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Summerfolk

WHAT makes Robert Hastie’s productions different from other theatre directors is an extraordinary combination of visual richness and visual freedom. His shows just seem to flow. Summerfolk is stunning. 

It is the height of summer, and the well-off are well ensconced in their dachas doing very little. They walk. They write bad poetry. They complain.

Maxim Gorky’s 1904 satire of Russia’s holidaying middle classes — that unfamiliar layer between the landed aristocracy and the peasantry, people who’ve grappled their way up to wealth and promptly lost their nerve — fills the vast Olivier stage to the brim with people not having a good time, and telling us about it at considerable length.

It’s an ensemble evening, all drifting into a 20th century about which the only thing they know is that it is not going to live up to any of their private or public hopes.

“I want to live” is the repeated refrain of these restless, self-deceiving characters. It is also, one suspects, their problem.

Robert Hastie steers an ensemble of two dozen magnificently, and the acting is uniformly terrific. Paul Ready’s Sergei is infuriating and odious, all gravelly voice and grating laugh. Doon Mackichan’s Kaleria is a hilariously pitiable woo-woo figure with a penchant for cringey poetry.

Sophie Rundle’s Varvara perfectly strikes the balance between aloofness and likability. Best of all is Alex Lawther, whose Vlass is sharp, anguished and deeply funny: a comic performance of real precision.

Gorky’s script has been given an idiosyncratic, often coarse updating by siblings Nina and Moses Raine that will divide audiences (quite a lot of people left at the interval) but which I found entertaining. Peter McKintosh’s design and Paul Pyant’s half-gloom blue-green lighting conjur moods and subtle action with quiet authority.

Nipping at the edges of this charmed circle are the poor: beggars shooed away, servants barely acknowledged, a woman frantically searching for a missing child. The world, we sense, is quietly breaking apart.

Yet the evening remains fascinating rather than forceful. With 18 named characters, it is hard to care deeply about any of them for long. Once you’ve established who loves and who despises whom, dacha life proves stubbornly circular. Characters repeat themselves — “I’m so unhappy”; “This picnic is boring. Like life.” — and the play occasionally earns the same verdict. 

One character delivers a withering notice of The Cherry Orchard: “Went on too long. Didn’t like it.” Summerfolk goes on a tiny bit too long as well. It is, though, considerably more likeable than that. A sumptuous and emotionally charged experience.

There are a few minor imperfections: I could have done without superficial nod to female solidarity – it disrupts the tone and its simplifications put the past in an artificial perspective. On the other hand, it serves as an incredible reminder of how far we’ve come. Class is in the air. 

To me, this adaption is a fine piece of craftsmanship — every detail in place, nothing wasted. But it neither rouses nor amuses. It’s a class fable that knows exactly how close it stands to camp, and holds its laconic distance like someone gripping a ledge.

Anyhow. What unsettles me is not the rare, striking adaptations and revisionism — the ones that make us genuinely care about the characters and what befell them (Vanya, Yerma, 1536) — but the indifference of so many. The politics are in the original piece. 

Summerfolk is on at the National Theatre until 29 April

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Michael Morpurgo Interview: “It is the right of every child in this country to be able to go to a theatre and not spend a fortune.”

ON a beautiful late-winter morning, Britain’s storyteller-in-chief Sir Michael Morpurgo, 82, sits back in his armchair in a secluded Japanese-style tea house on his farm in beautiful Devon.

He is youthful and wise all at once as he begins to respond to gently probing questions a hush falls over the room. A kind of kinetic energy flows from this gentle and funny man.

We are talking about his book Private Peaceful which is about to be revisited as a major touring stage production that will return to theatres across the UK in Autumn, bringing fresh life to the acclaimed one‑person adaptation directed by Simon Reade.

Author of over 150 books, he is a defining voice in children’s literature: War Horse, The Butterfly Lion, Private Peaceful, Farm Boy and more are cherished as deeply by parents and teachers as by young readers.

In his award-winning 2003 novel Private Peaceful, Morpurgo delivers a deeply moving account by a seventeen-year-old soldier on the Western Front. Through the eyes of Private Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful, counting the hours to a dawn execution for cowardice. As he looks back over his childhood, his memories are full of family life deep in the countryside. 

Thirty years ago, while he was conceiving his story, Morpurgo and his wife, Clare, came upon a War Cemetery near Ypres, one name caught their eye: Private T.S.H. Peacefull, killed on 4 June 1915. It was never in question that this would become the name of his protagonist.

I ask why it is important for him to see his work regionally beyond major cities. “Well, soldiers from the First World War came from all over,” he says.

“Every single town should have a theatre. It’s the right of every child and every person in this country to be able to go to a theatre and not spend a fortune. When arts are decided in terms of worthwhileness; by the money you spend on them, then you have a problem,” Morpurgo says.

One of the pressures in schools today, Morpurgo believes, is time. “Teachers simply don’t have the space in the day,” he says. Then he leans forward. “I want to mention Mrs Skiffington.”

She was headteacher at Wickhambreaux Primary where he began teaching — and, he says, she understood instinctively why stories matter. Delightfully unconventional, she once arrived at a staff meeting with what she called a revelation.

“The school day is half an hour too long,” he nods. “I want to go home, you want to go home — and most importantly, the children want to go home. No one is learning anything. So, from three o’clock until half-past, every afternoon, choose a story or poem you love and read them aloud. Let the children leave school thinking and dreaming about stories.”

