EWAN CAMERON picks out two fascinating music shows, fusing the Korean, and the Celtic, with the modern
Latest editorial
Seasonal light and darkness in Emma Rice's illuminating Matchgirl
[Steve Tanner]
BENJAMIN POTHIER suggests that Palaeolithic cave paintings in Spain point to the ceremonial use of hallucinogenic flora
The bard confirms that the right has a humour bypass, and replays the English Revolution on period instruments
MARIA DUARTE and ANDY HEDGECOCK review Sunny Dancer, Tony, Songs of Forgotten Trees, and The End of Oak Street
JOHN GREEN relishes a powerful and moving drama that explores the lived realities of west London’s Punjabi community
MARTIN HALL welcomes a plea for greater compassion between believer and non-believer via the framework of philosophical enquiry
The Little Matchgirl and Other Happier Tales
Bristol Old Vic
IN MANY ways, this production of some of Hans Christian Anderson’s best-known stories is traditional Christmas fare, complete with witty rhyming couplets, bright inventive costumes, song, dance and audience interaction and a spattering of jokes.
But it is so much more. The Matchgirl, a mute war refuge, is a vulnerable puppet who burns her matches to conjure up other stories narrated by a music-hall performer and his vaudevillian troupe.
Similar stories
EWAN CAMERON picks out two fascinating music shows, fusing the Korean, and the Celtic, with the modern
Family issues and dragon-fuelled history amount to a vacuous spectacle that ill-fits the theatre, muses SIMON PARSONS
At the Edinburgh Fringe, MATTHEW HAWKINS reviews eight shows in a single day in one venue, all of which reward the spectator
SIMON PARSONS applauds an artist who rescues and rehumanises stories of women, the victims of violence, from a feminist perspective