Broken Glass **** TNT

Being Jewish proves a torment for married middle-aged Brooklynites Sylvia and Phillip in Arthur Miller’s powerful blend of the personal, psychological and political, written in 1994 (when he was nearly 80) but set in 1938 as news of the Nazis’ Kristallnacht rampage hit the NY headlines.

Lucy Cohu’s gentle, understated Sylvia has mysteriously become paralysed - perhaps because of her deep fears about what might follow, perhaps because of her unfulfilling marriage.

Antony Sher’s Phillip, despising his origins yet proud of what he has achieved despite them, is pasty, sweaty, uptight and unable to physically express the love he feels for his wife. He’s the polar opposite of Nigel Lindsay’s completely assimilated Jewish doctor whose interest in Lucy’s psychosomatic symptoms threatens to overstep professional boundaries in this intense and poignant revival.

Tricycle, Kilburn High Road, NW6 7JR (Tube: Kilburn) 020 7328 1000 tricycle.co.uk Until 27th November £12 - £22

Me and Juliet *** TNT

It’s prettily done and lustily sung, but Rodgers and Hammerstein’s 1953 parody of the Golden Age of musicals is a hotchpotch of half-developed storylines and confusing characters – instantly forgettable, but enjoyable while it lasts.

Set backstage (a nicely realistic design by Alex Marker who consistently works miracles in this tiny space) where chorus girl Jeanie is having trouble with her love life, the show-within-a-show structure is unnecessarily complicated but at least gives replacement lead Betty (a sassy Jodie Jacobs) the chance to shine even if her stage manager boyfriend refuses to date her any more now they’re working on the same production.

Meanwhile Laura Main's good girl Jeanie, fed up with being given the run around by bad boy lighting electrician Bob (a powerfully voiced, well-muscled John Addison with a fiery temper to match), finds herself drawn to Robert Hands’ unassuming but far more suitable Assistant Stage Manager. Unfortunately, she neglects to tell Bob.

It’s no surprise that this musical comedy proved to be one of the duo’s least commercially successful collaborations – it’s not a patch on Oklahoma or The Sound of Music and lacks the quirky originality of their State Fair, which the Finborough staged last year. But director Thom Southerland has assembled some fine voices and Sally Brooks’ clever choreography exploits the limitations of the stage in this likeable, small scale European premiere.

Finborough, Finborough Road, SW10 9ED (Tube: Earl’s Court) 0844 847 1652 finboroughtheatre.co.uk Until 30th October £15 - £18

Krapp's Last Tape **** TNT

Just turned 70, Michael Gambon is only a year older than the protagonist in Beckett’s seminal monologue. With his crumpled features he looks as though all the life has been drained out of him as he sits, slumped, at his desk before getting up to scrape his nail deliberately along its decorative edge, retrieve a banana or two from a drawer and add a moment or two of comic business to the glum proceedings .

Running at under an hour, with a long opening sequence carried out in virtual silence and periods spent listening to the birthday tapes he recorded thirty years previously, this reflection on the end of life needs an actor of Gambon’s stature to carry it off.

Shuffling around in a shabby waistcoat and dusty trousers, angrily sweeping the tin containers which hold the carefully catalogued spools marking the passage of the years, he delivers Beckett’s sparse dialogue with the world weary resignation of someone with nothing left to look forward to and the dreams of an unfulfilled writer to haunt him. His haggard features are every bit as expressive as that sonorous voice with its Irish tones.

It’s a masterly portrayal of hopeless decrepitude and it comes as something of a shock when the lights come back on and Gambon skips nimbly downstage to take an age-defying bow.

Duchess, Catherine Street, WC2B 5LA (0844 412 4659) krappslasttape.co.uk nimaxtheatres.com Tube: Charing Cross Until 20th Nov £25 - £35

Birdsong *** TNT

Although this routine adaptation of Sebastian Faulk’s bestselling 1990 novel held my attention throughout the three hour running time, I was never completely convinced by the passionate affair framing its depiction of life in the trenches.

Projected images facilitate rapid scene changes in Trevor Nunn’s efficient production as, in 1910, Ben Barnes’ personable young Englishman Stephen falls in love with the unhappy wife of his brutal French host. War devastates the idyllic landscape of their secret riverside trysts and damages the increasingly isolated Stephen as he marshals his men at the Somme.

