Desperate Scousewives - Review

Theatre Royal, St Helens

****

Written and directed by Lynne Fitzgerald

The cast of Depserate Scousewives

Desperate Scousewives is a warm, gritty and filthy comedy that is proudly Liverpudlian. Written and directed by Lynne Fitzgerald (who also performs as one of its cast of four) it is set around the streets of Liverpool, mainly situated on the street where the characters' four terraced houses nestle side by side. 

Vanessa (played by Samantha Alton) is getting married the next day. Her fiancé is currently banged up in Walton Prison and we learn that Vanessa in fact has never met her intended – rather he has proposed to her based upon the topless photos that she had posted to her Only Fans account. Fitzgerald’s writing proudly embraces the familiar scouse stereotypes of being thieving, workshy benefit scroungers. Indeed, were the play to have been written from outside the city it would have been damned for being bigoted. But her humour is wickedly sharp too. When one of her characters refers to being “on the Jumanji – it’s knock-off Mounjaro”, the moment is comedy gold. 

Lynne Francis is Tricia, the outsider – who initially earns the contempt of the other three due to being ginger, from Manchester and most shamefully of all, working for her living in gainful employment rather than living off DWP handouts. 

Completing the quartet is the star-billed Crissy Rock who plays Lily. Bringing some scouse gravitas and wisdom, Lily is the foursome’s matriarch – but she also sits at the play’s darkest core. We learn that both Tricia and Lily have been the victims of domestic abuse, with Fitzgerald choosing to end the first act with a harrowing monologue from Lily detailing the violence suffered at the hands of her misogynist partner.

Act two descends into classic farce, much of which involves the well-tested gag of a corpse being moved from location to location. It all becomes extremely far-fetched, however Fitzgerald never lets the energy levels flag. 

The Theatre Royal St Helens was packed, with Desperate Scousewives being received with massive applause, gasps of pain at the tough moments and roars of laughter as every gag landed perfectly. It is rare that a play can blend eye-wateringly funny smut, with a message about domestic abuse that is truly painful to listen to. That Fitzgerald accomplishes this says much for her skill as a writer.

On tour, click here for dates

Photo credit: David Munn Photography

War Horse - Review

National Theatre, London

*****

Based on the novel by Michael Morpurgo

Adapted by Nick Stafford

Directed by Tom Morris

Revival directed by Katie Henry

The cast of War Horse

London’s South Bank is seeing yet another throughbred equine revival. As Peter Shaffer's Equus plays downstream at the Menier, the National Theatre's Olivier stage welcomes the return of War Horse where it premiered some 20 years ago. Michael Morpurgo’s richly layered yarn about the cruelties of war as seen from the perspective of a Devon-born horse has proved to be one of the National’s most successful productions, having not only toured the globe, but also been translated into a Steven Spielberg movie. Seeing the play back between the Olivier's gaping jaws however is a reminder of just how stunning good storytelling can be when the core narrative is strong and the theatrecraft deployed in its telling, is world class.

War Horse is the simplest of tales. The chestnut foal Joey is trained by a young Albert in a touching relationship of love for the animal and the richness of rural English history. As Joey grows into a full size Hunter, war breaks out and Albert's beloved horse is nefariously sold to the British Army. Albert, too young to sign up, lies about his age and ships out to the French battlefields, dreaming of being reunited with Joey.  Amidst this powerful narrative we are also introduced to another Hunter, Topthorn, with Morpurgo's yarn following the horses and the horrors of war that they are (and in real life, were) forced to endure.

The story's landscape is vast (possibly, in a slightly overlong second-act, too vast dare I say it) but with an enormous company and ingenious projections, the tale is beautifully told.

However, whilst the acting throughout is top-notch, War Horse is famous for the puppetry deployed in (almost literally) bring Joey and Topthorn to life. On the night of this review the three puppeteers animating Joey were Felicity Donnelly, Matthew Lawrence and Lewis McBean, while the team responsible for Topthorn were Rianna Ash, Michael Larcombe and Rafe Young. Toby Sedgwick returns to the production as the Director of Movement and Horse Choreography, and what Sedgwick coaxes from these six talented performers almost defies belief. The visionary genius of the Handspring designed puppets, leaves one gasping at the almost effortlessly realistic portrayal of the horses that these performers create. Theatre, and movement in particular, does not get better than this!

Even more uplifting, again on the night of this review, was to see the packed audience that filled the vast auditorium include a number of school parties. In a world of addictive screen usage and stories endlessly being told via CGI and AI, for these young people to witness such flawless practical theatre and movement being delivered so simply and yet so perfectly, with no digital assistance whatsoever, only added to the evening's beauty.

