London Archives - North West End UK

Ali in Wonder(Eng)Land – Jacksons Lane Theatre

15Jul

By Paul AckroydNo Comments

London

Ali in Wonder(Eng)Land – Jacksons Lane Theatre

This rather clumsily titled play is the “rabbit hole” to a rather fascinating 75 minutes of devised drama by the LegalAliens Theatre’s Tottenham Project which reimagines Lewis Carroll's famous Alice in Wonderland as the experience of an immigrant trying to negotiate the English immigration system and cultures. Directed by Lara Prlmiani the play was first created in 2023 and has now been updated for the current production at the Jacksons Lane Theatre. Each successive cast, all of whom are immigrants from a wide range of countries, bring their own perspectives of their challenges in settling in England to the text. The use of Lewis Carroll's famous story as a template was an inspired idea since nothing could be more English and yet it is very effectively and humorously used to illus...

14Jul

By Olivia CoxNo Comments

London

Tender – Bush Theatre

Haunted houses aren’t just the decaying, cobwebbed old mansions we’ve seen in popular culture for decades. In a similar vein (and even colour scheme) to A24’s hugely successful 2026 horror movie Backrooms, Eleanor Tindall’s Tender explores the fear that can lurk in the walls of even the most seemingly ordinary spaces. Part psychological thriller, part queer love story – with sprinkling of body horror for good measure – Tender tracks the lives of young women Ivy (Nadi Kemp-Sayfi) and Ash (Francesca Amewudah-Rivers) as they become intertwined after a chance encounter on a night out. Ivy’s existence looks perfect from the outside, admitting to herself that “everything is in place” – the nice flat, the stable boyfriend, the pleasant job running an overpriced cafe. But from the offset we kno...

14Jul

By Charlotte MansfieldNo Comments

London

Heathers – The Arts at Marble Arch

Based on the cult film from 1989, Heathers the Musical has returned to London ahead of a wider UK tour. Dealing with teen mental health and the pressures of high school, the show is billed as the ‘darker, dirtier cousin’ of High School Musical. However, it's much more of a precursor to Mean Girls, with three popular girls, all called Heather, transforming Veronica (Gerardine Sacdalan) from likeable nerd into a member of their clique, until she realises the mistake she’s made. In Heathers, however, her revenge takes the form of murder staged to look like suicide, encouraged by her angst-ridden boyfriend, JD (Louis Hearsey). Awash with examples of toxic males and females, the musical attempts to inject some humour into its gritty subject by turning the characters into caricatures. Fathers...

12Jul

By Alan Stuart MalinNo Comments

London

Princess Sparkles – Museum of Comedy

If Disney ever collided with a psychological breakdown, the result might look something like ‘Princess Sparkles’. Lily Maryon's debut solo show is gloriously unhinged, unapologetically absurd, and one of the most confidently bonkers princess character comedies I've seen in quite some time. The premise is deceptively simple, Princess Sparkles is a princess-for-hire expecting a room full of excited five-year-olds. Instead, the audience becomes those children, willingly swept into an increasingly chaotic birthday party as reality slowly unravels beneath the glitter. Her repeated insistence that she is "definitely not a Disney princess", something that is totally believable, only makes the comparison even funnier. Maryon demonstrates remarkable command of the room throughout the hour...

12Jul

By Carole GordonNo Comments

London

Shanay Holmes in Concert – Cadogan Hall

Shanay Holmes' first solo concert proved to be a considerable success, her powerful voice presenting a repertoire of well-known musical theatre classics and the songs that have formed part of her own theatrical story. From Oliver! which garnered her the Best Female Lead award in a Musical at the Black British Theatre Awards, to Rent, Annie, The Sound of Music, West Side Story, Miss Saigon and Sweeney Todd, Holmes' clear soprano created an entertaining evening. She hasn't appeared in all these shows, but has chosen songs which she loves and been moved by, as well as those she's performed. And mostly these are great choices which perfectly match her impressive range. Initially slightly nervous, she quickly settled into the roles and the emotional characters in the songs, interspe...

