Theatre review: Yen

Another Bruntwood Prize winner comes down to London, to the Royal Court Upstairs this time, with Anna Jordan's Yen taking us to a dark council flat in Feltham. 16-year-old Hench (Alex Austin) and his 13-year-old half-brother Bobbie (Jake Davies) are shirtless, barefoot and filthy, fending for themselves after their alcoholic mother Maggie (Sian Breckin) moved in with a new boyfriend who doesn't want them there. They left their clothes at their grandmother's to be washed, but she also ran off with a man so now they're down to one T-shirt between them for when they make a special trip outside - usually to shoplift some food. Hench sometimes has night terrors and wets the bed they share, while Bobbie has unspecified behavioural issues and is meant to go to a "unit" in the daytime; but it's the summer holidays and the boys spend their time in the flat drinking stolen beer, playing Call of Duty, watching porn and shouting at the dog, Taliban, they've got locked up in a bedroom. It's Taliban who brings a new face to the flat when concerned teenage neighbour Jenny (Annes Elwy) comes round to threaten to call the police if they don't stop mistreating the dog.

Theatre review: but i cd only whisper

There were cheers when it was announced there would be major improvement works done to the Arcola's unloved new building. Less so when it turned out the biggest changes would be to Studio 2, pretty much the only part of the theatre that was liked by audiences the way it was. The smaller studio has been relocated to the basement, directly below its previous home (which is now the bar.) The good news is that if the first show to be staged there, but i cd only whisper, is anything to go by, the transition has been fairly smooth. Kristiana Colón's play is set in an American city in 1970, and looks at the experience of black Vietnam veterans through a character study of a particularly damaged one: Following a dishonourable discharge from the army, Beau Willie Brown (Adetomiwa Edun) has committed an unnamed but seemingly appalling crime since his return home.

Theatre review: Chalet Lines

PREVIEW DISCLAIMER: This review is of the final preview performance.

Madani Younis makes his debut as Artistic Director at the Bush with Lee Mattinson's Chalet Lines, which follows a family of Newcastle women backwards through the decades as they revisit a holiday camp, the scene of many tense encounters between mothers and daughters. Linking the scenes is Barbara (Gillian Hanna,) celebrating her 70th birthday as we join them in a shabby chalet bedroom. She's accompanied by oldest daughter Loretta (Monica Dolan) and granddaughters Abigail (Laura Elphinstone) and Jolene (Robyn Addison.) But as Barbara makes no bones about expressing to Loretta's face, all she really cares about is the absence of her other, favourite daughter. We don't meet Paula (Sian Breckin) until the action jumps back to the 1990s, Loretta's daughters are teenagers, and she too has a clear favourite: Pretty and gregarious Jolene will presumably be easy to marry off but wallflower Abigail is to be berated at all times for her shortcomings.