Old Red Lion Theatre Archives - North West End UK

6Apr

By Samantha CollettNo Comments

London

Horne’s Descent – Old Red Lion Theatre

In the intimate surroundings of the Old Red Lion Theatre, you feel as if you have been invited to a dinner party from the last century. With 1920s décor, and a set that resembles a real-life drawing room, this is an immersive fly on the wall experience. Albie (Magnus Gordon) sets the scene for the coming soiree with his cut glass accent and aristocratic ways. We meet his childhood friend Peter Horne (Alexander Hackett) who has recently become a priest, and who Albie wishes to avail himself of his godly duties by marrying him to his latest fling, Mary (Bethany Slater), the niece of Etta (Cici Clarke). Of course, a party is never a good party without trouble, and the scene is set for a night of debacle and debauchery when we learn of Etta’s interest in the occult. Add in the PTSD of t...

Breaking the Castle – Old Red Lion Theatre

8Nov

By Aditi DalalNo Comments

North West

Breaking the Castle – Old Red Lion Theatre

There must be something special about a one-man show relating to addiction and mental illness if it has toured multiple venues across Australia and the UK. With outstanding reviews and audiences engaging with the show, it is clear that the dark, heavy and sensitive themes of the play are skillfully dealt with by writer and actor Peter Cook. The audience enters to a stage littered with some props, chairs and stools. These are creatively used across the settings that the play traverses through. Cook is a great storyteller, both with his words and performance. He tirelessly braves through the 75-minute play, sharing his own experiences with addiction and rehabilitation through the fictionalised character of David. The writing is crisp and conversational - and in a space as intimate as the...

7Sep

By Paul AckroydNo Comments

London

Sugar – The Old Red Lion Theatre

This one-woman show, which was performed initially online at the 2021 Edinburgh Fringe and, thereafter, live at the 2022 Fringe to critical acclaim is now being performed to London audiences at The Old Red Lion Theatre in Islington. Written and performed by Mabel Thomas it charts the life of May, from schoolgirl, aged 6, to a young lady of 18 just entering the adult world. May is a feisty young lady with a determination to win at all costs. This is first demonstrated when in primary school determined to be champion at a rather strange game of " Dibbits" she takes revenge on the boy who actually wins by inveigling him to take her along to share the much-vaunted prize. Aged 10 she decides to become an entrepreneur in order to earn some money but is frustrated when the school decide...

Paved with Gold and Ashes – Old Red Lion Theatre

11Aug

By Khushboo ShahNo Comments

London

Paved with Gold and Ashes – Old Red Lion Theatre

Julia Thurston’s Paved with Gold and Ashes effectively captures the “American” gold-dusted dreams and hopes of five of the many immigrant garment workers employed at The Triangle Shirt Waist Factory. Based on a true story, the play heart-warmingly encapsulates their journeys, working conditions, relationships with each other and the factory in a crisp hour, all leading to the tragic fire claiming the lives of 146 garment workers in 1911. Their interactions- shuffling between each other and the audience are cleverly and cohesively crafted using movement, song and visceral storytelling with directorial support from Maria Cristina Petitti, Warren Rusher, and Stephen Smith. An intimate black box with static warm golden lights, wooden chairs and white fabric create a str...

<strong>Ikaria – Old Red Lion Theatre</strong>

11Nov

By Anisha PucadyilNo Comments

London

Ikaria – Old Red Lion Theatre

Ikaria is a moving capture of two young people's lives in college over a semester. The play recreates for us young love and passion. However, a cloud of loneliness and sadness lurks over our lead Simon. The protagonists' choices may shock and surprise you. We share the intimacy of being in their bedroom in the University halls, but all is not revealed to us until the last scene. Playwright Philippa Lawford's debut play, IKARIA, has won one of 5 runner-up awards for the Ambassador Theatre Group Playwrights' Prize 2022, in association with Platform Presents and Time Out. Her reflections during covid on loneliness, isolation and clinging to a personal relationship in the time of crisis are present in the characters' ruminations. A close observation of the challenges and realities of livin...