But it’s a superb Lee Ross who steals the acting honours with his honest portrayal of working class sapper Jack, worrying about his son dying of diphtheria back home, whilst tunnelling deep beneath no-man’s-land towards the German lines.

Comedy, Panton Street, SW1Y 4DN (0844 871 2118) Tube: Piccadilly Circus (Until 15th January) £20 - £49.50

Enlightenment *** TNT

Programming at the Hampstead theatre has been somewhat hit and miss in recent years, so hopes are high that incoming artistic director Edward Hall will turn things round and restore its former reputation as a first class off West End venue. Unfortunately, his inaugural production fails to live up to expectations, a double pity as playwright Shelagh Stephenson has a proven track record as a writer of intelligent, witty and thought provoking drama.

The premise is promising enough – backpacking 20 year old Adam has been missing for 6 months since the Jakarta bombings and his academic step-father Nick and mother Lia crave proof, one way or the other, of the fate of her missing son.

Although the opening scene - with a not very funny psychic - doesn’t ring true in the context of their pristine middleclass household, the desperate anguish of Julie Graham’s Lia certainly does. So one can just about buy her reluctant decision to get involved with Daisy Beaumont’s unscrupulously persistent TV programme maker (who’s more caricature then credible) in a last ditch attempt to trace him. But one loses patience with Lia’s prolonged indulgence of the amnesiac (and increasingly disturbing) cuckoo in the nest who meets them at the airport, and, whilst moderately entertaining, this psychological thriller fails to live up to its more profound (and only partially integrated) aspirations.

Hampstead, Eton Avenue, NW3 3EU (020 7722 9301) Tube: Swiss Cottage www.hampsteadtheatre.com Until 30th October £22-£29

Traces **** TNT

The intriguingly named young Canadian troupe Les 7 Doigts de la Main consists of a couple of former Cirque du Soleil performers plus alumni of Montreal’s National Circus School. The training shows. They’ve brought all their considerable acrobatic skills with them, but have ditched fancy costumes (they don’t need them) and superannuated clowns in favour of a short, edgy production which builds to a jaw-dropping finale with lots of gasp-making moments along the way.

Staged within the conceit that, sometime in the not-too–distant future, they find themselves sheltering in a bunker, the five performers introduce themselves - name, height, weight and the barest of personality information – then throw their lithe bodies across the stage with a breathtakingly fluid agility.

The solo routines are impressive enough – Philip Rosenberg’s superbly controlled hand balancing on a disjointed window dummy, Antoine Carabinier Lepine’s gyroscopic rotations on the single wheel, Antoine Auger giving the monkeys in the jungle a gravity-defying run for their money as he swings from pole to Chinese Pole. But there’s also an astonishing amount of trust between the acrobats as Genevieve Morin throws herself backwards into the air to land on her partner’s shoulders. There’s light-hearted urban fun, too, with basketball and skateboard routines led by a cheeky Jonathan Casaubon - all leading up to an accelerating tumble through an ever higher pile of hoops, diving backwards, forwards and every which way in a quicksilver climax to a thrilling show.

Go see.

Peacock Theatre, Portugal Street WC2A 2HT (0844 412 4322) sadlerswells.comTube: Holborn tube Until 30th October £10 - £38

Faust TNT

Icelandic theatre company Vesturport first made an impact over here in 2003 with an aerial Romeo and Juliet. Its eye-catching approach opened London doors for actor/director Gisli Orn Gardarsson who has since brought us inspired productions of Kafka’s Metamorphosis and Buchner’s Woyzeck.

His latest venture reinvents Goethe’s life’s work as a disturbing Christmas time occurrence in an old people’s home where the residents are waiting to die and retired actor Johann is bemoaning the fact that, during a long and successful career, he never had the opportunity to play Faust. Encouraged by a fellow resident, he starts to enact it, but, frustrated by the knowledge that he can never possess the beautiful young nurse Greta, he tries, instead, to hang himself with the Christmas fairylights. His attempt is foiled (or is the whole episode a brink of death experience?) by a neck-crunching Mefisto, ripping off a latex mask to emerge from a recent corpse and offer him the chance of a moment of perfect happiness with Greta in exchange for his soul.

The production is a collaborative effort but isn’t totally successful. The basic theme of the mammoth original is still there, though confusing, but what fascinates is the gymnastics of the Icelandic cast who wade across the enormous fishnet suspended over the stalls to the atmospheric music provided by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis. Every so often, a performer lands in the crisscross mesh, seemingly from nowhere, with the explosive force of a shot fired from a cannon. Walls are scaled and the floor holds its own secrets.

