Karen Tennent
Christmas Dinner
★★★★☆ Touchingly funny
Christmas Dinner may be something of a stopgap as this year’s Lyceum show, but it proves a success in its own right. Amusing, energetic, and wearing its considerable profundity lightly, it should appeal to the widest possible audience.
Still
★★★☆☆ Tender
Still at the Traverse is in many ways a tough watch, with themes of death and loss offset by excellent performances and perceptive writing.
Seats Up at the Lyceum
Installation celebrates Scotland’s missing theatre:
The foyer of the Royal Lyceum has become the set of #TakeASeat, with freelance theatre designers creating a tableaux of empty seats to mark the loss of theatre during the Covid pandemic.
The Secret Garden
★★★★☆ Blooms with delights:
The Secret Garden, Fife-based Red Bridge Arts has once again given a children’s classic a radical makeover without losing the heart of the original story.
Strange Tales
★★★☆☆ Cultural collision:
There are certainly moments of magic in Strange Tales, the Christmas co-production between Grid Iron and the Traverse, but they are too few and far between.
A Game of Death and Chance
★★★★☆ Eerily Interesting
Young critics scheme review
In A Game of Death and Chance, the National Trust for Scotland’s first ever Fringe show, four characters from the 17th century – and death himself – have occupied an old Edinburgh tenement to tell stories of Scotland’s past.
Lost At Sea
★★★★☆ Poignant:
Perth Theatre’s production of Lost At Sea, at the King’s until Wednesday, is emotional, humane and beautifully staged.
Three Sisters
★★★★☆ Direct:
Edinburgh’s Lung Ha theatre company has created a strong and emphatically direct production of Chekhov’s Three Sisters, in a new version by Adrian Osmond at the Traverse and on short tour.
Our Fathers
★★★☆☆ Charming:
Our Fathers at the Traverse has a great deal of talent behind it. The end result is amusing and entertaining but ultimately somewhat too frothy.
Glory on Earth
★★★☆☆ Accomplished:
Extreme care has been lavished on the Lyceum’s Glory on Earth. It has a clarity to its storytelling and performances, backed up by some excellent staging, but never engages the heart or mind as fully as it promises.
