Sadie Pearson, Author at North West End UK

A Moon for the Misbegotten – Almedia Theatre

29Jun

By Sadie PearsonNo Comments

London

A Moon for the Misbegotten – Almedia Theatre

Tonight, at the Almeida, A Moon for the Misbegotten lands like a blow wrapped in poetry—a raw, heartfelt collision of booze‑scarred souls, human flinches, and a moonlight that enthrals as much as it devastates. Leading the charge is Ruth Wilson as Josie Hogan, delivering a performance that’s fiercely grounded, physically charged, and impossible to ignore. Set on a rundown Connecticut farm in 1923, A Moon for the Misbegotten follows tenant farmer Phil Hogan and his strong-willed daughter Josie as they face the looming threat of eviction. In a calculated gambit, Phil hatches a plan to use Josie to manipulate their landlord, James Tyrone Jr. But as night falls and moonlight casts its harsh glow, the façade of strategy gives way to something deeper—unspoken grief, buried longing, and a frag...

29May

By Sadie PearsonNo Comments

London

House of Life – Soho Theatre

Mad, glitzy and totally camp, what a glorious night of theatre House of Life is. A silly show with heaps of heart, The Raverend (Ben Welch) and Trev (Laurence Cole) take their audience on a journey of joyous enlightenment through a 6 step plan to get happy quick. Mad as a concept, the performance is less of a story and more of a cabaret-come-religious-experience, with glorious concoction of house, gospel and a cracking set of pipes (the Raverend in particular knocking it out the park vocally every time). Attacking the audience's insecurities with mantras of radical self love, honesty and community, House of Life’s great success is that it leaves no audience member un-nurtured. Chickens often the theme - an unsubtle metaphor for rebirth - we are offered egg-maracas (as well as f...

15May

By Sadie PearsonNo Comments

London

1536 – Almeida Theatre

A period drama which couldn’t be more pertinent, 1536 by Ava Pickett is a triumph of feminist rage against a system which is perpetually rigged against women. The trail of Anne Boylen seen through the eyes of three anonymous women - stripping patriarchal attitudes down to bare bones, this electrifying drama exposes – with a warning claxon – the dangerously well-trodden path toward female subjugation. It is not a play to be missed. ‘History is told by victors. And for most of history, men have been the victors’ states Suzannah Lipscomb in the programme’s foreword. This is a play which inverts that narrative. In a small village near Essex, Anna (Siena Kelly). Jane (Liv Hill) and Mariella (Tanya Reynolds) gather in their seclusion of their childhood meeting place, hungry for London’s gossi...

What If They Ate The Baby? / A Letter to Lyndon B Johnson or God: Whoever Reads This First – Soho Theatre

20Mar

By Sadie PearsonNo Comments

London

What If They Ate The Baby? / A Letter to Lyndon B Johnson or God: Whoever Reads This First – Soho Theatre

The ceiling is clanging. the spaghetti casserole is green and the two housewife’s mannerisms are disconcertingly in-sync. In this absurdist comedy, beneath a polite veneer, nothing is quite as it seems… Shirley (Natasha Rowland), 1950s housewife, is a picture of idealised domesticity - scrubbing floors in a marigold dress to match the marigold gloves that it is apparent she lives in. But when Dottie (Xhloe Rice) arrives to return a casserole tray, despite synchronised displays of social respectability - a polite remark to their husbands’ health - an exchange of recipes - it is clear something is desperately wrong beneath all this. Exploring female autonomy, McCarthyism and queer relationships, as the pretences unravel, so too does the world the characters inhabit. What hooks you firs...

13Mar

By Sadie PearsonNo Comments

London

Weather Girl – Soho Theatre

A fiery tragicomedy and scorching analysis of our climate crisis, Weather Girl at Soho Theatre is a rallying cry for the necessity of protecting our planet. Weather Girl follows Stacey (Julia McDermott), a Californian weather girl who may look like a bleach-blonde-Barbie ‘perfect woman’, but in reality, is anything but. With a Stanley cup full of Prosecco, she is neurotic, impulsive, and a self-confessed alcoholic. See, California is on fire, and this is a fact which Stacey cannot stomach. As the wildfires consume her home, her life begins to be consumed with it. At the heart of this piece the question: how lost are we from nature, and therefore, from our humanity? Watkins delivers a script which boasts a multi-layered exploration climate change to match it’s multi-layered narrative....