Not without its moments of wry humour – a synchronised wheelchair workout to Wham’s Last Christmas, the decrepit oldies transformed into seductively athletic, punkish devils – but, despite a touching performance from Thorsteinn Gunnarsson as the lovesick Johann, ultimately this is more show than coherent content.

Young Vic, The Cut, SE1 8LZ (0207 922 2922) Tube: Southwark/ Waterloo youngvic.org
Until 30th October £10.00 - £27.50

Lower Ninth *** TNT

Stranded on a rooftop, two African-Americans sweat, bicker, banter and wonder whether anyone will come to their rescue before it’s too late for them, just as it is already for the garbage bag covered corpse of their drug-dealing friend whose body, hauled from the rising water, lies decomposing next to them.

Kicking off the Donmar’s first Trafalgar Studios season showcasing the work of its Resident Assistant Directors, Charlotte Westenra’s atmospheric production of American playwright Beau Willimon’s short new play takes us back to 2005 when the Mississippi flooded its banks in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and New Orleans became a watery grave for hundreds of inhabitants - and the failure of the emergency services subsequently claimed the lives of many more.

The dialogue fizzes in the early scenes as young E-Z and older bible-spouting Malcolm try to outwit each other in a time-passing game of twenty questions. Malcolm was once a bad boy who, years ago, walked out on E-Z’s now dead mother and has since found God. But Willimon only offers tantalising hints of their past lives, focussing on their current predicament as, without food or water, their condition deteriorates.

Like its protagonists, the play can’t find a way forward, but Ray Fearon and Anthony Welsh are superb as, respectively, born-again Malcolm struggling to maintain control over a still volatile temper and edgy, resentful E-Z who’s more scared than he wants to let on.

Trafalgar Studios (2), Whitehall, SW1A 2DY (0844 871 7632) Tube: Charing Cross tube donmarwarehouse.com £17.50 Until 23rd October

Passion This is London

Inspired by the 1980's film of mid 19th century Italian Iginio Ugo Tarchetti's unfinished novel (he died, at 29, before he could complete it) Sondheim's musical version is perhaps one of the most operatic of his works.
The melodies are elusive, the lyrics less witty than customary, and though there are tiny touches of humour in the officers' mess, this is, overwhelmingly, the powerful story of an unequal triangle
in which a dashing young soldier finds himself unexpectedly torn between his torrid love affair with his beautiful married Milanese mistress Clara and the relentlessly scheming Fosca, the overwrought, sickly cousin of the colonel in charge of the remote garrison where he is posted.
Played without an interval, Jamie Lloyd's elegantly choreographed production (the scene changes executed with military precision by Giorgio's fellow soldiers) builds in intensity as Fosca's manipulative plotting begins to wear Giorgio down. Christopher Oram's triple arched set provides the backdrop for both boudoir and barracks.
Scarlett Strallen brings a luminous purity to the role of Clara, her afternoons of adulterous bliss slowly replaced by doubt and the growing knowledge that she has an unlikely rival. She is well matched - physically and vocally - by David Thaxton's Giorgio (despite a certain lack of subtlety in his acting).
And though it's hard to see the inner beauty which overcomes Giorgio's initial repulsion in this gothic love story, Elena Roger's tiny, emaciated Fosca (her cheeks sunken but her eyes bright with desire for the handsome young officer) gives touching credibility to the feverishly relentless passion with which she stalks her prey and her doomed delight when she finally enjoys the affection she so desperately craves.

Donmar Theatre

Yes, Prime Minister *** TNT

Fans of the immensely popular ‘80s sitcom won’t be disappointed by the reincarnations of Cabinet Secretary Sir Humphrey and Prime Minister Jim Hacker.

Henry Goodman’s pocket-lining civil servant is on Machiavellian form, using his superior intelligence to run rings round David Haig’s increasingly apoplectic PM. But, although often very funny, the original 30-minute TV formula yields decreasing rewards when stretched to two hours.

