It's the final curtain for The Seven Dials Playhouse (and a mini review for Pete 'n Keely from 2017)

I'm sad to read that the charming Seven Dials Playhouse is closing at the end of this month according to The Stage (subscription required). I'm not exactly surprised. The economics of running a central London venue is tough at the best of times, let alone only being a 70-seater. I suspect each incoming show barely broke even for either the venue or the theatre company.

It's the end of a long journey for the venue, formerly known as The Actors Centre which housed the Tristan Bates Theatre (named after Alan Bates's son). There's some background here on The Actor's Centre current site with their take on what happened. 

I've seen a few shows there and it's a cute venue in a great location with a cute bar so I am genuinely sorry to see it go. My favourite show I saw there was Pete 'n Keely back in 2017. A two-hander musical, it was witty, relatable and poignant with terrific performances from David Bardsley and Katie Kerr as Pete Bartel and Keely Stevens respectively. They are former sweethearts, a singing duo and TV hosts who are now divorced and haven't spoken to each other for 5 years and are thrown together for a TV reunion concert. Chaos ensues in this show within a show.

My memory of the detail of the story is sketchy as it's nearly a decade since I saw it, but I remember how it made me feel - I remember a lot of loud laughter but also feeling moved by the chemistry between the two. I thought more might have come of the production but I don't think it's been on anywhere since unfortunately, and having read the reviews for it retrospectively, it didn't go down that well with critics which is a shame given how much I enjoyed it.

There is some good news out of all of this - The Actors Centre is continuing its work and is now housed at the lovely Marylebone Theatre and I hope it continues to thrive.

Brainsluts at Seven Dials Playhouse

What happens when you trap four millennials in a hospital waiting room without WiFi? Dan Bishop's "Brainsluts" answers that question with both warmth and sharp wit in this Edinburgh Fringe hit that's now playing at The Seven Dials Playhouse in Covent Garden.

The premise is deceptively simple: four strangers participate in a clinical trial, spending one day a week over several weeks testing a mysterious new drug. When the WiFi fails and phone signals disappear, their planned day of doom-scrolling gets derailed, forcing actual human interaction. What follows is a masterclass in character comedy that feels both absurd and painfully relatable.

Dr Eavis (Emmeline Downie) oversees the chaos as the slightly frazzled researcher whose narration bookends each week's events. Downie strikes the perfect balance between professional authority and imposter-syndrome induced panic. Her commentary provides both structure and laughs as the situation unfolds.

The four guinea pigs or ‘brainsluts’ are brilliantly realised millennials. Kathy Maniura's Bathsheba floats through life in bohemian bliss, stringing beads while blissfully unaware of reality crashing around her. Robert Preston delivers a pitch-perfect performance as Duggan, the desperately eager young man whose attempts to connect fall flat through his social incompetence and inability to read the room. Dan Bishop (who also wrote the piece) embodies Mitch, the work-shy activist who views the drug trial as political resistance, while Bethan Pugh's Yaz initially seems the quietest of the bunch, lacking confidence and preferring to observe from the sidelines.

As the WiFi-free hours stretch on during the weekly visits, these characters reveal themselves in funny and unexpected ways. Bishop's writing sparkles with both comedy and uncomfortable truth as the lengths people will go to fill silence become apparent. The oversharing escalates, secrets spill, and modern life's absurdities get laid bare.

The comedy hits from the opening moments. Bishop has crafted dialogue that flows naturally while landing consistent laughs. His characters feel authentic rather than constructed, their neuroses and insecurities recognisable without being mean-spirited. There is some physical comedy too which complements the verbal wit beautifully. I particularly enjoyed the wonderfully surreal meditation scenes. Who knew that a guided meditation could (a) be funny and (b) reveal so much about each character.

Directors Noah Geelan and Seth Jordan, with associate director Rohan Sharma, make excellent use of the simple hospital waiting room set. The staging maintains energy and pace in the confined space, ensuring the action never feels static despite the limited setting. The cast maximizes every inch of the small stage, their movements and interactions keeping the audience engaged throughout.

What makes "Brainsluts" work so well is how it uses comedy to explore genuine themes about connection, loneliness, and modern life as experienced by young people. It exposes, perhaps, how our digital dependencies have changed the way we relate to each other. The characters' struggles to communicate face-to-face feel both funny and slightly tragic, a mirror to our own anxieties.

The performances are uniformly strong, with each actor fully committed to their character's particular brand of millennial dysfunction. Preston's physical comedy as the socially inept Duggan is particularly memorable, while Maniura brings genuine warmth to what could have been a one-note hippie stereotype. Bethan Pugh’s Yaz shows there’s much more to her than her anxiety. Emmeline Downey as Dr Eavis showed us a lot more depth than I was expecting as her own story is revealed at the end. Dan Bishop shows impressive range as both writer and performer. He nailed the politically passionate Mitch.