Runs until 30th July 2026

Photo credit: Brinkhoff-Moegenburg

Allegra - Review

Richmond Theatre, London

****

Written by Peter Quilter

Directed and choregraphed by Stephen Mear

Maureen Lipman

In a play that will touch the hearts of many, Maureen Lipman plays Allegra, a woman of senior years who, through conditions that are unstated in the script but clearly recognisable, is losing her connection with the world around her. Frequently disappearing into her own private world of song, it matters not whether dementia or Alzheimer’s is her diagnosis, rather that Allegra is a woman of remarkable mental energy who is finding her world increasingly confusing.

Quilter offers three foils to Allegra’s vivacity: her brother Ronen (John Middleton), her Czech carer Anna (Elizabeth Bower), and PC Rogers (Bailey Patrick) the local cop who’s tasked with challenging Allegra over her singing that has been complained about as a public nuisance.

The strength of Quilter’s writing lies in its deliberately unsophisticated charm. The action as it plays out is simply defined, in a dialogue peppered with neatly timed gags that all land perfectly. Throw in a liberal measure of songs that stretch back over the years - and how Allegra, who may not remember that she had only seen her brother barely two hours ago, but can remember lyrics and tunes that date back decades - and one realises the perceptive depth of Peter Quilter’s script.

There are hints of Quilter’s Glorious! - about Florence Foster Jenkins - in the story, as well as a hint of One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest as Allegra reluctantly subjects herself to the medication imposed upon her by the Court.

More than just the writing however, it is Lipman who takes this story of simple charm, lifting it into an evening of simply stated drama, that’s also rather wonderfully sung. In a performance of powerfully poignant presence and poise, she captures not only Allegra’s comic eccentricities but, almost heartbreakingly, her fragile vulnerabilities too.

The musical backing may be prerecorded, but Lipman’s singing, often a-capella, is thrillingly glorious, truly live, and possibly one of the finest performances to be found. That the lyrics of Take Me Out To The Ball Game are also projected on screen, encouraging an audience singalong, only adds to the evening’s magic.

Stephen Mear directs his first play (albeit one with music and some neat choreography of course) and he has helmed a hit, unlocking a beautifully nuanced story of simple humanity.

Prepare to laugh and cry - Allegra is exquisitely crafted theatre.

Runs until 13th June, then on tour before playing at the Harold Pinter Theatre in the West End

Photo credit: Marc Brenner

High Society - Review

Barbican Theatre, London

*****

Music and lyrics by Cole Porter

Book byArthur Kopit

Additional lyrics by Susan Birkenhead

Based on the play "The Phildadephia Story" by Philip Barry

Directed by Rachel Kavanaugh

Julian Ovenden and Helen George

In a glorious whirl through the Great American Songbook, Rachel Kavanaugh’s take on High Society is an immaculately cast revival of Cole Porter’s deliciously frothy yarn.

Drawn originally from the 1939 play The Philadelphia Story, the story opens with divorcee Tracy Lord on the eve of her marriage to George a rather nondescript accountant. Mother Lord and younger sister Dinah are flapping supportively as Dexter, Tracy's dashingly suave ex who still holds a torch for her, turns up as a surprise arrival at the family home for the weekend. Her hitherto estranged father Seth, a disgraceful womaniser also arrives unexpectedly. Lob in a couple of journalist lovebirds and a drunk Uncle Willie and the stage is set. What makes this 2026 revival of such a ridiculously improbable story take flight however is the genius of marrying Cole Porter’s cracking songs to one of the finest character-driven casts in town.

Helen George leads the line as Tracy, the delightfully ditzy and over-privileged heiress who opens the show with the title number, goes on to learn the power of forgiveness and redemption (OK, there is a heart to High Society’s bonkers storyline), making equally fine work of some classily duetted numbers as the story unfolds.

Julian Ovenden plays the dashingly divorced Dexter, a man who is gifted the lion’s share of the show’s songs which he duly smashes out of the park, hit after hit after hit. You Do Something To Me and Once Upon A Time are his softer solos, while his spectacular duets of Be A Clown with Uncle Willie (Nigel Lindsay) and Well, Did You Evah? with journalist Mike (Freddie Fox) take the Barbican's roof off.

Lindsay gets a further chance to show off his singing chops, closing the first half with a spectacular Now You Have Jazz. Matching Ovenden for sheer vocal power and beauty is the always brilliant Carly Mercedes Dyer as Liz (the other aforementioned journalist). In act one Dyer deftly duets with Fox in Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? , but it is after the interval, with her mellifluous take on I’ve Got You Under My Skin, that she re-defines this song as her own.

