Theatre review: The Boy With Two Hearts

Phil Porter's The Boy With Two Hearts transfers to the Dorfman after originating last year at the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff - appropriately enough, as that's the city where Hamed & Hessam Amiri, authors of the memoir Porter's play adapts, and their family made their home. But not before a rough journey: Beginning in 2000 in Afghanistan, where the Taliban are at their strongest, Hamed (Farshid Rokey) and Hessam's (Shamail Ali) mother Fariba (Houda Echouafni) speaks out publicly against the regime's treatment of women. She expects repercussions but doesn't realise they'll be so quick or so brutal: Within hours the local Taliban has sentenced her to death, and when husband Mohammed (Dana Haqjoo) refuses to give up her whereabouts he's lucky to escape with his life after getting "disappeared" for a while. The family manage to escape Herat for Moscow, but it's only the beginning of their journey.

Theatre review: Vice Versa, or, The Decline & Fall of General Braggadocio at the Hands of his Canny Servant Dexter & Terence the Monkey

The Roman theme of this year's RSC season in Stratford extends to the Swan, most obviously in Vice Versa, or, The Decline & Fall of General Braggadocio at the Hands of his Canny Servant Dexter & Terence the Monkey. Phil Porter's farce is inspired by the plays of Plautus, although they're not the only thing that's been "lovingly ripped off" - that tagline itself comes from Spamalot, and Janice Honeyman's production resembles nothing so much as a Carry On film - there's even a nod to the famous "Infamy, infamy, they've all got it in for me" line from the play's gull, Braggadocio (Felix Hayes.) The vain and ludicrous General returns to Rome from a war, bringing with him some of the people he's enslaved - including the lady Voluptua (Ellie Beaven,) whom he's taken as a concubine.

Non-review: The Miser

Professional reviewers get most of the perks but there's one reserved for those of us who pay for our tickets: The right to make a run for it at the halfway point without feeling guilty about it*. So I can't call this a review of the whole of Molière's The Miser, loosely adapted by Sean Foley and Phil Porter, and directed by the former. I didn't actually hate it - if I had I'd probably have stuck it out so I could rip it to shreds with all the information to hand - I just knew by the interval that there was little to be gained from sticking around. In a production that appears to have been cast by watching a week's worth of repeats on Dave, Griff Rhys Jones plays the titular Harpagon, whose children won't see a penny while he's alive, which is a problem as they've both fallen for poorer people: Daughter Elise (Katy Wix) loves butler Valere (Matthew Horne) and son Cleante (Ryan Gage) their neighbour Marianne (Ellie White.)

Theatre review: The Christmas Truce

The RSC's winter season contributing to the World War I centenary even takes in the family Christmas show; and where Love's Labour's Lost and Won take us either side of the war, Phil Porter's The Christmas Truce puts us in the thick of it. Part of the inspiration was a local Stratford celebrity other than the usual one: Bruce Bairnsfather was an electrician who helped set up the electrics of the original Shakespeare Memorial Theatre, and lit some early productions. But once war broke out he became famous for a different talent, as the comic cartoons he submitted to magazines became hugely popular. He was considered such a morale-booster that once injured he wasn't allowed to return to the front, so he could keep the nation's spirits up writing full-time. But before that he was also present at an event at Christmas 1914 that would become legendary.

Theatre review: A Mad World My Masters

The title feels very familiar to me but apparently A Mad World My Masters' performance history doesn't quite match its fame: Sean Foley's production for the RSC is a rare chance to see Thomas Middleton's Jacobean sex comedy, a play whose relentless series of single and double entendres makes the Carry On films look chaste and reserved. There's two distinct plots: Dick Follywit (Richard Goulding) stands to inherit the fortune of his uncle Sir Bounteous Peersucker (Ian Redford) upon his death. But he's not prepared to wait that long and, with his friends Oboe (Harry McEntire) and Sponger (Ben Deery,) he sets off on a number of ridiculous schemes to part the old fool from his money. Elsewhere, Mr Littledick (Steffan Rhodri) is insanely suspicious of his wife's fidelity - with good reason, as Mrs Littledick (Ellie Beaven) is in lust with Penitent Brothel (John Hopkins,) who's got plots of his own to get her into bed.

Theatre review: Blink

Phil Porter's "voyeuristic love story" Blink comes to Soho Theatre after a successful Edinburgh run. A tragicomic, often joyous but ultimately rather sad look at modern isolation, it follows the unconventional relationship between two socially awkward misfits, both of whom have just lost a parent, and found themselves with both more money and more free time than they're sure what to do with. Sophie (Rosie Wyatt) has lost her job just weeks after her father's death, and is starting to believe herself invisible. Jonah (Harry McEntire) grew up on an isolated Christian farming community in Yorkshire, but his mother's dying wish is that he expands his horizons, so he takes the suitcase full of cash she left him to London, where he moves into the flat below Sophie's. Now a virtual recluse, she spots him feeding a mangy fox in their garden and hatches a plan to start up a relationship without actually interacting in any way.