7Mar

By Sadie PearsonNo Comments

London

Punch – Young Vic

A heartbreaking true story of male violence, working class anger and redemption. And a critical exploration of the systems which breed this. Punch at the Young Vic is essential viewing. James Graham’s Punch is a true story, harrowingly so. In 2011 Nottingham city centre, nineteen-year-old Jacob Dunne, threw one punch at a complete stranger, 28-year-old James Hodgkinson. Nine days later, Hodgkinson was dead and the punch, an act of murder. Based on the book Right from Wrong by Jacob Dunne, Graham’s script pays tender tribute to all those involved and leaves you unquestioning that – through the brutal lack of opportunity which fostered Jacob’s behaviour – everyone in this story is a victim. Directed by Adam Penford, the script is brought to stage with a sensitivity and nuance that is v...

Outlying Islands – Jermyn Street Theatre

16Feb

By Sadie PearsonNo Comments

London

Outlying Islands – Jermyn Street Theatre

What is human nature? How similar are our needs to those of the animals around us? Is society a force of refinement, or restriction? These are some of the questions posed by David Greig’s play Outlying Islands. August 1939, a prelude to the Second World War. Arriving on a remote Scottish island to a pagan chapel they will call home for the next month, Robert, (Bruce Langley) and John (Fred Woodley-Evans) are sent from London to undertake ministry-ordered observational research into the island’s seabird inhabitants. But this is not all that will be observed. Chaperoned by island owner Old man Kirk (Kevin McMonagle), accompanied by his young niece Ellen (Whitney Kehinde), the events which unfold offer a complex exploration of human nature. Our desires, when free from the shackles of socie...

4Feb

By Sadie PearsonNo Comments

London

Antigone (on strike) – Park Theatre

Antigone (on strike) written and directed by Alexander Raptotasios offered an exciting premise. The Greek classic reimagined into an all too relevant exploration of “the online court of public opinion”. Antigone, sister of an Isis bride righting for her remittance into the country. The likelihood of this, swayed by audience participation. You vote for how the story will turn out. A though provoking premise and a story of serious importance. Unfortunately, it sorely under delivered. Antiya is troubled by the loss of her sister. Not dead, rather at risk of a horrible fate, Esmeh is stranded in a refugee camp with her citizenship cancelled by the UK’s home secretary – Creighton. Having ran from home and joined ISIS at the impressionable age of 14, she is now forced to reckon with the conse...

My Mother’s Funeral: The Show – Yard Theatre

1Feb

By Sadie PearsonNo Comments

London

My Mother’s Funeral: The Show – Yard Theatre

Theatre at its best is an incensing experience. Something which puts vital stories to stage. Which affirms you of humanity’s strength. And fills you with light, as well as heartache and rage. My Mother’s Funeral: The Show written by Kelly Jones at The Yard Theatre does just that. Without a doubt, this is the most moving piece of theatre I have ever been privileged enough to experience. Quite possibly the best thing I’ve ever seen on a stage. Abigail is a working-class writer, recently bereaved. Suffering the fresh and painful loss of her mother, she is confronted with the reality of economic inequality at a time where what’s crucial is support and humanity. She cannot afford the funeral. Her grim luck: she happens to work in an industry which is hungry for ‘authentic trauma’ from ‘peopl...

29Jan

By Sadie PearsonNo Comments

London

The Gift – Park Theatre

What is the worst thing you’ve ever done? And what are the consequences you think you deserve for it? These are some of the questions which The Gift by Dave Florez seeks to answer. Colin is bereft, having received a beautifully packaged human excrement in the post. Unbeknownst to who it may have come from, Colin (Nicholas Burns), his sister Lisa (Laura Haddock) and his brother in law Brian (Alex Price) are subject, throughout the play, to a psychologically tormenting game of “who did it?” As the gift in question continues to anguish Colin, paranoia takes hold and domestic instability bubbles at the surface. More complex than meets the eye, this brilliantly absurd plot has the potential to travel to some truly dark places. Burns’ performance spanned a wide emotional range, veering fro...