Morpurgo – a father of three, a grandfather of eight and a great-grandfather of four – smiles when asked about the importance of keeping storytelling alive. “It’s vital,” he says. “Storytelling is love in action.”

The former children’s laureate recalls recently watching his grandson-in-law read to his one-year-old great-grandson. The child was too young to follow the plot, he admits — but that wasn’t the point. “He feels the arms around him. He hears the voice resonating on his back. That’s where stories begin — in warmth, in closeness, in connection.” 

It echoes his own childhood, when his mother would sit between his and his brother’s beds and read aloud — Shakespeare, John Masefield, Edward Lear — giving each character a voice, filling the room with rhythm and music. “Sometimes it was funny, sometimes it was sad,” he says, “And do you know,” he adds, “it was always alive.”

That, he believes, is the essence of it: “If you’re telling a story to a child, you must mean it. Children know when you do. And when you do, the story becomes part of the bond you share — something that stays with them for life.” 

He and his wife Clare founded the brilliant Farms for City Children, following the arrival of the first city children, a group from Chivenor Primary School in Birmingham, on January 26th 1976. Fifty years on, he describes the charity as his greatest story.

What began as a bold experiment is now a movement, with farms in Devon, Gloucestershire and Pembrokeshire. More than 120,000 young people have lived as farmers for a week — feeding hens and pigs at dawn, milking in the early light, growing and cooking their own food, and walking fields that stretch far beyond the classroom.

Elsewhere, War Horse returns to the Royal National Theatre this spring —the most successful production in its history —and has now been seen by almost 9 million people.

He remembers the nerves of that first preview in 2007. “I’d seen it, and I knew it was too long,” he admits. A small puppet, perched on a table and newly arrived from South Africa, hardly inspired confidence. “I thought, this is ridiculous — it’s a pantomime horse. It’s not going to work.”

The defining moment came early in the show. “You’re five, ten minutes in,” he recalls. “It’s a boy and his horse in Devon before the First World War.” Then, in a heartbeat, the foal transforms into a full-grown horse: “more horse than a horse.” In that instant, he knew this was one of British theatre’s most phenomenal creations. “That was when I realised something wonderful was going to happen…” Surrounded by seasoned industry professionals, he was overwhelmed. “I was in bits, tears pouring down,” he says, smiling. “All these cynical people — they weren’t coping either.”

Private Peaceful is devastating, but full of warmth, humour, and love. I ask him how important it is that this new production preserves that balance. “Sadness is fine,” he says. “It’s important. It’s part of life. It was important to make it human, so that the friendships between people, families and homes, are there. There’s a solid base for them to understand the story, and the most important thing, for children reading about this kind of a tragic situation, is that there’s hope.”

We go on to talk about the fourth anniversary of the Russian bombs falling on Ukraine. A conflict that has turned tens of thousands of Ukranian civilians into soldiers overnight. He reflects: “History is never behind us,” he says. “Well, I hope they remember,” Morpurgo says quietly. “Not just in a ceremonial, poppy-wearing way (that has its place) but in an authentic way. These were real people. Real lives lost. Real families devastated. Whole societies shaken. War is a kind of madness,” says Morpurgo.

As our time runs out, I ask what he hopes audiences carry with them as the lights fade up.

He pauses.

“I’d like audiences to leave thinking: we must not let this happen again. But it does mean we have to try, constantly, to shape it differently. To understand one another better. To build something kinder. That’s what remembrance should be for.”

“I wouldn’t say I hope you enjoy Private Peaceful,” he adds. “I hope you carry it with you. I don’t think you’ll forget it.

This is his anthem for peace and humanity.

Private Peaceful 2026 tour will visit venues nationwide

War Horse runs 16 May until 30 July at the National Theatre

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Hamlet at the National Theatre

Andrew Scott has ruined my life. His unforgettable fresh-minted Hamlet was mercurial, devastating, and left a profound mark on me.

Bernard Shaw defined Hamlet brilliantly: his passions are those that have produced philosophy, poetry, art, and statecraft—not merely weddings, coroners’ inquests, and executions. 

Any production of Hamlet stands or falls by its prince, one of the most complex characters in dramatic literature. The real problem arises when the weakest link in Hamlet is Hamlet himself.

Alas, this production’s prince is flat, unfocused, and ultimately forgettable.

Robert Hastie’s staging arrives freighted with significance: it is a showcase for Olivier Award-winner Hiran Abeysekera (Life of Pi) in the title role, and an early statement of intent under new artistic director Indhu Rubasingham. What emerges is visually striking, often witty, occasionally inspired—but muffled when it comes to the emotional force of Shakespeare’s tragedy.

Most of the action unfolds on sparse Ben Stones’s single set: a cavernous, palatial hall, part banqueting chamber, part mausoleum. Renaissance angels and cherubs gaze down from the walls, which double as camouflage for entrances. It is a striking backdrop—eerie and atmospheric in torchlit ghost scenes, aided by Jessica Hung Han Yun’s shadow-drenched lighting design. But if it dazzles, it never quite becomes the prison of Elsinore. The same applies to the production itself: atmosphere without tension, style without substance.

Abeysekera’s Hamlet enters not as a tortured philosopher but as a smartly dressed, forlorn figure who punctures his gloom with humour and acrobatic energy—childlike leaps, sly asides, bursts of sardonic wit. He queens out with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, grabbing their arse; his febrile, excitable prince feels modern, ADHD, full of nervous charisma.

