That was March in London theatre land - and a bumper crop of thesp spots
02/04/2017
Keith Stevenson in Out There on Fried Meat Ridge Road, White Bear Theatre (c) Erika Boxler
* The Almeida's excellent production of Hamlet starring Andrew Scott is transferring to the Harold Pinter Theatre in the West End in June.
* And...not to take away from Hamlet's success but putting the tickets on sale at midnight, on a Saturday for Almeida members was an odd decision not least because, if Twitter is anything to go by, there were glitches with the ATG Tickets website and apparently no customer services/tech support available to sort it at that time of night.
* One of my favourite plays of 2016 - Rotterdam - is transferring to Broadway. OK, so not technically London theatre but it was such a great play and production I’m really pleased to see it doing well.
* Back in London and fringe plays doing well, the excellent Out There on Fried Meat Ridge Road, which I saw at the White Bear back in January is transferring to Trafalgar Studios 2 in May. Yep, I will be seeing it again because I liked it that much.
* Stan-Fav Simon Stephens is adapting The Seagull (one of the only Chekhov plays I actually like) for a production at the Lyric Hammersmith starring Lesley Sharp in the Autumn.
* I haven't seen it yet - Easter treat - but Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead at the Old Vic starring Daniel Radcliffe and Joshua McGuire is extending its run by a week.
Thesp (playwright and director) spots
To say that it’s a been a bumper month is an under statement. A Sunday trip to see Ivo Van Hove’s six hour long Roman Tragedies proved extremely fruitful: Simon Stephens, Rupert Goold and Kate Fleetwood, Kyle Soler and Pheobe Fox, John Heffernan, Angus Wright, Jamie Lloyd, Ruth Wilson, Ian McDiarmid, Jonjo O’Neill, Jeremy Herrin and Leo Bill. That might be a record for a single production but is closely followed by a night at the Almeida's Hamlet where PolyG spotted Sienna Miller, Tom Sturridge and Robert Pattinson out together. George McKay, Ian McKellan and Mark Ravenhill were also in the audience. And not to rest on that she then saw Russell Tovey at a bus stop near her office (presumably on his way to Angels in America rehearsals), Ken Stott (also near her office) and Philip Glenister in Pizza Express in Manchester. I think she might have a celebrity stalker problem.