9Jul

By Saloni SanwalkaNo Comments

London

Operation Blank – Etcetera Theatre

Just off Camden High Street and up the stairs of the wonderfully cosy (and air-conditioned) Oxford Arms is Etcetera Theatre which, for the next two days, is home to Operation Blank, a 50-minute thought experiment about what happens when hopeless British bureaucracy meets nuclear crisis. The result is a rambunctious disaster which paints a grim albeit accurate picture of the collective “screw it” we all seem to have said in response to the world’s current state of affairs. At its core however Operation Blank is The George Grant Show and therein lies the audience’s true reward. When speaking with Grant (writer and lead performer) after the show, I learned that Operation Blank was born from a 10-page drunken rant after a night out. And— I mean this in the best possible way—it fee...

9Jul

By Paul AckroydNo Comments

London

Richard III: The Cockpit Theatre

This is an extraordinary production. Directed and starring Nicolas Perez Costa it was per formed to great acclaim at Madrid’s Teatro Infanto Isabel. It is in English but with a largely Spanish speaking cast it is a highly physical, visceral and arresting interpretation of Shakespeare’s classic play about power, ambition and evil. The cast paint their faces white with heavy black make up, along the lines of the Joker in the famous Batman films, and are dressed in dysfunctional costumes of black, translucent tops and heavy ragged cloaks. Something like a cross between grunge and steam punk. The set consists of nothing more than six oil drums and two wooden ladders. These the cast move into the positions required for each scene often standing atop them. The most amazi...

9Jul

By Paul AckroydNo Comments

London

Romeo and Juliet – Greenwich Theatre

Greenwich Theatre’s current production of Shakespeare’s much loved play has some interesting and innovative features. Romeo is cast as a woman, apparently as a tribute to the Pride movement, and it makes extensive use of music played and sung by the six performers who are all talented musicians. Whilst I was initially unsure about the same sex leading couple it worked well and appeared natural. The music was very pleasant although somewhat idiosyncratic, including at, one time, one of Simon and Garfunkel’s numbers, the relevance of which to the plot was not clear. An impressive backdrop had been constructed with a large steel balcony which was used, obviously, for the famous balcony scene but when it was used for dialogue between other characters, for example, in Lord Capule...

Sestercentennial – The Bread & Roses Theatre

4Jul

By Savitha VenugopalNo Comments

London

Sestercentennial – The Bread & Roses Theatre

The United States of America is celebrating its 250th birthday and Hamza Beshara, a Bangladeshi American, is throwing a party for his closest friends. They have been mates since their school days and Hamza thinks of himself as one of the boys, but do they think the same? Hamza has never questioned it, until now. Written, directed, and performed by Arif Silverman, the play observes USA’s sestercentennial by questioning its current politics. In particular, the situation of immigrants and non-white communities. “I was born here, I am American,” Hamza stresses. But he also sees that life is different for him as compared to his white friends. His parents had moved West in search of a better life, and Hamza knows he would struggle if he had to live in Bangladesh. To him, it is bu...

4Jul

By Ralph JeffreysNo Comments

London

-320° F – Sadler’s Wells Theatre

This is not a show I am going to be able to fully describe here. Across almost two and a half hours, Hideki Noda’s show was a mad, brilliant and strange whirlwind of ideas and images. Roughly, the story begins in the present day with a search for angel bones, which may hold the key to human desires. The main scientist Professor Kyuri thinks they will unlock humanity's secrets, the warring pharmaceutical sponsors, a brother and sister pair, are interested in their market value. The fight over finding and exploiting them centres around the character ‘Help’, because he happens to have an angel bone in his right arm, which allows him to detect other angel bones and use them to unlock the full power of his brain, connecting himself to past memories. As I said, this is not a straightforward p...