Review: Betty!, Manchester Royal Exchange

Published in The Telegraph on December 9, 2022

Consider this a spectacular finale to a trilogy about Yorkshire women, from the pen of Maxine Peake: first she immortalised cyclist Beryl Burton, then Hull fishwife Lillian Bilocca, and now Dewsbury’s Betty Boothroyd, the first female Speaker in the House of Commons.

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Review: The Glass Menagerie, Manchester Royal Exchange

Published in The Independent on September 8, 2022

At last, Atri Banerjee’s production of Tennessee Williams’s play sees the light: it was due to be staged in spring 2020. While the cast and team have re-assembled, Banerjee and designer Rosanna Vize completely reworked their plans, to take into account what we’ve all been through since then.

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Review: The Skriker, Manchester International Festival

Theatrically, The Skriker has got the bloody lot. This play reminds us what an astonishing writer – a manipulator of words – Caryl Churchill is, and what a fascinating collaborator: the script demands abstract movement, music, song, visual spectacle. Sarah Frankcom’s revival delivers them all up on big silver platters (sometimes literally). Continue reading “Review: The Skriker, Manchester International Festival”