He darts in and out of the action, sometimes narrating his own story, and there is freshness in his conversational, ironic delivery. 

Yet that same energy undermines the great soliloquies. “To be or not to be?” becomes throwaway, tossed off with a finger-pistol gesture and distracted by a T-shirt gag. The anguish is swallowed. Hamlet’s defining hesitancy—the struggle between thought and action—never lands.

If Abeysekera’s prince eludes us, Francesca Mills’s Ophelia seizes the heart of the play. Mills commands the stage with a presence at once playful, tender, and moving. She brings clarity, warmth, and humour to the early scenes, then fragility to Ophelia’s madness; the rest of the production, however, fails to coalesce around her. Her performance is rooted in real emotion, providing the rare intimacy this production otherwise lacks. The estranged lovers’ chemistry—strained, touching, doomed—offers flashes of genuine poignancy. It has integrity.

Alas, many of the strong actors in the cast seem either miscast or uncertain of the production’s vibe. Performances are uneven. Alistair Petrie’s Claudius has cool patrician cunning but zero menace. Ayesha Dharker’s Gertrude feels oddly muted. Geoffrey Streatfeild delivers a comic, earnest Polonius, dispatched absurdly by gunshot. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are well-pitched as interchangeable lackeys, and Ryan Ellsworth makes an effective, spectral Ghost. The “play-within-the-play,” with its microphones and splattered paint, rib Jamie Lloyd’s attempts at minimalism.

There are flashes of insight. The production is alert to the play’s themes of theatre itself: Hamlet dons a ruff, a player sports a wry Blockbuster Video Store tee, the staging toys with blurring performance and reality. Abeysekera’s sardonic humour gives Hamlet a wry awareness of his place in history, even nodding to the National’s own 1963 Hamlet. Yet these meta-theatrical gestures substitute cleverness for emotional connection.

Anyway. Abeysekera’s opportunity to play Hamlet matters—he is the first Asian actor to portray the Danish prince at the National – it’s the role every young actor dreams of, the benchmark against which they are measured. But this Hamlet enters a crowded field: in just the past few years, Luke Thallon, Radiohead’s Thom Yorke, Sir Ian McKellen, and, only weeks ago, Giles Terera have each donned the black suit, each bringing weight and definition. We have also had Fat Ham in Stratford Upon Avon.

By contrast, Hastie’s production feels oddly underpowered and uneven. What it lacks, above all, is weight. Shakespeare’s tragedy is shadowed by death, driven by grief, alive with existential terror. Here, the questions are raised but skimmed over; the grief muffled. We are intrigued, but rarely moved.

Francesca Mills alone provides the deep emotional tremor the production so sorely needs. Too often, what’s missing is a sense of emotional and psychological depth.

Hamlet runs at the National Theatre until November 25.

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Inter Alia

What would this evening be like without Rosamund Pike? Even if the dialogue and direction were the same, the meanings wouldn’t be. Pike dramatises herself seriously as posh mum judge. 

Pike blazes as tough-minded Jessica, a crown court judge who has fought her way up through the old boys’ club only to find the patriarchy lurking in her own kitchen.

She opens the play rising from the floor like a rock star — literally: her husband and son bash out drums and guitar as she takes the mic and eviscerates a sexist barrister. This musical element doesn’t really work for me. 

But it is an electrifying start — Miller’s feminism delivered with a rock’n’roll snarl.

“You’re not the judge of me!” Harry yells at his mum. It’s the kind of petulant teenage barb thrown across kitchen tables everywhere. 

And in Suzie Miller’s Inter Alia, the line lands with a thud. Because Jessica is a judge — and as her home life bleeds into her courtroom, the charge sticks in ways that chill.

Miller’s crisp play is narrated from Jessica’s perspective. This is her first major play since Prima Facie, her legal juggernaut that made Jodie Comer a Tony Award winning stage sensation.

Anyway: The same team returns — director Justin Martin, designer Miriam Buether — and so does the anger. Once again, the legal system is in the dock, this time alongside a family dinner table that might as well be an active crime scene.

But this is no easy empowerment anthem. Jessica is also a wife juggling Tesco orders, a mother fretting over her sweet, bullied son. And then comes the horror: a sexual assault allegation at Harry’s school, the accused being Harry himself. Miller’s question: what happens when the system you defend your whole life suddenly turns on your own child?

This is not a subtle play. It’s also not trying to be. Miriam Buether’s pistachio-hued family home splits apart and reconfigures into a courtroom, a robing room, a nightmarish fairytale forest. Puppets, illusions and child actors flicker through Jessica’s mind as she tries, desperately, to hold on to the story she wants to believe.

Pike is on stage the whole time, and she’s terrific — bracingly funny, unbearably raw, equally convincing in karaoke kickback or stony put-down. She multitasks in Marigolds and wig, party frock and robe, laying bare the cost of being both public moral authority and mum.

The play’s limitation is also its trick: we’re trapped inside Jessica’s spinning head. That means the men are mostly sketched too thinly. Husband Michael (Jamie Glover) is decent but dim, a dad in a nice jumper who wants to keep the peace.

Will she use her knowledge of the system’s flaws to help son 18 year old Harry? Harry (Jasper Talbot) is basically good — just desperate to fit in, lost online like every Gen Z kid; they could be any family. Their problem is they often feel like ciphers. 