The final singing accolade of the night has to go to David Seadon-Young as George. This accomplished performer has, at Leicester’s Curve over the past two years, perfected the style of the reserved, clipped gentleman whose complexities are unlocked, firstly as Professor Higgins in My Fair Lady and more recently as Georg Von Trapp in The Sound of Music. Seadon-Young channels his mastery of this particular style of character into, on this occasion, the far more shallow and two-dimensional George. It’s a modest (albeit critical) role to fill, with only one decent solo to perform, All Of You. Nonetheless he is yet another of this production’s gems.

So much for the songs - the show’s gags have been honed to perfection. All of the above-mentioned actors together with the stellar Felicity Kendal as Mother Lord and Malcolm Sinclair as Seth are terrific, hitting their marks with pinpoint precision and making sure that every gag lands just as intended.

Stephen Ridley's 16-piece band are a blast, Anthony Van Laast choreographs his company of 28 with flair, Tom Rogers’s sets, while designed for the road tour that the show will shortly set out on, is suitably glamorous, while Jon Morrell’s costumes are a fusion of both pastels and vivid brilliance. And as ever, Howard Hudson’s lighting plots enhance the whole affair.

High Society is an evening of pure theatrical pleasure.

Runs until July 11th, then on tour

Photo credit: Pamela Raith

Atonement - Review

Festival Theatre, Chichester

****

Written by Ian McEwan

Adapted for the stage by Christopher Hampton

Directed by Adam Penford

Miriam Petche

Ian McEwan’s Atonement takes an act of intimate deceit, exploding it across years and battlegrounds into a landscape of epic romance and consequence. It only took six years for McEwan’s 2001 novel to be translated into an award-winning movie and it is screenwriter Christopher Hampton who has returned to this modern classic, this time adapting the tale for the stage.

McEwan’s story as first published was a lavish depiction of wealth, class, deceit and its consequences, as well as a study on the power of the written word. To condense such an opus into two hours on stage (including interval) is a challenge that by its very nature sees corners cut from McEwan’s brilliant original. That being said, Hampton nonetheless fashions a stimulating drama that preserves much of the essence of this richly complex yarn.

We meet the young Briony Tallis in the 1930s. A precociously gifted young teenager with a vivid imagination, as the course of a misconstrued day in her family’s Surrey mansion unfolds, Briony tells a damning lie that sees her sister Cecilia’s lover Robbie ultimately jailed for a crime that he did not commit.

Isabella Dempster plays young Briony, who the story follows from adolescence into her early adult years. Dempster ages cleverly, with her youthful impetuousness evolving into a more considered maturity as the guilt of her deception weighs increasingly heavy upon her. Miriam Petche and Jasper Talbot are respectively Cecilia and Robbie, both delivering performances of heartbreaking poignancy. Theirs was a love barely requited, the two actors capturing the human complexities of their pain in moments of theatrical excellence. The story’s epilogue features a brief appearance from Jessica Turner as the elderly Briony, in terminal decline from vascular dementia and expounding upon her lifetime of atonement. Having been only very recently cast into the role following the unexpected indisposition of the originally cast Sian Phillips, Turner’s work is outstanding.

Atonement as a narrative depends upon a classy design brief, with Chichester veteran Anthony Ward delivering exquisite settings and costumes. A combination of practical ingenuity and slick projections transfer the action across southern England and war-torn northern France, while the costuming, notably Cecilia’s stunning green dress, critical to a focal point of the story, is outstanding.

Only on at Chichester for two more weeks, one can only hope for the show to transfer. Atonement is an evening of tragically beautiful theatre.

Runs until 20th June

Photo credit: Manuel Harlan

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang - Review

Watermill Theatre, Newbury

****

Written by Ian Fleming
Music & lyrics by Richard M. Sherman and Robert B. Sherman
Directed by Paul Hart

Me Ol' Bamboo danced in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

It is bold and visionary to stage Chitty Chitty Bang Bang within the intimate confines of the Watermill’s 200-seater auditorium, but much like the magic that transforms the car in Ian Fleming’s classic story, so too has Paul Hart’s production of the show spread its wings in one of the most gloriously imaginative productions to be seen this year.

Christian Edwards plays Caractacus Potts, the widowered inventor who has clearly been an inspirational and principled, if somewhat maverick, father to children Jeremy and Jemimah. On the night of this review the Potts kids were played by Francis Adams and Auora Breslin who were both flawless in their portrayal of these cute kids who are wise beyond their years.

