REVIEW: The Importance Of Being Earnest, Vaudeville Theatre ✭✭✭

David Suchet In The Importance Of Being Earnest

Director AdrianNoble strikes gold in the quartet of lovers: Gwendolyn, Jack, Cicely and Algernon. Without any question, Emily Barber and Imogen Doel are utterly exquisite, fabulously surprising, and inventively adorable as, respectively, Ms Fairfax and Ms Cardew. I have never seen better performances of those roles on any professional stage. Algernon is here played by Philip Cumbus, whose hunger and enthusiasm for Cicely matches his fervour for muffins. The gifted Michael Benz is a spiffing Jack/Earnest.

REVIEW: Twelfth Night, Richmond Theatre ✭✭✭

Michael Benz in Twelfth Night, English Touring Theatre

The alternative title to Twelfth Night is What You Will, and, more than anything else, that seems Munby’s inspiration here. He has, with real determination, found a new way to approach the text; deliberately emphasised different aspects of the story to fundamentally change the experience.