Empty theatres

Among the saddest sights in half-empty London are its theatres. Walk along Shaftesbury Avenue and adjoining streets, and there is theatre after theatre advertising empty shows. The Victorian and Edwardian grand buildings, with their stony solidity, graced with sculptural curlicues and busts of Shakespeare, proudly bearing the names of theatrical greats, squeezed tightly into theRead More

Timon in Athens

I’ve been in Athens for a few days, on holiday, not having visited city or indeed the country before now. One curious event I wasn’t expecting was finding out that the National Theatre of Greece was putting on William Shakespeare’s Timon of Athens. Timon in Athens? I could not say no. Timon of Athens isRead More

The Bridge

The Bridge. It’s a good name for a theatre. It makes you think of those plain, bold, striking names given to London’s theatres in Shakespeare’s time: The Globe, The Rose, The Swan, The Theatre. They were located (most of them) on the southern bank of the Thames, and likewise The Bridge, which sits on theRead More

Printer’s devil

Ink is a new play running at the Almeida Theatre in London, written by James Graham, author of the very successful drama about 1970s politics, This House. Its subject is the relaunch of The Sun newspaper under owner Rupert Murdoch (played by Bertie Carvel) and editor Larry Lamb (Richard Coyle). It’s a clever and entertainingRead More