Emma Rice on bouncing back with Wise Children: ‘This show has been my saviour’

Published in The i on October 15, 2018

Emma Rice is scrolling through her emails as the cast of her new show, Wise Children, prepare to rehearse a scene. She laughs: somehow she’s wound up on a recruitment email service, suggesting she apply for a job in a call centre. Continue reading “Emma Rice on bouncing back with Wise Children: ‘This show has been my saviour’”

Andrew Scott: ‘There was no Hamlet rivalry with Benedict Cumberbatch’

Published in The Observer on June 17, 2018

Andrew Scott, 41, was born and raised in Dublin. Recently seen in the BBC adaptation of King Lear, he is best known for playing Moriarty in Sherlock, and for starring in Robert Icke’s production of Hamlet, which transferred from the Almeida to the West End last year. In 2008, Simon Stephens wrote Sea Wall – a monologue about grief – for Scott; it is being revived as part of the Old Vic’s bicentenary celebrations. Continue reading “Andrew Scott: ‘There was no Hamlet rivalry with Benedict Cumberbatch’”

Why Christmas shows are going down a psychedelic rabbit hole

Published in The Independent on Sunday on December 4, 2015

At no other time of the year are family-friendly shows more welcome than at Christmas. Yet it’s also often a time of boringly traditional, bankable fare. Panto reigns and theatre can tend towards the literary, twee and old-fashioned: Dickensian orphans in the faux snow, endless visits to Narnia and Neverland. This year, however, there’s a sleigh-full of alternative shows hurtling down a distinctly psychedelic rabbit hole. Continue reading “Why Christmas shows are going down a psychedelic rabbit hole”

Review: High Society, Old Vic

Published in The Independent on May 15, 2015

What a treat this show is. A hotchpotch of previouses – adapted by Arthur Kopit from Philip Barry’s 1939 play The Philadelphia Story, but owing more to the 1956, Cole Porter-scored film version High Society, and with extra numbers from his back catalogue slipped in – this staging achieves the arguably rare feat of surpassing its filmic predecessor. Maria Friedman, a musicals veteran onstage, proves she’s just as good in the director’s chair, and the show certainly makes for a “swellegant, elegant” last hurrah for the Old Vic’s outgoing artistic director Kevin Spacey. Continue reading “Review: High Society, Old Vic”