Matt Barton

Reviewed the touring Memory of Water which gets a cosy production where depth sits alongside shallowness

I think the best time to see Operation Mincemeat has been and gone. What you now get is an easy, breezy romp (that needs to be funnier to sustain two and a half hours) whose original idiosyncrasies have been minced up in the process of becoming an outsize commercial hit

Great to chat to two of the brilliant minds behind Imitating the Dog – the OGs of live camerawork on stage – about their (underrated, imho) new War of the Worlds adaptation and what they think about their imitators: Jamie Lloyd, Kip Williams, Katie Mitchell et al

Reacting to the grimly predictable announcement of a Traitors stage adaptation, Rebecca Watson writes: “Culture’s job seems increasingly to be about déjà-vu comfort rather than originality … Artistic directors need to trust that the audience is out there.”

“A critic without criticism is PR … If everyone just oozes blandishments, the crimes committed are worse than negativity.”

See also: theatre reviews

This had an incredible look and concept, brilliantly reworking the Lady Macbeth character. With more dramaturgy and richer writing, it could’ve been extraordinary

There will be a 6pm curfew. You are advised to avoid all theatres in and around Greater Manchester.

Rightly sounding like a PSA

Reviewed Guess How Much I Love You? which didn’t floor me as much as most critics (although I’m not a parent, which must make a difference), but I thought the performances, design and ending were really great

🎵 I’m loving angles instead 🎵

(For reference, the next show in the season is max £48. So this is a 56% hike)

Regional theatre not immune to dynamic pricing, it seems, with Manchester’s Royal Exchange upping top-price tickets for Road to £75 (let’s call it £80 by the time you’ve paid fees on top). A lovely gesture for the opening show of its 50th anniversary season…

I’ve seen these actors do great work. But I really think a revival of a dated 1930s comedy of manners needs some driving idea behind it, otherwise it’s just a revival of a dated 1930s comedy of manners

A clear and coherent creative vision for the venue remains MIA. And I’m not sure when they’ll realise that their increasingly stubborn resistance of anything recognisable as theatre continues to disillusion audiences and result in patchy attendance

Another scattershot season announcement from Factory International. Bewildering for, among other things, calling “spring” the months between May-September. Big names aside (ENO, Ai Weiwei, Kip Williams doing opera), there’s once again no theatre to be seen, and shows running for max three nights

I also loved Romans (Almeida), Mojo (Kings Arms), The Maids (Donmar), Inter Alia (NT), Giant (West End), The Seagull (Barbican) and Till The Stars Come Down (West End) this year

To which I’d also add honourable mention of Escaped Alone/What If If Only at the Royal Exchange – both mesmerising in their own ways, and both thrummed with the buzz of great writing. When the set literally cracked open, it felt like something similar was happening in the theatre itself

Shared a couple of highlights and lowlights from 2025

Reviewed Christmas Day at the Almeida - another great anti-festive show, even if it could’ve done with being a bit more decisive about the eerie abstract elements that decorate it like strange, dark baubles

There’s little fun of the fair in Oldham Coliseum’s Christmas show. A dull and fusty Jim Cartwright revival with none of the bravery and risk-taking of the theatre’s manifesto that we’re handed on our way out

Tried to do justice to the kids in the audience who very audibly asked throughout: “Has it been half an hour yet?”, “What’s going on?”, “What’s that?” and at the end of one sequence, with withering dismay, “All that for that?!”

Aardman characters + Circa acrobaaatics. What should be a surefire hit ends up a shear (🐑) waste of talent

The Everyman’s panto once again chooses a story it’s not especially interested in performing, and the design seemed noticeably cheaper this year too. But a great dame stops it becoming fee fi ho hum

I will be the five millionth person to say All My Sons is incredible. People have picked out individuals perfs like Paapa and Marianne, but how rare is it to see a cast where absolutely nobody puts a single foot wrong?

Royal Exchange hit-maker Raz Shaw has done a great job with what I don’t think is an amazing musical. Although the pace occasionally makes it feel like Singin in a Tornado, this is sunny stuff with a strong chance of rain-drenched rapture

Now this is more like it

Brolly-tree for Singin’ in the Rain at the Royal Exchange

I caught the Toby Jones/David Harewood Othello, which often looked great but essentially hammed the whole thing up in a jarringly overripe way that consistently made the audience laugh while rendering Othello a comic fool rather than a tragic hero

Dinsdale’s Scrooge scrimps slightly on grumpiness, but the BSL performers really added something to the story, and a brilliant Ghost of Christmas Past puppet really added something to the scares

Second Cinders of the week – this one Cinder-better than the last