Having conquered Edinburgh, "Brainsluts" translates perfectly to London audiences who'll recognise themselves and people they know or have met in these characters. It's rare to find a play that's genuinely funny while also having something meaningful to say about contemporary life.

This is a smart, laugh-out-loud comedy that doesn't sacrifice substance for laughs and is relatable whether or not you're a Millennial. If you're looking for a short play about modern life that'll make you think while making you laugh, "Brainsluts" delivers exactly that. 

Brainsluts runs at The Seven Dials Playhouse until 13 February. Running time 70 minutes.

My year in theatre - 2025

The Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, London

I've seen more shows in one year than most people see in a lifetime and my life is all the richer for it. I don't read many books (I never have) so my exposure to new ideas is primarily through theatre and I'm as happy seeing a West End blockbuster as a fringe gem. I'm also happy to try new formats and genres, although I'm still on the fence with 'immersive' theatre but I'll keep trying. I've reviewed a number of shows this year and I'm slowly adding all the ones with my name on them to my blog (I've ghost written and co-written a few as well but am not credited).

Anyway, this is a summary of my year in theatre:

163 shows seen (not including concerts)

Most visited venue - The National Theatre (where I'll be again next week watching Clive Owen and Saskia Reeves in End) but fringe venues also get a decent look-in. 

My smallest venue was the etcetera theatre in Camden with just 42 seats and the biggest, the Eventim Apollo in Hammersmith with over 3,000. The Museum of Comedy was a newly discovered gem - a lovely, intimate,, basement venue in Bloomsbury.

About a third of what I see are musicals. I thought it would have been more than that as I do love a good musical.

January and April were my busiest months with 20 and 22 shows seen respectively. November was my quietest month with only 8 shows, but that was down to being away for work for half the month.

And I've even ventured out of London to see a couple of things (must make more of an effort for out-of-London trips next year)

So what's been good, what's been not good and what am I looking forward to in 2026...

Plays: 

1. Punch (Young Vic/West End) (hard hitting, emotional, great writing and a true story from my favourite contemporary playwright, James Graham - a schools tour is coming soon)

2. Kenrex at The Other Palace (booking until end Jan) (I was riveted throughout. Just wow. Also based on a true story)

3. Much Ado About Nothing at Drury Lane  (About the most perfect version of any Shakespeare play I've ever seen and supersedes my previous favourite, The Bridge Theatre's Midsummer Night's Dream)

Honourable mentions: Kyoto (RSC), Til The Stars Come Down (National), Dear England (National)

Musicals:

1. Just for One Day (booking until February at The Shaftesbury Theatre) - it's a great retelling of an important part of modern cultural history with fantastic music. I've seen it three times!

2. Evita - Jamie Lloyd did what he does best with Evita. He threw all his motifs at it, but they all worked. Rachel Zegler and Diego Rodriguez were fabulous in the lead roles. I also saw the balcony scene twice which was also wonderful.

3. The Producers (booking until at least the Spring) - fast-paced and utterly hilarious. I laughed so much that the next day it felt like I'd done a workout!

Honourable mentions: Shucked (Regents Park), London Road (National), Oliver (Simon Lipkin makes a great Fagin in this faithful restaging of the familiar story and it's booking for 12 months-ish so it's doing well) and Tina Turner (now on tour)

Off West End /Fringe

1. Murmuration Level 2 at The Peacock theatre was a clever and beautiful dance production. The cast moved as one organism. Quite something to behold. You can find out more about them here.

2. Dimanche was gorgeous with wonderful puppetry and movement and was part of the annual MimeLondon season (there were many treats as part of the festival such as Moby Dick and Manekine).

3. Sing Street was a lot of fun with youthful energy and great music (I hear rumours of a West End transfer)

Honourable mentions: Salty Brine (Soho Theatre), Tones A Hip Hop Opera by Gerel Falconer at Brixton House, In The Dark (back in the Spring with new immersive music experiences), Ada Campe's Behind The Nightlight (who has a show coming up at Crazy Coqs soon)

Worst show

1. Bacchanalia at Hoxton was not a good experience, not least witnessing some punters and their sordid voyeurism leering at the young cast. Even without that, it summed up everything I dislike about the 'immersive' genre. 

2. Bettie Page (the musical) - good idea in principal but poorly executed. There is a story in there to be told but this version wasn't it. 