<strong>The Drought – Old Red Lion Theatre</strong>

3Nov

By Anisha PucadyilNo Comments

London

The Drought – Old Red Lion Theatre

Nina Ates's The Drought is showing at the Old Red Lion theatre. The 600-year-old pub hosts the 40-year-old intimate theatre setting. The theatre is renowned for its off-west end theatre staging challenging and ambitious work that transfers to the west end and off-broadway. The drought is arresting in its use of light, sound and acting. Marooned in an imaginary time and place where the sea has vanished, the three men battle lack of sleep, food and desperation. The set has drapes of a sail of a boat. The wind's relentless sound on the wood sends a cold tickle down one's spine. The play unfolds bit by bit the circumstances of this lone Captain and Stewart, who seem to be grasping at the last straws of survival. The outsider, the whaler, arrives asking for refuge. He breaks the ritua...

Tomorrow May Be My Last – Old Red Lion Theatre

27May

By Stewart Who?No Comments

London

Tomorrow May Be My Last – Old Red Lion Theatre

In the Second Summer of Love, during the late ‘80s, I went full-tilt psychedelic. I tie-dyed my clothes, listened to Janis Joplin’s Pearl and read the infamous sex and drugs memoir, ‘Going Down with Janis’ by Peggy Casserta. Unlike Janis, I lived to tell the tale. In post-modern 2022, that teenage flirtation with psilocybin and flares seems very distant. Tomorrow May Be My Last delivered a patchouli flavoured flashback to my flower powered youth and is probably the nearest one can get to experiencing a Janis Joplin live show. Nobody sings like Joplin. That’s a fact, but Collette Cooper brings an impressive range to the table in this one-woman show, exploring the life and work of the iconic rock goddess. It’s a tall order, but at times, Cooper totally nails the vocals, es...

The Rubber Merchants – Old Red Lion Theatre

14Jan

By Louise PennNo Comments

London

The Rubber Merchants – Old Red Lion Theatre

A lengthy and absurdist look at commerce, love and sex, this revival of Hanoch Levin’s tragicomic play is brought to the stage by Gamayun Theatre and proves to be an uncomfortable and disquieting watch. The Rubber Merchants is about staying safe, with Asya Sosis’s production attempting to merge “the absurdist comedy of Israeli literature, Ukranian theatre tradition and British styles of performance”. With a floor strewn with packing peanuts, a throbbing disco beat, and a constant drooling objectification of women, this play somehow struggles to hit its mark. Yohanan Tsingerhai (sweaty, nervous, a borderline pervert around women, played by Tom Dayton), Bella Berlow (unpleasant and impenetrable, played by Hadas Kershaw), and Shmuel Sproll (a jaded would-be rock star, played by Joseph ...

2Oct

By Zoё MeeresNo Comments

London

Snowflakes – Old Red Lion Theatre

A man awakes in a hotel room, unsure of how he arrived there. He is agitated, struggling to make sense of his situation when two strangers arrive with a deadly mission. The hotel door is locked, and it will stay locked until the job is done. In Snowflakes, writer Robert Boulton presents a thought-provoking piece of theatre, exploring a number of issues that have been tackled in recent popular fiction, including programmes like Black Mirror and the Saw films. In a society where so many feel unjustly treated, where is the line between right and wrong, judgement and punishment and criminality? Who is the real ‘bad guy’, and how far will people go to see that justice is done? If it’s not an entirely unique plot – I found the ending satisfying if not a little predictable – what really st...

Saving Britney: Prologue – Old Red Lion Theatre

7Apr

By Paul DownhamNo Comments

REVIEWS

Saving Britney: Prologue – Old Red Lion Theatre

Hot on the heels of the recent television documentary Framing Britney Spears, this collaboration from Fake Escape and the Old Red Lion Theatre is a prologue for a live show opening in the Islington space in mid-May. It opens with a shadow puppet introduction which made me think back to the Barbie dolls which populated the film Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (1988), although the words were borrowing heavily from Romeo and Juliet. This tells, very quickly, the story of the rise of Britney Spears from a child artist to a woman who is denied her financial and professional independence. As a one-woman show, Saving Britney: Prologue focuses on Shereen Roushbaiani as Jean, a moderator on a Britney Fan Group. She is around thirty-years old, seems to populate a room full of Britney mem...