The show’s classic love story is the understated romance that blossoms between Caractacus and the confectionery heiress Truly Scrumptious (Lydia Louise) and it is a credit to this production that the tender humanity that sits at the core of the story is so delightfully picked out. Without veering into cheesy sentimentality, the strong familial love that binds the Potts clan together is beautifully portrayed.

Even more remarkably, not only was the versatile Edwards the face behind West End Producer, a man with whom I shared many an interval conversation over the years, but Louise is making her professional debut in this show. Based on the quality of this performance, a stunning career awaits her.

The show’s carefully crafted comedy is top-notch. Sam Pay as Boris and Alexander Zane as Goran, the two bungling Vulgarian spies, have honed their timing to perfection. And from a musical perspective Zane, the onstage MD in this actor-musician show, delivers some exquisite percussion on the glockenspiel during act two’s Doll On a Music Box. The other half of the evening’s hilarity is delivered by Samuel Morgan-Grahame as Baron Bomburst and Mairi Ikegami as his wife, the Baroness. These two nail their lampoonery to perfection, taking the scripts gags that, like a pantomime, are aimed at both the young and the not-so-young in the audience and delivering them immaculately.

The star of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang will always be, to use the vernacular, a car that’s more than spectacular, and the Katie Lias's designs for the Watermill do not disappoint. In a neat turn of staging that sees the audience de-camped half way through act one into a fairground marquee for a choreographed treat of Me Ol' Bamboo, on returning to the theatre, the magically powered car has been brought on stage and hidden under dustsheets (think of that chandelier in Phantom…). And of course, as the story unfolds, the car first drives, then takes to the sea, before finally, before our eyes, soaring into the skies with the Potts family and Truly all aboard.

Fabulous family theatre!

Runs until 13th September

Photo credit: Pamela Raith

The Shawshank Redemption - Review

Richmond Theatre, London

***

Adapted by Owen O'Neill and Dave Johns

Based on the short novel by Stephen King

Directed by David Esbjornson

The cast of The Shawshank Redemption

There is always a risk in adapting an iconic film for the stage. Based (like the movie) on Stephen King’s novella, Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption, there was the possibility that Owen O’Neill and Dave Johns might have found their own unique interpretation, inviting the film’s fans on a different and exciting journey. After all, this is an emotionally loaded, years-long story with several interesting characters and it could have been approached differently.

Their play however does not go far enough, forcing the audience into endless comparisons with the 1994 Hollywood classic. By itself this is not necessarily a bad thing, indeed some fans might find it amusing material to chew over. But the play does a disservice to the film and to King’s core strength as a writer: his ability to generate genuine empathy even for the most heinous criminals. And that is, by itself, a sort of crime.

The Shawshank Redemption pulls us back to the late 1940s, to an American prison in Maine full of hardened criminals. That in itself makes for an interesting experience to watch in 2026. An all-male play — a theatrical man cave, if you like — where one can dive into thought-provoking themes of masculinity, sexual harassment among men, the power of friendship and the adherence to hope in the face of blatant injustice. But as the play struggles to plant the seeds of empathy deeply enough, there are very few brief moments of catharsis in which the emotional involvement overshadows the grim, casual mention of the reasons why many of these men are in prison in the first place (usually the murder of women in their lives).

Ben Onwukwe, as Ellis ‘Red’ Redding, steps confidently into the big shoes of Morgan Freeman as the main narrator, delivering his own effortless interpretation of one of the story’s most beloved characters. Onwukwe’s Red, as a resourceful and well-connected prisoner, provides a good mixture of heart and comic upbeat, while showing us the gentle forging of a brave friendship with the prisoner Andy Dufresne, who has been sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of his wife and her lover, despite his professions of innocence. Joe McFadden’s Dufresne, however, struggles to bring to life the unforgettable, nuanced character of the wise, confident and yet alien nature of his character that the story requires. Instead, his Dufresne comes across as fragile and almost neurotic — which does not quite fit the story arc.

Elsewhere, Samarge Hamilton as fellow inmate Rico provides well-measured comic relief, Kenneth Jay as the elderly prisoner Brooksie, enthrals the audience in one of the most emotionally gripping scenes, while Bill Ward charismatically plays the corrupt and ruthless Warden Stammas.

The evening’s flaws include distracting inconsistencies in the actors’ American accents, together with the director’s struggle to mirror the passage of time. The clever use of changing musical fashions adds authenticity to the story, but does not serve well enough as the main indicator of passing time inside the prison walls.

With a running time of more than two hours, while The Shawshank Redemption makes for entertaining theatre, it might simply be easier to grab your remote control and drift back into Freeman’s familiar narration once again.

Reviewed by Florit Shoihet

Runs until 6th June

Photo credit: Jack Merriman