The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE recommends an impressive impersonation of Bob Dylan
Searching for your inner Arthur Miller
MAYER WAKEFIELD speaks to playwright David Edgar about the political analysis that underlies his two new plays
The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Here, Vermiglio, William Tell and Wolf Man
New releases from Thorpe and Morrison, Daria Kulesh, and Will Finn and Rosie Calvert
RINA ARYA confronts the brutal operation of Francis Bacon’s approach to portraiture
Emphasising his continuous engagement in labour movement struggles, ALISTAIR FINDLAY salutes John Foster’s contribution as activist, strategist, intellectual and defender of the Morning Star
ANDY MIAH advocates the use of AI to assist people by expanding access to global literature and culture
EWAN KOTZ relishes a veteran Glasgow band that have lost none of their verve for live performance
THE five years since I last spoke to the prolific playwright David Edgar have been a wild ride crammed with war, rising right-wing populism and a global pandemic.
As I sit down to talk to him about two new plays that he currently has in performance, The New Real at the RSC and Here in America at the Orange Tree, there is much to discuss and, as he admits, “it’s difficult to be optimistic.”
The RSC’s production, his tenth at the theatre over almost 50 years, centres on US political consultants “spreading their dark arts across the planet” — something Edgar is very keen to highlight. So much so that he has also co-authored a book on the subject with Jon Bloomfield titled The Little Black Book of the Populist Right.
More from this author
A landmark work of gay ethnography, an avant-garde fusion of folk and modernity, and a chance comment in a great interview
ANGUS REID applauds the inventive stagecraft with which the Lyceum serve up Stevenson’s classic, but misses the deeper themes
ANGUS REID time-travels back to times when Gay Liberation was radical and allied seamlessly to an anti-racist, anti-establishment movement
ANGUS REID speaks to historian Siphokazi Magadla about the women who fought apartheid and their impact on South African society
Similar stories
GORDON PARSONS applauds one of those few brave plays to confront the politics of our world head on
MARY CONWAY feels the contemporary resonance of a new play set amid the manic and self-destructive patriotism of the McCarthy era
GORDON PARSONS relishes a Shakespearean comedy played at pace for sheer delight
Transmorphed into a romp in the Caribbean, the play effortlessly wins over the audience, writes GORDON PARSONS