It is true that the polemic keeps pushing through as the part-flashbacked family relationships are unravelled.

But Miller’s rage gives the piece its power. She isn’t just angry at a legal system rigged against victims — she’s horrified by a society that keeps breeding boys like Harry. 

The 100 minute production lurches from courtroom to kitchen sink to haunted woods, the real monster never quite named but always there: a culture of violence, hardcore porn, and casual misogyny that seeps through bedrooms and screens.

The final stretch wanders a bit — Jessica, literally lost in the woods, drifts into symbolism so heavy it nearly stalls. But the question it leaves behind is knottier than any verdict. 

How do you raise boys who understand consent when the world is spinning poison? What happens when the thing you’ve spent your life fighting comes home in your child’s Macbook?

Inter Alia — “among other things” — is exactly that: a Greek tragedy, a family drama, a legal thriller. It’s flawed, messy, and sometimes obvious, but that hardly matters. It’s meant to sting — and it does.

Pike’s face is etched with anguish and self-recrimination as she falls. This scenario is relatable to many parents, highlighting the dangers of complacency and the dread of catastrophe. If the evening sparks a debate about how one generation guides the next, the appropriate behaviour of men, and how society can foster respect, safety, and justice for women, it’s all success.

Like the National’s tote bags that shout “The fucking patriarchy!” in big block letters, this is theatre as a provocation. Either way, you’ll leave the theatre chewing this over — which, in Miller’s world, is the point.

In the end, a lot is so familiar and so evocative that a feeling of empathy floods over us. Inter Alia doubles as a rich work of social critique.

A couple of months ago, my bright teenage cousin got into trouble at school for “arguing the toss” — he refused to hand over his phone when a teacher tried to confiscate it. When his mum showed me the daily report from school, one line stuck with me: he’d told the staff he wouldn’t give up his phone to “random women that he didn’t trust.” That phrase set off alarm bells.

Schools are on the front line. Many teachers witness boys repeating rhetoric about resisting women’s “control,” mistaking basic rules for attacks on their manhood. What seems like a teenage tantrum often hides a fragile masculinity fueled by manipulative, misogynistic influencers.

Alienated young men are a big problem for us all. And they are closer to home than we realise. 

“Inter Alia” runs the Lyttelton theatre, National Theatre, London, until 13 September. In cinemas from 4 September.

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Till the Stars Come Down

WEDDINGS have long been a staple of the stage, providing dramatists with a setting for characters to gather, burdened by history and ready for recriminations.

Beth Steel’s Olivier-nominated drama, Till the Stars Come Down, retains its humour and poignant melancholy in this timely West End transfer.

Three sisters from Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, find themselves battling on the wedding day of their youngest sister, Sylvia, to a Polish newcomer, Marek (Julian Kostov).

Sylvia (Sinéad Matthews), the bride, calls on her sisters Hazel (Lucy Black) and Maggie (Aisling Loftus) to help her prepare for her wedding. 

Hazel, the family’s sole breadwinner, is fed up. Her husband, Adrian Bower, barely looks at her, and she longs for a bad day. However, she knows she can’t, as her fragile family depends on her.

This bruising play could be said to be a strange one to begin its life in London. 

The National Theatre should totally take it on tour.

Anyway. Gifted Steel taps into a wider mood of uncertainty, resentment, and yearning for change, exploring the subject of post-industrial Britain.

Xenophobia is in great supply: “That’s not a language, it’s a Wi-Fi password,” Aunty Carol (a hilarious Dorothy Atkinson) says of the Polish language. It becomes impossible to ignore.

Steel’s chaotic portrait of sisterhood and community divisions, with its unpatronising portrayal of working-class life, is energised by strong a ensemble performance. 

The play is hilarious, intimate, and bears the tragic inevitability of a soapy Greek drama. It has around 100 brilliant one liners.

Samal Blak’s unassuming in-the-round set design features an artificial turf and a glitterball, fracturing light designed by the brilliant Paule Constable.

Gareth Fry’s classy sound design adds pop anthems to the mix alongside Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. These moments remind us that time marches on.

This vibrant play constantly asks what it meant to be a family and how communities can sustain themselves in the face of changing times and division.

Steel’s writing’s greatest strength lies not in its depth or surprises, but in the opportunities it offers its trio of performers, particularly Black. 

The language is rich and resonant, precise and often cutting or savage.

Modern life is out of control, and Steel forces us to confront our national identity crisis by confronting audiences with uncomfortable local ideas. 

At one moment, Pete (Philip Whitchurch), the estranged brother of the bride’s father, Tony (Alan Williams), sets up the guests like a living planetarium, sending them circling one another. It’s a lovely scene.

Instead of assuming everyone is nice, she encourages us to interrogate our own thoughts and beliefs, as well as those of others, and the inevitable fallout of globalisation on a local level.

People aren’t choosing to go right-wing; they’re opting for the destruction – creative or otherwise – of the old ways that haven’t worked for them – because the country is screwed.

Indeed, the polls are going Nigel Farage’s way, and it’s not inconceivable that Reform could win the next election.

As old ideologies resurface and the nation divides once again, we’d do well to heed its warning. This is England, after all.

N.B. Last night, I had the pleasure of bumping into Dame Helen Mirren. 

During the play, a rogue pair of elasticated Spanx launched by a character from the stage, landed squarely on her head mid-stalls. She had a good time.

