Bristol

4.0★ ★ ★ ★

Catastrophe Bay

Two and a half hours fly by with Catastrophe Bay, Bristol Old Vic Theatre School’s graduate production created by Kit Buchan and Jim Barne.  Set in Newfrock, a fishing village gathered around a lighthouse in...
5.0★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Birthmarked

For two more nights, you can catch Brook Tate performing Birthmarked at The Bristol Old Vic. Regardless of what you have planned, cancel it, then storm down and get a ticket.  I first saw this show just unde...

Faustus: That Damned Woman

Faustus: That Damned Woman is brought to the stage with energetic spirit by Headlong, in a production directed by Caroline Byrne. By making Faustus a woman, Bush’s rewriting raises angry questions about women’s...

Cyrano

Paris, in the second half of the 17th century. Enter nuns, singing hymns of repressed lust under an autumnal apple tree. An overlarge moon is shining in the background. The scene is set for this Bristol Old Vic...

Pride and Prejudice (Sort Of)

Can one really review any adaptation of Pride and Prejudice without some kind of variation on truths universally acknowledged? Probably, so I decided to use all of them in here so no one else has to. It is a...

Roberto Devereux

The works of Donizetti are loved by some for the opportunities they provide for great singers to display their wares. In the bel canto world he dominated for a while, his arias for doomed heroines and forsaken ...

Richard III

Served by a sumptuous cast and set, John Haidar’s production of Richard III brings an instant classic quality to Shakespeare’s blood-drenched conclusion to the War of the Roses. This production neatly reshap...

Wise Children

After premiering in London to enthusiastic reviews, Emma Rice’s latest production Wise Children has just begun the first stretch of its UK tour, in which Bristol doubtless holds a central part. The play is the ...

La Cenerentola

Welsh National Opera has taken two of their productions to the Hippodrome in Bristol, a brave venture given the limitations of the venue, the most serious of which is the lack of an orchestra pit. Despite the d...

Twelfth Night

Asked to sum up Twelfth Night in three words, director Wils Wilson said “CHARATER CHARACTER CHARACTER”. This does not go unnoticed when watching her take on the 17th-century comedy, co-produced by the Bristol O...