★★★★☆ There is something particularly engaging about a personal revelation: insights into actual minds affect us in a way that differs from fictional narratives, perhaps not more powerfully, but with an added poignancy . . . Mental is an honest and humane piece of theatre that draws back the curtain on an area of public misunderstanding . . .
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★★★★☆ In many ways, the most beautiful thing about this play is its apparent mundanity – the set could be your mum’s living room, the dialogue could be the chat you have with a colleague on your lunch break. But it’s just so real. Eddie and Carol’s conversation ranges from discussing favourite animals to suicide attempts.
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★★☆☆☆ Translating the inner to the outer is the challenge facing many an adapter of novels for the stage. Some things skip from page to stage whilst others have to be dragged, bullied and injected with various performance enhancing concoctions. The present offering at the Theatre Royal, however, seems to have developed a resistance to any such persuasions.
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★★★★☆ Looking for the perfect antidote to Trump, Brexit and a second general election in two years? Well, here you go! Anything that can light up a miserable, wet Monday evening in Bristol as effectively as this definitely has the necessary medicinal properties . . . For some simple feel-good, escapist razzmatazz, head on down to the Hippodrome.
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★★★☆☆ Don’t Dress for Dinner is an unashamed farce. Following a couple in their house in the French countryside, both husband and wife are trying to smuggle their respective lovers into the house without arousing suspicion. Within an elaborate web of improbably bluffs, mistaken identities and gross misunderstandings, chaos naturally ensues . . . if you want a good laugh in a so far dreary June, this fits the bill.
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★★★☆☆ The piece is full of idiosyncratic individuals from the fictional seaside town of Llareggub who guide us through their day. The young players of the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School have chosen this much-loved grand old master to showcase their voices and talents during a tour of the West Country, which started at the Backwell Playhouse last night.
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