Till the Stars Come Down runs at Theatre Royal Haymarket until 27 September
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 Here We Are  
WHERE to go for brunch?
Here We Are was completed posthumously after musical maestro Stephen Sondheim’s death.
Sondheim critics say that he often lacks heartfelt simplicity and directness, coming off more as clever-for-clever’s sake than genuinely sincere: too pleased with his own ingenuity to be satisfying.
When I saw the show’s first outing in New York in 2023, I stated that I kept waiting for Here We Are to get started — to get into something. I was still waiting when it was over and I was back out on the street.
Anyway. This collaboration between Stephen Sondheim, Joe Mantello, and writer David Ives is now at the National Theatre for its European premiere. The production had been seven years in the making when Sondheim died at 91, leaving it to be completed posthumously. 
(At one point, Sondheim quipped that an ingrown toenail rendered him unable to compose; a glimpse into his neurosis.)
The plot is a hybrid reinterpretation of two classic social satires: The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972) and The Exterminating Angel(1962).
Unfortunately, the misshapen material is still as paper-thin as the satirical targets it aims for. At its hollow core are hedge fund billionaire Leo Brink (Rory Kinnear) and his ditzy trophy wife Marianne (Jane Krakowski), who set off in search of brunch following an unannounced visit from a plastic surgeon (Jessie-Tyler Ferguson) and his jaded film agent wife (Martha Plimpton).
David Zinn’s white box set design cleverly transitions from sleek, abstract New York restaurants to a surreal, elegant prison, mirroring the characters’ deepening sense of entrapment. His cartoon costumes are expressive, enhancing a modern world that feels both recognisable and subtle: each transformation exuding a certain chic panache.
Director Mantello has described Here We Are as “the punctuation on an extraordinary career.” And writer David Ives says: “Sondheim was drilled by the press for shows that later became staples. He was his own brand, always new, always smart, always funny. He is his own universe.”
The book is full of forced, unnaturally fast quips that one might, in a state of extreme exhaustion, find amusing. So self-conscious about its themes that nothing in the storytelling occurs naturally.
“Back to square one, everybody into the car.” God, it’s repetitive.
There are, however, some good ideas tucked away inside the scrambled unpleasantness. 
Choreographer Sam Pinkleton adds flair with playful tableaux that animate the ensemble.
Yet despite the polish of Mantello’s staging, the production ultimately feels like a stylish but aimless diversion—an experiment that, for all its craftsmanship, might have been better as a concert.
In Act 1 there are no songs; there is music. In Act 2 there are virtually no songs and no music.
Here We Are is lavishly produced, though, with great care given to the sets, costumes, and makeup, but the spirit is missing.
W.H. Auden said, “All that we are not stares back at what we are,” and I feel exactly this way whenever I think about Here We Are.
A mosaic that never comes together.
Instead, after two hours it closes, looping back on itself with a final, haunting note: ‘The world is pretty messed up.’ And it is.
Runs until June 28, nationaltheatre.org.uk
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 Five Things From The Stage’s Future of Theatre Conference  
April 2025.
I attended The Stage newspaper’s Future of Theatre conference at Soho Place, London.
Overall, it was an interesting day (and I may write more about it at another time). But for now, I have pulled together 5 of the most interesting things that were said during it.
Rosemary Squire 
Speaking at The Stage’s Future of Theatre 2025 event at Soho Place, London Trafalgar Entertainment joint chief executive Rosemary Squire discussed the company’s ongoing growth and shared insights on how the theatre sector can navigate challenging times.
Reflecting on the end of her time running ATG, she said: “Business was booming but behind the scenes, our financial partners didn’t always share our view of how we wanted the business to develop.”
“It was probably the most painful moment of my career as we said goodbye to the company that Howard and I had spent 25 years creating. A truly existential crisis. A body blow.”
Erica Whyman 
Former Royal Shakespeare Company acting artistic director Erica Whyman criticised theatre boards for being “frightened” of staging provocative work.
Speaking during the panel Surviving the Hate Speech: Free Speech and Theatre Lines, Whyman urged boards to be honest — with themselves and their sponsors — about their venue’s mission.
“I think there’s quite a lot of dishonesty about that… We have far too many frightened boards, or we have a funny mixture of frightened and really brilliant business minds.” she said.
Indhu Rubasingham 
Elsewhere, The National Theatre’s new artistic director, Indhu Rubasinham. unveiling her inaugural season this week, said she would welcome being asked about her work as an artist or director, rather than repeatedly fielding identity-focused questions.
Rubasingham outlined her vision for the NT and highlighted the vital role theatre and arts plays in uniting communities and opening children’s hearts and minds.
“We need to be serious about boosting arts education and tackling the growing skills gap affecting our sector,” she said.
“The seeds of creativity are planted in our classrooms and nurtured through skills that empower future generations. Without it, we risk losing not only tomorrow’s artists, but the stage managers, lighting technicians, costume makers and stage designers who make live performance possible.”
Big Idea
A proposal for a “devolved, national, repertory network” of theatres has won the Big Ideas debate at this year’s Future of Theatre conference.
Actor and director Rob Myles issued the provocation, asking: “Labour has made devolution a central policy elsewhere – why not in this industry?”
Graeme Farrow
The chief creative and content officer at Wales Millennium Centre has warned that the theatre industry could face a workforce crisis within two decades without urgent action.
