REVIEW: The Seagull, Chichester Festival Theatre ✭✭✭✭

The Seagull at Chichester Festival Theatre

Hare’s adaptation, the best of the three in the Season, is crisp, charming and comical, thereby magnifying the effect of the more tragic aspects. It’s a markedly short version of the play, and Kent assists the understanding of its contours and colours by interposing interval between Acts 3 and 4. This allows the four central characters of the play to stake out their positions, develop their tensions and alliances, their hopes, fears and dreams; by the time the third Act is over, the various dice have been rolled and Act Four, set two years on, is about consequences; chickens – or seagulls – coming home to roost.

REVIEW: Ivanov, Chichester Festival Theatre ✭✭✭✭✭

Ivanov at Chichester Festival theatre

Honesty, as David Hare points out, is the dominating theme of Ivanov. It is also the dominating principle adopted by Jonathan Kent as the guiding light for his revival of Ivanov, now playing at the Chichester Festival Theatre as part of their Young Chekhov season. The performances he elicits from the specially formed repertory company are intensely honest, truly felt, and they create a theatrical tapestry which is rich in detail and unsparing in terms of vitality and verity.

The Absence Of War 2015 UK Tour

Reece Dinsdale in the 2015 Uk Tour of David Hare's The Absence Of War

CLICK FOR THE ABSENCE OF WAR TOUR DATES BELOW Headlong, The Rose Theatre Kingston and Sheffield Theatres have announced the 2015 UK tour of David Hare’s The Absence Of War. It’s now or never for George Jones. The heavy-smoking, Shakespeare-loving Labour leader needs to get out of opposition and into Number Ten. Plagued by a hostile media, beset by divisions in his party and haunted by his own demons, George has three weeks to convince the Great British Public that he’s their man. But how much compromise is he prepared to make? How can you truly appeal to the man in the street from the Palace of Westminster? And which tie should he wear for Prime Minister’s Questions? Reece Dinsdale will be joined by Theo Cowan, Ameira Darwish, Don Gallagher, James Harkness, Charlotte Lucas, Barry McCarthy, Maggie McCarthy, Cyril Nri, Ekow Quartey, Helen Ryan and Gyuri Sarossy in David Hare’s … Read more

REVIEW: Behind The Beautiful Forevers, Olivier Theatre ✭✭✭✭

Behind the Beautiful Forevers at the National Theatre. Photograph: Richard Hubert Smith

What Hare has created here is a marvel: a tale of hope, horror and truth on an enormous scale, but rooted firmly in the characters and personalities of a particular culture, a particular place. It is, in every way, epic and at its most epic when looking into the minds of the central characters as they contemplate their existence which is a reflection of all of ours.

Cast Announced for David Hare’s The Vertical Hour at The Park Theatre

David Hare The Vertical House Park Theatre

Park Theatre Artistic Director Jez Bond has announced the full cast for the first London revival of David Hare’s The Vertical Hour. Joining Peter Davison and Thusitha Jayasundera will be Cameron Cuffe in the role of Dennis Dutton, Pepter Lunkuse as Terri and Finlay Robertson as Philip. The play, which received its UK premiere at the Royal Court in 2008, will be directed by Nigel Douglas and opens on 25 September, with previews from 23 September, running until 26 October. Nadia Blye knows exactly what her stance is on Iraq. A former war reporter and Professor of International Relations at Yale, she has advised the President and seen action in Sarajevo and Baghdad. She is sure of her place in the world and her opinion of it. Until, that is, she meets an equally opinionated and lethally charming man – her boyfriend’s father – over a weekend in Shropshire. His … Read more

REVIEW: The Judas Kiss, Duke Of Yorks ✭✭✭✭

The Judas Kiss review Duke Of Yorks Theatre

Neil Armfield’s glorious revival of David Hare’s masterpiece about the torments, triumphs and tragedy of Oscar Wilde’s last years, The Judas Kiss, is spellbinding theatre and, but for one glaring inadequacy, would be hard to beat as revival of the year.