Author: Hugh Simpson
The Woman in Black
★★★★☆ Still so spooky
The Woman in Black – touring to the King’s yet again this week – retains all of its mysterious power to entrance and terrify.
Looking Good Dead
★★☆☆☆ Unfortunate
Subtle as a bulldozer and only sporadically gripping, Looking Good Dead, which is at the King’s all week, works on one level as undemanding entertainment, but is not exactly guaranteed to have the crowds flocking back to the theatres.
PPP: A New Life (A Mini Musical)
★★★☆☆ Emotional
A New Life (A Mini Musical) at the Traverse every lunchtime this week is certainly not ‘mini’ in its emotional scope or its ambition.
Groan Ups
★★★☆☆ Flat
While there is real energy and commitment in Mischief Theatre’s Groan Ups at the King’s, it is in the service of a script that probably doesn’t deserve such efforts.
PPP: Rose
★★★☆☆ Important
Rose, the latest in the new series of A Play, A Pie and A Pint, produced by Oran Mor in association with Aberdeen Performing Arts and the Traverse, is an involving biographical sporting tale.
History
★★★★★ Outstanding
History by Roy Williams is not only the best so far of the offerings on the Lyceum and Pitlochry Festival Theatre’s Sound Stage audio platform, it must also have a claim to be the most essential of all the audio dramas provided by theatres in the last 18 months.
Playing With Books – the Yellow Door
…and other final Book Festival events by Hugh Simpson The last of this year’s Playing With Books events at the Book Festival was a singular piece. The Yellow Door was even more of a ‘work in progress’ than is usual for the strand as it is not yet even a book. Instead this was an […]
Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age
★★★☆☆ Mixed bag
Given the honour of closing the Edinburgh International Festival that so nearly never happened, Alan Cumming responds with his trademark gusto and skill. Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age at the Old College Quad is, however, an odd combination of the delightful and the infuriating.
Playing With Books – the Long Drop
..and other recent Book Festival events
The Book Festival continues in its new home at the Edinburgh College of Art on Lauriston Place, and also continues to offer events of interest to theatre-goers.
Jack Docherty – Nothing But
★★★★☆ Oddly serious
Jack Docherty – Nothing But in the Gilded Balloon Wine Bar showcases Fringe veteran Docherty, in a piece of deceptively serious dramatic monologue. It draws on his comic roots and showbiz history, but ends up delivering something more troubling and rewarding.