Farrow cautioned against complacency, stating it would be “dangerous” to assume theatremaking will endure simply because it has for millennia. He urged greater collaboration between venues and a bolder embrace of artistic risk.
On the panel How Does the Craft of Theatremaking Survive?, Farrow said: “It would be dangerous to assume that theatremaking will always be here because it’s been here for 4,000 years… I’m not sure we could staff the industry in 20 years’ time if we don’t take real action now.”
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 Indhu Rubasingham’s National Theatre  
THE National Theatre ain’t broke, so I wouldn’t fix it.
Anyway, Indhu Rubasingham has today announced her inaugural season at the National Theatre. First up: Ballet Shoes will be returning to the Olivier this Christmas.
The artistic director of the National Theatre must do far more than programme three stages and occasionally put in 100-hour weeks. 
They must steer the organisation itself—and, by extension, the wider industry—through a fragmented landscape.
Evidently, it’s a role that demands not only nerve, vision, and unshakable resolve but a deep understanding of what the word “national” truly means in today’s fractured Britain.
With an annual public subsidy of around £16.2 million, its burden—and its brief—is to be everything to everyone. That scale of responsibility becomes all the more weighty when placed against the stark backdrop of regional funding disparities now laid bare.
Is the National truly national enough?
It’s a timely question, especially in light of recent research from the BBC, which reveals a sharp contraction in the UK’s subsidised theatre sector. A 2024 survey found that the 40 best-funded producing theatres staged just 229 original productions—a 31% drop from 332 in 2014.
These findings echo a 2023 report by Data Culture Change, showing a 37% decline in self-produced performances across ten major producing theatres in England and Scotland during the same decade.
It is reassuring to see Hull-based Middle Childand Barnsley’s Lung have been named the first companies in residence under a new initiative.
Enter Indhu Rubasingham, the seventh artistic director of the National Theatre, and the first woman—and first person of colour—to hold the post. She follows in the footsteps of Laurence Olivier, Peter Hall, Richard Eyre, Trevor Nunn, Nicholas Hytner, and Rufus Norris.
Rubasingham is characteristically reluctant to centre her identity in public discourse. 
She prefers to lead as an artist first, with a focus on excellence, tenacity, and broadening theatre’s reach—not box-ticking. “I’ve always felt better equipped to express my thoughts through the work itself,” she says. Her promise is simple but pointed: to “appeal to as many people as possible. Audiences like a good story, well told—and that’s true whether you’re at the Kiln or the National.”
Her work on the National’s own stages has also paved her way. From Stephen Adly Guirgis’s The Motherfucker with the Hat (2015) to Anupama Chandrasekhar’s The Father and the Assassin (2022), she has demonstrated the rare ability to balance critical acclaim with popular appeal—a vital skill.
Meanwhile, Rubasingham’s new leadership team signals her artistic intent. Director Miranda Cromwell, playwright Lynn Nottage, and academic Sophie Duncan join as artistic associates alongside Clint Dyer, who stays on. Robert Hastie, former artistic director of Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, will serve as her deputy.
But the challenges are formidable.
Startlingly, both Peter Hall and Richard Eyre in their diaries admit to being forced to thoughts of suicide by the pressures of the top job, describing it as “three-dimensional chess in the dark” and like having a gun pointed at their head. 
And Sir Nicholas Hytner, for his part, recently noted that “the challenges are much more extreme now. Funding has been drastically reduced. The National, like everyone else, must devote a large portion of its resources to education, outreach, and community work—essential and good, but Arts Council England (ACE) seems far less interested in artists than it once was.”
After sixty-two years, the National Theatre remains a work in progress—shaped by economics, shifting cultural tides, and the strengths and flaws of those who lead it.
Rubasingham’s first season suggests she understands the brief: relevance, reach, and rigour. This includes expanding the global audience for National Theatre at Home, a £9.99 per month streaming service for productions that insiders hope to make into a “Netflix for theatre”.
The season of work features 16 brand new productions, including a return to repertory theatre for the first time since 2020.
Rubasingham will direct a rap adaptation of Bacchae herself. This reimagining of the Euripides drama is the work of first-time playwright Nima Taleghani. Paul Mescal will appear in two classic 20th Century plays – Death of a Salesman and A Whistle in the Dark. 
A new musical adaptation of Pride, based on the acclaimed 2014 film, is being staged by P&P Productions in collaboration with the National Theatre, with performances scheduled in London and at Cardiff’s Sherman Theatre.
Elsewhere, a new collaboration between the theatre and rap artist Stormzy was also announced, but details have not yet been revealed. And a family production of The Jungle Book and Hamlet. 
She has already, however, proven that she can redefine a theatre. Now she must help redefine a national stage.
As Laurence Olivier, the National’s founding director, once said, the theatre’s purpose is simple: “To make the audience applaud.”
Needless to say, applause isn’t just symbolic—it’s financial. But no national theatre can ever meet all expectations.
It is ticket sales that largely pay for the productions, and therefore the National are under pressure (as commercial theatres are) to be popular if they are not to dwindle.
I have high hopes for Indhu’s tenure – may she walk the walk, swerve the culture wars and above all stay serene.
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 Why I’m Worried About Regional Theatre  
