MAYER WAKEFIELD applauds Rosamund Pike’s punchy and tragic portrayal of a multi-tasking mother and high court judge
Latest editorial
Thriller fails dramatically in mountain ascent
Escapees: Hasan Dixon and Katie Elin-Salt
[Jonathan Keenan] 
FIONA O CONNOR recommends an unflinching depiction of child sexual abuse and its aftershocks, set in a working-class Liverpool family
New releases from Paul Weller, Wet Leg, and Dino Saluzzi
PAUL DONOVAN relishes the spectacle of a 1950s detective in pursuit of a 500-year-old murder mystery
MARIA DUARTE recommends the intricate study of a high-performance and highly dysfuntional German family
GUILLERMO THOMAS is intrigued by a history of the Middle East that demonstrates how promising post colonial beginnings were snuffed out by Western imperialist interests
Black Mountain
Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond-upon-Thames
BUILDING dramatic tension is not an easy skill for a playwright to master. Just a word or two, or even a pause, in the wrong place can puncture long spells of hard-earned unease.
In Brad Birch's latest play it is not so much his delicately crafted and intriguing wordplay that bursts the bubble but the deflating lack of substance behind it.
James Grieve's minimalist in-the-round production utilises just a ring of light and a collection of shrill sounds to illuminate the story of a murky love triangle.
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