3. Stiletto was one of those that looked good on paper and had high production values - the set and costumes were lush with a good band and one of the largest casts I've seen at Charing Cross Theatre. However, this musical lurched back and forth between drama and parody and ended up being neither. And it was so overblown. And why is no-one talking about the 'Thriller' style zombie dance? What on earth was that about? And why wasn't there a counter-tenor on stage? I know they're not that common, but they do exist.

(Dis)honourable mentions: Salome, Saving Mozart 

Overall favourites 

1. Punch

2. Kenrex

3. Just for One Day

Most looking forward to:

1 Paddington - I have my ticket but it's months and months away!

2. Something Rotten - I saw the concert version with Jason Manford and Richard Fleeshman in the leading roles and can't wait to see them again.

3. Waitress - I've never seen the whole thing, only clips on YouTube and I love the song She Used To Be Mine so I'm looking forward to catching it on tour.

4. Avenue Q - I never saw it in the West End but know some of the songs which are so funny.

5. Cats - I never saw it back in the day but know all the songs and I need to expunge the dreadful movie version with something (hopefully) much better from Drew Maconie at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre.

Tending - Riverside Studios

Tending, written by and starring El Blackwood, staged at Riverside Studios this week and last week, is a piece of verbatim theatre drawn from 70 interviews with real NHS nurses. With just three actors - El Blackwood, Anjelica Serra and Ben Lynn - and a simple set consisting of three chairs, a striplight and a surgical-style curtain as a backdrop, the production lets the words do the work.

The nurses' testimonies chart their journeys into the profession, their day-to-day work in the NHS, and the challenges they faced - firstly as newly qualified nurses ('they told me I'd be crying every day for the first 6 months and they were right') and then as early and mid-career nurses. Their roles made all the more challenging by funding cuts, relentless demand, and the long shadow of COVID. Their stories are by turns funny, harrowing and deeply moving, and as someone who has been both a patient and a visitor in hospital, I found many of the images they conjured very familiar, some of them painfully so.

The acting was outstanding - honest, nuanced and emotional. This was as powerful as anything I’ve seen in the West End, despite having none of the budget. Through raw, direct storytelling, the cast revealed what it really means to be a nurse in Britain today and also how they witness the human condition in all its forms from the sublime to the ridiculous. There were moments that certainly brought a lump to my throat, especially around palliative care (something I know about from being my late mother's carer), but the piece was never heavy-handed. The writing allowed for light and shade, making space for hope and humour alongside sorrow.

That said, the way the play ended felt strangely unresolved. Given the strength of the voices we’d just heard, I was left wondering what we were meant to do with it all. It felt like a missed opportunity—an ending that offered no direction. Instead, my friends and I came away feeling a bit despairing and helpless. 

Still, this was poignant, urgent, and vital theatre and shares more insight into the realities of the NHS than any episode of Casualty or Holby City. Tending is a moving reminder of the human faces behind the hospital scrubs and how critical the NHS is to our society here in the UK. 

You can still catch it until Sunday 4th May.

Ordinary Days - Upstairs at the Gatehouse

Ordinary Days, a musical by Adam Gwon, follows four New Yorkers as they navigate daily life in the big city. Two of them are a couple whose relationship slowly unravels before us; the other two are strangers, one an aspiring academic, the other a young man who is muddling through life, who connect through a lost item. During the show, all four characters reveal what brought them to New York and what they're searching for to create the lives they dream of. They reveal hopes and fears and the daily dramas in seemingly trivial things. Ultimately, we see how they find meaning, joy, and connection in an increasingly complicated world.

This production, from Birmingham’s Old Joint Stock Theatre, was staged Upstairs at The Gatehouse with a strikingly minimalist set: a few moveable boxes, some carefully placed props, and a single picture frame. Accompanied by a live pianist, the four actors—Aidan Cutler, Melissa Camba, James Edge, and Dora Gee—perform the entire show without spoken dialogue. The songs carry the narrative, giving the piece a lyrical, flowing rhythm.

Despite being written over 15 years ago, the musical feels fresh and timely. Cutler’s comic timing is impeccable, bringing warmth and real vulnerability to Warren, his oddball optimist of a character. Dora Gee is a standout as Deb, delivering razor-sharp humour with ease. All four performers are strong vocalists, and the pianist deserves credit for underpinning the show beautifully.

The sparse set and well-judged lighting effects enhanced rather than distracted, allowing the characters and music to take centre stage. The staging was excellent and the small cast used every inch of space giving the audience a feeling that we were in a much bigger space. Given that Ordinary Days requires only four actors and a pianist, it deserves to travel further. This production told its story with heart, humour and a quiet originality and despite it's relatively light tone, it felt life-affirming and I certainly came away feeling a little lighter than when I arrived. I hope it isn’t the last we see of it. Ordinary Days is anything but ordinary.