Gielgud, Shaftesbury Avenue, W1D 6AR (0844 482 5130) Tube: Piccadilly Circus yesprimeminister.co.uk
Booking until 15th Jan 2011 £17.50 - £52.50

(Unedited version below)

Stepping into dead men’s shoes isn’t easy, but fans of the immensely popular 80’s sitcom won’t be disappointed by the reincarnations of Cabinet Secretary Sir Humphrey and Prime Minister Jim Hacker, nor by a discomfited Jonathan Slinger as the latter’s Principle Private Secretary uncomfortably caught between them.

Henry Goodman’s pocket-lining civil servant is on Machiavellian form, using his superior intelligence to run rings round David Haig’s increasingly apoplectic PM, who knows there are things he ought to know but has no idea what they are.

But, though brought up to date and often very funny, the original 30 TV minute formula yields decreasing rewards when stretched to 2 hours in an overegged plot involving a $10 trillion loan from Kumranistan and the illegal sexual proclivities of its unseen foreign minister

On Ageing *** TNT

I loved the idea behind this likeable but ultimately underdeveloped production from Fevered Sleep in which 7 youngsters aged from 7 to 13 deliver quotes from individuals of all ages about what growing older means to them.

One by one, they walk on to the white stage, bare but for an elongated white desk with microphones and jugs of water, and the chairs on which the children take up position. By the end of this short devised piece, the set is cluttered with the paraphernalia of a lifetime, the items carried on one by one by the young performers and each capable of evoking a long lost memory.

A lawn mower, a bird cage, televisions, a fishing rod, a rocking horse, armchairs - the summation of years of storing no longer used possessions in the loft. Nothing particularly out of the ordinary except, perhaps, for the skeleton which stands as a reminder of where we are all eventually headed.

The contrast in the way in which the young and the old view the process of ageing comes across strongly – the children very much in the moment, the oldies recalling birthday celebrations stretching back decades – and the verbatim quotes coming, winningly, from the mouths of comparative babes both amuse and take on new resonance.

But, charming though it is, the piece needs to go deeper than the rueful “Ageing is realising you never had a Plan B” to fully justify its 70 minute running time.

Young Vic, The Cut, SE1 8LZ (0207 922 2922) youngvic.org Tube: Southwark / Waterloo Till 9th October
£17.50 (under 26’s £10)

The Big Fellah **** TNT

Fast, funny but with a very serious side, too, Richard Bean’s sharp and unobtrusively informative new play for Out of Joint follows the fortunes of a small New York based IRA cell for almost fifteen years on either side of the 1987 Enniskillen Remembrance Day bombings in Northern Ireland.

From fundraising and counting out bucketfuls of donated cash after Bloody Sunday in 1972 to stuffing teddy bears with detonating devices decades later, he charts the changes in their lives and the events back in Ireland which mould their attitudes to their membership of a violent faction which, as Big Fellah Costello warns New York fireman Michael (the latest recruit) entails “selling your soul for a lifetime of pain”

It’s his Bronx apartment which becomes the new safe house where Rory Keenan’s excellent, fast-talking Ruari (previously banged up in Long Kesh for his part in the shooting of a British soldier and now with ambitions to become legal and a practising architect) and none-too-bright, homophobic NYPD officer Tom Billy meet Finbar Lynch’s sinisterly charismatic Costello who turns up periodically with orders from above.

The slick dialogue sugars the dark, deadly side to the IRA’s activity – even when Fred Ridgeway’s deadly security officer puts in an appearance from the old country - and Bean’s mordant humour proves as lethal as any hitman in Max Stafford-Clark fluid production which surely deserves a much longer life.

Lyric Hammersmith, King Street, W6 0QL (0871 221 1726) www.lyric.co.uk Tube: Hammersmith
Till 16th October £10-25

Design For Living **** TNT

Noel Coward’s 1933 comedy about an unconventional relationship was written with the intention of providing himself with a starring role. But there’s nothing suave about Andrew Scott’s interpretation of playwright Leo, who forms one point of an irresponsible triangle of inextricably attracted and moneyed bohemians.

It’s an attention-grabbing performance that yields dividends. So does Lisa Dillon’s portrayal of insecure interior decorator Gilda, who loves Leo and painter Otto as much as they love her and, controversially, each other.

Neatly constructed and performed with relish, this is a disrespectfully witty (if long) treat, with the bonus of Angus Wright’s older, loyal art dealer and Maggie McCarthy’s housekeeper voicing their disapproval to no avail.

Old Vic, The Cut, SE1 8NB (0844 871 7628) Tube: Waterloo Until Nov 27 From £10