firsts are out there, like One Arm. Written as a screenplay but too explicit to get produced in the 1970s, it's been combined by Moisés Kaufman with the short story on the same subject to create this stage version. It's told in flashback from the prison cell of Ollie Olsen (Tom Varey,) who's on Death Row. No pardon seems likely but ever since his face appeared in the papers, letters of support have been flooding in from across the USA. A former Navy boxing champion, Ollie found work hard to come by after losing his right arm in a car crash. But his good looks weren't affected in any other way, meaning he was still much in demand for other reasons.