Latest editorial
ANGUS REID urges us to understand the persecution of Jason Arday from a political and historical perspective, and to see the victim in human terms
A playhouse that’s perfect for Jacobean acts
Re-releases of the classics Gypsy Rhumba and Buena Vista Social Club, and a stunning album by Palestinian artist Faris Ishaq
Nothing, says ANDY HEDGECOCK, can rescue this undistinguished amalgam of ponderous melodrama and shallow philosophical speculation
JAMIE BRITTON invites readers to visit 3,500 locals as part of a marathon artistic pub crawl
JOHN GREEN welcomes a valuable and incisive analysis of a world become hyperpolitical but without the mass movement institutions to represent it
IN JANUARY the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse in London opened for its inaugural production The Duchess of Malfi, directed by Dominic Dromgoole and starring Gemma Arterton.
The space itself is a remarkable addition to London’s cultural landscape. It’s a recreation of a Jacobean indoor theatre which, while drawing on the 17th-century Blackfriars Playhouse, makes no claims to be an exact replica. It is an “archetype” but, whatever the space’s configuration, its productions have been fantastic.
Right from the opening of John Webster’s play, the atmosphere was electric. A remarkable sense of claustrophobia was immediately established and to sit in close quarters with David Dawson’s Ferdinand was unsettling and uncomfortable.
Similar stories
At the Edinburgh Fringe, MATTHEW HAWKINS reviews eight shows in a single day in one venue, all of which reward the spectator
KEITH RICHMOND relishes a superbly conceived modern version of Aeschylus’ drama of murderous family succession
England survived a thrilling Azteca encounter, but the stadium and its supporters created one of the tournament’s defining nights, writes JAMES NALTON
MARY CONWAY becomes impatient with the intellectual self-indulgence of Tom Stoppard in a production that is, nevertheless, total class