Gordon Hughes
Three Queens from the Opera
★★★☆☆ Viva queens!
For one night only, writer and director Michael Scott brings together three formidable queens for a preview performance of his new opera concert parody, Three Queens from the Opera.
Dangerous Corner
★★★★☆ Absorbing
The Edinburgh Graduate Theatre Group’s production of J.B. Priestley’s Dangerous Corner, upstairs at the Assembly Roxy until Saturday, is a tense affair, well staged and compelling.
Shakers
★★★★☆ Impressive
The Edinburgh Graduate Theatre Group revive Shakers to great effect at The Royal Scots Club for the first week of the Fringe only.
The Taming of the Shrew
★★★☆☆ Suspiciously old-fashioned
The Edinburgh Makars’ production of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, at the Church Hill until Friday, is an apparently traditional version of the play which may well be more quietly subversive than many modern revisions.
The Satyricon
★★★☆☆ Smutty
Martin Foreman’s new adaptation of Petronius’s first century bawdy comic romp, The Satyricon, is at Assembly Roxy to Saturday in an initially awkward staging that eventually finds its pace and pomp.
The Herd
★★★☆☆ Ruminating
There is plenty to chew over in Threepenny Theatricals studied production of The Herd, by Rory Kinnear, at the Church Hill Theatre until Saturday.
Hay Fever
★★★☆☆ Lightly hilarious
Every family has their foibles, but the Bliss family are next-level eccentric in Noel Coward’s delicious comedy Hay Fever – brought to the Assembly Roxy by EGTG for four performances only.
Passing Places
★★★★☆ Charming
After too long away, Edinburgh Theatre Arts are back in Stockbridge with their take on Passing Places, exhibiting a vibrant spirit and huge delight.
Catch 22
★★★★☆ Catchy:
As with so many great books, Catch-22 seems to have defied dramatic representation over the years. And while EGTG’s version at the Biscuit Factory does not necessarily kill off such an idea, is still an extremely impressive production.
Review – Six Degrees of Separation
★★★★☆ Multilayered
Responsible for popularising the idea that every person in the world is just six connections from every other, John Guare’s Six Degrees of Separation is a play about greed and envy; about what happens when those six connections are reduced to just one.
