Review: People – Pitlochry Festival Theatre

First published in The Times, Monday July 24 2017

Three Stars 

The predicament of aristocrats and establishment types who have fallen on hard times is a recurring theme in the plays of Alan Bennett. He charted the fates of the Cambridge Spies, Guy Burgess and Anthony Blunt, in his works, An Englishman Abroad and A Question of Attribution. Miss Shepherd, the heroine of The Lady in the Van, is a former concert pianist reduced to sleeping rough following a spell in a psychiatric institution.

Review: Magic Sho – Tron Theatre, Glasgow

First published in The Times, Tuesday October 6 2015

Four Stars

Over the past two decades, Shona Reppe has built a reputation as one of the leading purveyors of theatre for children and families, both at home in Scotland and internationally. In recent years she has fine-tuned her inventive, offbeat approach to storytelling in shows such as Potato Needs a Bath, in which a group of anthropomorphised vegetables and fruit get ready for a party, and Huff (created with Andy Manley), an ingenious art installation that reimagined the story of the Three Little Pigs as a CSI-style crime scene.

Review: The Lady in the Van – Pitlochry Festival Theatre

First published in The Times, Tuesday July 14 2015

Three Stars

Faced with the prospect of having a stranger’s Bedford van parked in their driveway for more than a decade, most homeowners would have seen red. Alan Bennett, however, spotted a creative opening in his uninvited guest’s filthy clothes, offhand manner and ripe odour. His 15-year relationship with the eccentric, reactionary Miss Shepherd would ultimately lead the playwright to pen a radio series, a play and a feature film, to be released later this year.