The holidays are over, and Theatre continues at its best in Europe’s “number one” theatre town. A few new performances one shouldn’t miss:

RED DEMON
Written by Hideki Noda, Translation and Adaptation by Roger Pulvers, British Adaptation by Hideki Noda and Matt Wilkinson 

At the Young Vic
66 The Cut, London, SE1
Tube Waterloo
Telephone 020 7928 6363

Previews from 31 Jan 03
Opens 3 Feb 03
Booking to 22 Feb 03
Closes 22 Feb 03
Time Mon - Sat at 7.30pm, Mat Sat at 3pm 

Performers Simon Gregor, Tamzin Griffin, Marcello Magni, Samantha McDonald, Clive Mendus, Hideki Noda, Ofo Uhiara and Matt Wilkinson
Director Hideki Noda
Design Miriam Buether and Vicki Mortimer 
Lighting Rick Fisher 
Producer Noda Map and Amy Kassai Ltd 

In a land far away, a stranger is washed up near an isolated fishing village. Unable to understand his language or why he looks so different, the villagers decide he is a demon and must be destroyed. Only one woman, also an outcast, befriends him. 

MIDNIGHT'S CHILDREN
A new dramatisation of Salman Rushdie's novel by Simon Reade, Tim Supple & Salman Rusdie 

At the BarbicanTheatre
Barbican Centre, London, EC2Y 8BQ
Tube Barbican
Telephone 020 7638 8891

Previews from 18 Jan 03
Opens 29 Jan 03
Booking to 23 Feb 03
Closes 23 Feb 03

Performers Zubin Varla (Saleem) Ravi Aujla (Mian Abdullah/Hanif/Ayooba) Antony Bunsee (Tai/Lifafa Das/Deshmukh)
Pushpinder Chani (Joe d'Costa/Shaheed/Thin Man) Kammy Darweish (Narliker/Ghani/Sabarmati/Sonny)
Meneka Das (Amina) Neil D'souza (Bose/Nadir/Fat Perce/Zia/Najmuddin) Mala Ghedia (Pia/Masha)
Kulvinder Ghir (Aadam/Picture Singh) Anjali Jay (Jamila) Alexi Kaye Campbell (Methwold/Zegallo/Priest/Brigadier Dyer)
Shaheen Khan (Naseem/Lila) Ranjit Krishnamma (Homi Catrack /Glandy Keith/Farooq)
Syreeta Kumar (Alia/Parvati) Selva Rasalingam (Shiva) Tania Rodrigues (Emerald)
Sirine Saba (Mary Pareira/Rani of Cooch Naheen) Kish Sharma (Zulfikar/Wee Willie Winkie/Mujib)
Antony Zaki (Ahmed/Fat Man) Sameena Zehra (Padma)
Director Tim Supple
Design Melly Still
Lighting Tina MacHugh
Choreography Melly Still
Producer Royal Shakespeare Company / Columbia University, the University of Michigan/University Musical Society

'Midnight's Children' is a complex work combining three main tales: the turbulent history of twentieth-century India, Pakistan and Bangladesh: the saga of a Muslim family: and the story of one man, Saleem Sinai, whose telepathic powers allow him to communicate with other children born at the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947. 

BLACK MILK
By Vassily Sigarev, translated by Sasha Dugdale

At the Royal Court Upstairs
Sloane Square, London, SW1W 8AS
Tube Sloane Square
Telephone 020 7565 5000
(From 31 Jan 03 to 1 Mar 03)
Time Tues - Sat 7.45pm, Sat Mat at 4pm 
Director Simon Usher

At a railway station deep in the Russian wastes, a couple of new Russians from the capital are stranded with no train until the next morning. But as the night wears on they encounter the strange, cruel and whimsical world of provincial Russia. 
PART OF THE INTERNATIONAL PLAYWRIGHTS: FOCUS RUSSIA

ACCIDENTAL DEATH OF AN ANARCHIST
By Dario Fo, in a new translation by Simon Nye 

At the Donmar Warehouse
Earlham Street, WC2H 9LD
Tube Covent Garden
Telephone 020 7369 1732

