Most famous for being chased by the hapless Keystone Cops, Buster Keaton ( 1895-1966) was along with Charlie Chaplin and Laurel & Hardy one of the great comic geniuses of the golden age of silent movies. I certainly spent many happy hours watching his movies. So it is most exciting that the … [Read more...]

The defining image of the 2008 financial crash was the Lehman Brothers staff leaving their glass and steel building on Wall Street with nothing more than a shoebox full of their belongings. It was an ignominious end for the so-called masters of the universe. Sam Mendes (American Beauty) has … [Read more...]

This is a black comedy about a black cat. Its part Reservoir Dogs and part Father Ted and as such The Lieutenant of Inishmore is a surreal, comic satire and send-up of Irish terrorism. Written by Martin McDonagh (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing) and starring Aidan Turner (Poldark) this is a very … [Read more...]

Everything about Imperium is imperious and peerless. The historian is Tom Holland our foremost classic scholar, from whose writings Robert Harris based his novels the Cicero trilogy – Imperium, Lustrum and Dictator- the adapter for the theatre is Mike Poulton (Wolf Hall), the company is the RSC, the … [Read more...]

Where is satire? Alive and kicking in the shape of the uniquely talented Melinda Hughes. Melinda writes, acts and sings her own material. Her latest venture is a show recreating the Berlin cabaret era of the late 1920s until the Nazis came to power on the 30th January 1933. I saw the show last night … [Read more...]

Are we doomed? That is the question which choreographer Alexandra Waierstall asks us to consider in her exquisitely beautiful, profoundly moving and deeply disturbing work And here we meet at the Lilian Bayliss studio. In a tour de force she creates a work of astonishing power and beauty in 40 … [Read more...]