THEATRE has been viable for thousands of years. 
But we live in chaotic times where conventions and norms are disintegrating by the day.
Speaking at the Olivier Awards in London, Lesley Manville urged increased funding for theatres across the UK, highlighting chronic underinvestment in regional theatre as her greatest frustration.
Manville emphasised the urgent need to support theatres beyond the capital.
She’s right, of course.
And so to today’s BBC report that indicates that between 2015 and 2025, (feels like 50 years -one of the bleakest of arts eras) UK theatre production in 40 of the highest-funded Arts Council England NPO (National Portfolio Organisations) has plummeted by around a third. 
This is not just a crisis for artists; it’s a slow-motion collapse of a national cultural infrastructure. 
But when times are hard, why should you care? Because theatre matters. Culture is one of the few world-class sectors this country has left.
I have worked in producing and receiving house theatre education departments in Salisbury, Dorchester, Winchester, Colchester, and Lancaster. (I mention this only in case you don’t know and so you understand that I know what I’m talking about.)
Indeed, from Truro to Liverpool these provide training and opportunity as a key pipeline for talent, feeding Britain’s burgeoning television and film industries, too. True story.
It’s also the reason that the annual RTST Sir Peter Hall Director Award is vital. The winner gets the chance to direct a full-scale, fully funded production. 
Alas, these kind of opportunities for talent are dwindling.
And here we all are. Across the country, the majority of beloved UK theatres are struggling. It’s not only social change, culture wars, and pandemics that demand agility—it’s also shifting attitudes toward funding.
In the past decade, the economics have radically changed.
ACE’s airy “Let’s Create” strategy, now under government review, has failed to reverse the decline. It’s failed full stop.
This ‘Equality Action Plan’ nobly prioritises “underrepresented protected characteristics groups and lower socioeconomic backgrounds.” 
Now, though, a panel chaired by Baroness Hodge is soliciting public input—questions like “What changes would you like to see in ACE’s mandate?” need urgent and honest answers. 
Meanwhile, the former government’s scattershot “Levelling Up” agenda— that saw ENO forced out of London and relocate to Manchester— has blurred ACE’s priorities. 
So what has gone wrong? It is now common—and I use the word “common” in its every sense— for creative learning within regional theatres to be driven primarily by funding opportunities, with the community work in these departments largely disconnected from the stages and the broader artistic life of the organisation. 
The sector’s issues are structural. We need bold leadership and systemic reform, not more bureaucracy. 
Instrumentalism.
ACE’s budget now stands at £446 million—£3 million less than in 2010. In real terms, public arts funding has fallen by 48% over the past 14 years, while production costs have soared. Energy bills alone have jumped 120% since 2019. The result? Fewer shows, shuttered venues, and a sector teetering on the brink.
In fact, 40% of theatres could become unsafe within five years without urgent capital investment. Heck, one 150kg metal blade on the side of the Curve in Leicester recently fell off the building and narrowly missed a man. Totally normal.
Landlord Leicester City Council is now set to spend £2.2 million to make the Curve safe. 
Anyway, having worked in UK theatres with pest control problems, holes in the roof, a recurring drainage failure that floods the auditorium and one that didn’t even have a lease, none of today’s data surprises me. 
Crucially, this isn’t just about bricks and mortar. It’s about people. After the pandemic, an ongoing cost-of-living crisis, and years of stagnation, many theatre workers are burnt out. 
Freelance careers increasingly rely on unpaid labour, narrowing access to those with financial privilege. According to ACE’s own research, only 43% of freelancers would recommend a career in the sector. Is it any wonder?
On top of this, a new crisis is emerging: censorship. Recent controversies, like the shambolic last-minute cancellation of Royal Exchange’s Midsummer Night’s Dream — that led to CEO Stephen Freeman standing down, HOME Manchester’s bone-brained cowardice pulling an event celebrating Palestinian voices & the collapse of Oldham Coliseum — reveal an atmosphere of risk-aversion, chaotic indecision, and deadly organisational failure. 
In conversation, I overuse the phrase “the worst people in the world”, but the majority of theatre CEOs / top brass that I have encountered really are up there. Actually, I think the calibre of arts leaders is very, very badly depleted.
Creativity is being stifled at a time when it’s needed most.
And then there’s the rolling crisis of arts education.
Performing arts subjects have seen a 68% drop in student numbers, while figures for those taking GCSEs have dropped by 47% and A-levels by 29%. A generation is growing up without meaningful exposure to drama, music, dance, opera or art.
I cannot reiterate how cross I am about it.
Worse, creative subjects are being ditched by secondary pupils as more schools are being forced to abandon GCSE and A-level courses to stay afloat, the Sutton Trust has warned.
In case I haven’t mentioned it enough already, we have to get arts back into schools. There’s no time to waste.
In fact, Ravensbourne University London’s research reveals that 75% of 18- to 25-year-olds aspire to work in the creative industries. However, many feel unsure about how to break in or even where to begin. 
It is on all of us to inspire the theatregoers of tomorrow.
Still, all these factors interlink in a complex and dangerous way. I mean, this isn’t just a curriculum issue—it’s a long-term threat to the UK’s cultural, civic, and creative economy. Because if we want to halt this decline in theatre production, we need more than cash—we need courage, imagination, and vision.
This matters because we are repeatedly told that the arts and creative industries are set to play a crucial role in the UK government’s strategy for economic growth. 
