Online@theSpaceUKGuileless hero Christopher Blank is ‘born without a single funny bone in his body’ in a one-man play that paints a near future US in broad brushstrokesComedians becoming politicians and pundits. Politicians playing the lovable buffoon….
Exit pursued by a marsh harrier: why I wrote a play for nature reserves | Steve Waters
Created deep in the fens of East Anglia, Murmurations is a new drama about conservation in the age of extinctionIt’s not been a great year for playwriting. In March 2020 I was deep in casting for a revival of my plays on climate change, The Contingency…
Colin Bateman: ‘I don’t usually get emotional while writing but this is hugely personal’
The author of dark comic novels such as Divorcing Jack has written a play, Nutcase, drawing on his relationship with his teenage sonAfter writing 34 books (including comedy crime novels such as Divorcing Jack and Driving Big Davie) and numerous movies …
An electric Faust outfit and a pair of kinky boots in V&A’s ‘major refresh’
Most items in the museum’s new theatre and performing arts galleries going on display for the first timeA fabulous red dress and thigh-high leather boots worn by Lola the drag queen in the musical Kinky Boots are to go on display near to what many woul…
I’m finally seeing live shows again – and I feel like a kid in a sweetshop
Kitchen discos and archive performances kept us going – but being stuck at home made me pine for a full houseIn the early months of the pandemic, as the survival instinct of the live arts community performed a macabre two-step with the increasingly gri…
Edinburgh fringe dance and circus roundup – naked trampolining and alt-twerking
Glasgow-based choreographer Mele Broomes’ intelligence stands out amid the cascade of online dance and circus offerings from this year’s festivalWatching recorded dance on your laptop at home couldn’t be further from the Edinburgh fringe experience: th…
Joe Thomas: the post-Inbetweeners comedown
The ex-Inbetweener’s new work-in-progress standup show, about breaking beyond being typecast, has a self-lacerating characterThe maladroit comic parlaying their anxiety into humour is as old as standup itself. But it’s a highwire act: other people’s ne…
Curtain Up review – audience livens up poignant grab bag of short plays
Theatr Clywd, MoldLetting the audience choose props and costumes adds both absurd and affecting possibilities to this selection of 15 new short playsDirected by Theatr Clwyd’s artistic director, Tamara Harvey, Curtain Up is an appropriately celebratory…
Josephine Baker to become first Black woman to enter France’s Pantheon
Performer who became part of the French resistance will be moved to the mausoleum in NovemberThe remains of Josephine Baker, a famed French-American dancer, singer and actor who also worked with the French resistance during the second world war, will b…
‘I came close to death’: David Harewood on racism and psychosis
Thirty years ago, fresh out of drama school, the Homeland star found himself in the midst of a breakdown, ending up in a locked hospital ward. He recalls the years of racial abuse that had pulled him apartWaking up in a mental institution is a strange …