Theatre review: The Glass Protégé

Matthew Gould's production of The Glass Protégé opens with the full three-minute trailer for the 1947 film The Bishop's Wife, in which Cary Grant, David Niven and Loretta Young exchange scripted banter about how the film's so full of surprises, they're not going to show any clips in the trailer so as not to spoil the audience's experience watching it. It's not got anything to do with the rest of the show, but it's still the best thing about it. In 1949, some cheekbones called Patrick Glass (David R. Butler) are discovered in local rep in Oxford, and taken to Hollywood by their agent/producer (Roger Parkins.) When one of the leads in his first picture is sacked for inappropriate behaviour, Patrick is promoted to second lead opposite established heart-throb Jackson (Alexander Hulme,) whose legions of female fans are kept in the dark about his sexuality. Patrick quickly falls for Jackson and they're soon sleeping together.

Theatre review: Nothing is the End of the World (Except for the End of the World)

American Playwright Bekah Brunstetter's new sci-fi comedy Nothing is the End of the World (Except for the End of the World) was originally written for a performing arts high school, and features in its lineup all the archetypes of a US teen movie: There's the popular but highly-strung class princess, Jessica (Skye Lourie,) her sexually confused jock boyfriend Kit (Christopher Webster,) the angry rock chick Emma (Amanda Hootman,) Esther, whose parents are religious fundamentalists obsessed with the End of Days (Sheena May,) flamboyant drama geek Danny (Robin Crouch) and outcast Lucy (Natalie Kent.) But in their midst is dropped an even bigger pair of outsiders: Godfrey (Dan Crow) and Olive (Lisa Caruccio Came) are artificially intelligent androids built from the bodies of dead humans. Their attempts to assimilate with the human teenagers will be filmed for reality TV.