I don’t see how we can make a future without taking better care of the next generation of theatregoers. 
Last week, the cross-party culture, media and sport committee unexpectedly endorsed a levy on major streamers. Perhaps a similar levy could be applied to the West End landlords and theatre owners.
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy says she wants to “bulldoze” barriers in the sector.
The responsibility for saving regional theatre should rest squarely with central government. How about: Nandy demolishes ACE and hands the funds and decision-making directly back to DCMS in the same way that Wes Streeting scrapped NHS England? Just an idea.
By the way, I’ve not given up hope for the future. Daniel Evans and Tamara Harvey at the RSC in Stratford, Deborah Warner in Bath, Elizabeth Newman in Sheffield, Adam Penford in Nottingham and, not least, Paul Hart in Newbury still offer exciting and ambitious programming in the regions.
But like I say, there is clear and present danger for regional theatre in Britain.
A 31% drop in theatre production isn’t just a statistic—it’s a wake up call. 
A friend who rebuilt her life from addiction often says to me, “I can only sweep my side of the street.” It’s a timely reminder that change starts at home. 
We must rally behind our local theatres—not just as audiences, but as advocates for the magic that a vibrant theatre can breathe into a weary city centre, turning it into a place of destination, creativity, and community.
As for the way out of this, it’s time to pull together and get a few steps ahead: now is as good a time as any to start shouting very loudly indeed.
Here’s what you can do
  1. Write to your local MP
  2. Complete the ACE consultation – this call for evidence closes midday on 24 April 2025, so hurry.
  3. Be prepared to fight for the preservation of your theatre.The research for the story counted original and co-productions that opened in 2014 and 2024, including revivals, transfers and tours. They had to be professional in-person theatre productions, at least an hour long, and to have run for at least a week. If a co-production was jointly made by more than one theatre, it was counted as a single production.The research covered the 40 venues, festivals and touring companies that produce original theatre, were operating in 2014 and 2024, and had the highest annual grants in 2024/25 from the Arts Councils of England, Wales and Northern Ireland, Creative Scotland and the Scottish government
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 Top 5 Shows of 2024 (according to me)  
Hello to you.
Hope you’ve been well, I’ve been fine thanks.
So, 2024.
There were sad extinguishings.
Dame Maggie Smith who effortlessly made the ordinary look like high stakes, died aged 89.
As did Timothy West, known for his varied roles across UK theatre and appearing with his wife, Prunella Scales, in C4’s Great Canal Journeys.
American actor Legend James Earl Jones hailed for his many classical roles also passed away.
Among the lowlights were:
5 Bluets at Royal Court: Ben Whishaw under Katie Mitchell’s ghastly direction delivered a relentless monologue about the colour blue, but it was a struggle to get through.
4 Enemy of the People at Duke of York’s Theatre: We didn’t get Jeremy Strong from Broadway, instead we got Matt Smith. No comparison.
3 Your Lie in April at Harold Pinter Theatre: This incoherent manga adaptation was a shambles, with dreadful music to boot.
2 Mean Girls at Savoy Theatre: The movie musical was dumbed down for the stage, and the AI-generated set design was hideous.
1 Opening Night at Gielgud Theatre: Sheridan Smith was stuck in a Van Hove musical that left me speechless – and not in a good way.
Oh my God. 
Still, one way to not get too down about 2024 is to remind yourself that next year will be worse.
So here again are my choices, and as ever readers are invited to vote for their choices below the line and point out what they feel are omissions.
Ultimately, it is down to critics and reviewers to redouble their passions to argue for theatre in pubs, off west end, in the regions & the Fringe that deserve to be seen before they disappear into oblivion.
Is it possible to involve more intelligent, creative interpretation in reviews while at the same time still letting readers know whether the damn thing is actually worth seeing or not?
I’m not interested in celebrity casting; I’m interested in finding something wonderful to write about.
Having worked in the subsidised sector for over a decade I welcome the impending review of Arts Council England — brilliant Baroness Hodge will be appointed by Lisa Nandy to scrutinise the body’s use of public money amid a row over where in the country it is being allocated. 
Anyway: my top 5 shows of 2024 only hint at the glints of the year and I can today confirm that they are:
5 Starlight Express – Amazing.
4 The Importance of Being Earnest – Sharon D. Clarke, Hugh Skinner and Ncuti Gatwa reinvent Oscar Wilde’s Victorian comedy with gorgeous style. 
In cinemas worldwide from 20 Feb.
3 Punch – At Nottingham Playhouse, James Graham’s unflinching play (his best work since Ink) based on a real moving story soared. It had something to say. And it said it with sincerity.
Runs at Young Vic 1 Mar – 26 Apr 2025.
2 Picture of Dorian Gray – Aided by elaborate technology, Sarah Snook brilliantly played 26 different characters.
Technology played a central role, with a camera crew so Snook’s performance could be beamed on to overhead screens.
The smart production won two Olivier Awards.
Next stop: Broadway.
1 Hello, Dolly!
She came, she saw, she conquered.
There was, of course, a countdown.
Dame Imelda Staunton put her stamp on ultimate diva Dolly Levi at the London Palladium. 
Dominic Cooke’s luminous revival – entirely enhanced by Bill Deamer’s choreography – entertained with warmth and fun. (I went five times).
The whole production erupted with joy, and with wonderful ensemble songs like “Put On Your Sunday Clothes” & “Before The Parade Passes By”.
Just marvellous. 
And that’s your #content from me done for the year, let’s see how 2025 pans out, shall we?
Carl x
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