ANDY HEDGECOCK is entertained by a playful novel that embeds a fictional game at its heart
ALFRED JARRY'S Ubu Roi caused a riot in 1896 with its depiction of a tin-pot dictator's rise to power, and Kneehigh's semi-improvised update of the political satire is as riotously funny.
Co-directors Carl Grose and Mike Shepherd have left the play rough around the edges which, combined with a high level of audience interaction, creates a spirit of anarchy in a production that, in the spirit of Jarry, lacks any subtlety.
Characters are literally flushed down a giant toilet and the often puerile jokes and double entendres create a pantomime of delightful absurdity.
GORDON PARSONS salutes the apt return of Brecht’s vaudevillian cartoon drama that retains the vitality of the boxing or the circus ring
GORDON PARSONS is blown away by a superb production of Rostand’s comedy of verbal panache and swordmanship
DAVID NICHOLSON recommends a dazzling production of Bernstein’s opera set in a world where chaos and violence are greeted by equanimity
MARY CONWAY revels in the Irish American language and dense melancholy of O’Neill’s last and little-known play