Previews from 20 Feb 03
Opens 26 Feb 03
Booking to 19 Apr 03
Closes 19 Apr 03

Performers Rhys Ifans 
Director Robert Delamere 
Producer Donmar Warehouse 

This 1970 political satire concerns corrupt police in Italy 

THE DUCHESS OF MALFI
By John Webster

At the Lyttelton, National Theatre
Royal National Theatre, South bank, SE1 9PX
Tube Waterloo
Telephone 020 7452 3000

Previews from 18 Jan 03
Opens 28 Jan 03
Booking to 10 Mar 03

Performers Janet McTeer (Duchess), Lorcan Cranitch (Bosola), Eleanor David (Julia), Charles Edwards (Antonio), Will Keen (Ferdinand), Sally Rogers (Cariole), Jonathan Slinger (Delio), James Howard, Penelope McGhie 
DirectorPhyllida Lloyd
DesignMark Thompson
Lighting Mark Henderson
ProducerNational Theatre 

Charts the calamitous consequences of a young widow's refusal to obey her brothers' command never to remarry. When the spy, Bosola, is planted in her household, the trap is set which leads to exile, torture, madness and death. 

Phyllida Lloyd's production of THE DUCHESS OF MALFI will tour the UK with its original Lyttelton cast, including Janet McTeer in the title role.
The dates and venues are: The Lowry, Salford (18 - 22 March), Malvern Theatre (25 - 29 March), King's Theatre, Edinburgh (1 - 5 April), Theatre Royal, Plymouth (3 - 7 June), Theatre Royal, Nottingham (10-14 June).

HONOUR
By Joanna Murray-Smith

At the Cottesloe, National Theatre
Royal National Theatre, South bank, SE1 9PX
Tube Waterloo
Telephone 020 7452 3000

Previews from 21 Feb 03
Opens 27 Feb 03
Booking to 27 Mar 03

Performers Eileen Atkins, Corin Redgrave, Anna Maxwell Martin, Catherine McCormack
Director Roger Mitchell
Design William Dudley
Lighting Rick Fisher
Producer National Theatre 

Murray-Smith's play anatomises marriage, or rather the failure of a marriage, with astonishing clarity. By turns funny and desperately sad, it sheds vivid light upon the battlefield of marital breakdown.

IRON
By Rona Munro 

At the Royal Court Downstairs
Sloane Square, London, SW1W 8AS
Tube Sloane Square
Telephone 020 7565 5000

Previews from 22 Jan 03
Opens 27 Jan 03
Booking to 1 Mar 03

Performers Helen Lomax, Louise Ludgate, Sandy McDade, Ged McKenna 
Director Roxana Silbert 
Design Anthony MacIlwaine
Lighting Chahine Yavroyan
Costume Alex Eales
ProducerT raverse Theatre / Royal Court

Josie is visiting her mother Fay in prison for the first time. She's not seen her for 15 years, not since the day her mother was taken away when she was 10 years old. Fay is in prison for murder. A murder Josie cannot remember and Fay has always tried to forget. 

TEMPEST
By William Shakespeare
Constructed by John Lahr, reconstructed by Elaine Stritch
Cottesloe, National Theatre

At the Old Vic
Waterloo Road London, SE1
Tube Waterloo
Telephone 020 7369 1722

Previews from 16 Jan 03
Opens 16 Jan 03
Booking to 15 Mar 03
Time Mon - Sat 7.30pm, Mats Thur & Sat at 3pm

Performers Derek Jacobi (Prospero), Daniel Evans (Ariel), Nigel Lindsay (Stephano), Sam Callis (Ferdinand), Robert East (Alonso),Louise Hilyer (Caliban), Michael Jenn (Antonio), David Mara (Sebastian), John Nettleton (Gonzalo), Claire Price (Miranda), Iain Robertson (Trinculo), Stuart Burt, Peter Bygott, Sophie Franklin, Colin Haigh, Christian Mortimer.
Director Michael Grandage
Design Christopher Oram
Lighting  Hartley T.A Kemp
Producer Sheffield's Crucible Theatre / Triumph 

For more commentary and articles by Andrea Kapsaski, check the Archives.

© 2003 Andrea Kapsaski

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