Salty Brine, These are the Contents of My Head at Soho Theatre

I didn't know what to expect from Salty Brine. I'm never quite sure that I'm the target audience for drag acts at Soho Theatre. After all, I'm CIS female, straight and certainly old enough to be the artiste's mother. I've been a bit non-plussed by some of those that I've seen there in the last few months feeling that they were aimed squarely at a queer, male audience and misogyny is also evident more times than I would like. 

I needn't have worried with this show. Salty is different. They had something to say that could touch anyone in the audience so it had a more universal appeal. Sure, there were things in it that a gay man would relate to more than me, but that feeling of being an outsider and trying to fit in in places where you're never really going to fit in resonated. 

The show is clever in that weaves Brine's Judy Garland singing persona, the songs of Annie Lennox's album DIVA, the Kate Chopin book 'The Awakening' (required reading in US schools apparently) and the tale of Brine's own upbringing. Despite this seemingly complex premise, it was easy and fun to be carried along with the adept storytelling, the wonderful singing and music. The whole thing was engaging, thoughtful and funny - a complete theatrical experience rather than a song cycle with anecdotes. 

A special mention should go out to Brine's band. What a treat to have a full ensemble on stage instead of a soundtrack. The musical arrangements were superb and Brine's Musical Director, Ben Langhorst, is also an absolute hoot! This show has style, pzazz aplenty and yet retains the human story at it's core. 

The next time Salty hits Blighty, I'm there!

Review: The Inseparables at Finborough Theatre

There’s a lot to admire in The Inseparables, a new play by Grace Joy Howarth based on Simone de Beauvoir’s novella of the same name (you can read about that here), now playing at the Finborough Theatre. It’s an ambitious project to take on a reworking of this recently found novella. The story shines a light on the early life and friendships that helped shape one of the 20th century’s most radical thinkers. And whilst the production has flashes of beauty, particularly in its visuals and performances, it doesn’t quite land emotionally, mainly due to issues in the writing.

The source material is loosely autobiographical: Sylvie represents de Beauvoir and Andrée is based on her real-life best friend and confidante, Elizabeth 'Zaza' Lacoin. These two young women were pioneers in thought, pushing against social norms and having the kind of formative conversations that would later feed into de Beauvoir’s feminist philosophy. On paper, it’s fascinating. But on stage, the depth of their connection doesn’t fully come through. I didn’t quite feel their inseparable-ness, which seems like a bit of a problem when that’s the central premise. Teenage girl friendships can be some of the deepest, passionate bonds around, as intense as any romantic crush and I needed more of that emotional weight to make sense of the story.

The play unfolds in a series of short, fast-moving chronological scenes, jumping from childhood into their twenties. That structure might work on the page, but here it felt a little rushed and fragmented. It was hard to settle into any particular moment before we’d moved on again. It was also hard work as an audience member to keep up with what was going on and where we were in place and time. This also meant there wasn't time to get to any emotional depth between the two girls. We got glimpses of their radical spirit, but not enough of the raw, thought-provoking conversations that maybe fuelled de Beauvoir’s work.

That said, the production design is full of clever touches. Hazel Poole Zane’s set is minimal but effective: a simple window with lace curtains, a chaise longue, a dresser-turned-anything, and a couple of prop shelves - nothing flashy, but enough to give each scene a clear sense of place. The stage is small, but it never feels cramped, and the transitions are smooth and purposeful.

The standout design element, though, is the video projection by newcomer Jessica Brauner. These projections add real texture to the world of the play, transporting us from school chapels to rural idylls to domestic interiors. The stained glass effect is especially striking—there’s one moment in Act 2 where it’s used in combination with shadow dancers to contrast Andrée’s faith with Sylvie’s rebellion, and it’s genuinely beautiful.

Costume-wise, everything feels grounded in period—give or take the odd zip (a small detail, but zips weren’t really a thing until the 1930s!). Overall, though, the look and feel of the show is cohesive and well thought-out.

Performance-wise, the cast of four is strong. Lara Manela as Andrée is a real highlight—graceful, expressive, and consistently engaging. She brings a subtle wildness to the role that hints at something deeper beneath the surface. Ayesha Ostler as Sylvie is solid too, although I didn’t always feel the fire of Sylvie’s emotional or ideological journey. I think that's down to the writing as much as anything. Alexandre Costet-Barmada and Caroline Trowbridge both provide excellent support, juggling multiple roles with ease and nuance.

The real treats come in the movement sequences, choreographed by Daniela Poch. Andrée’s love of music, especially the violin, is beautifully rendered through dance. These moments could have veered into interpretive-dance cliché, but they don’t. They’re elegant, clear, and a lovely way of deepening the character. The music choices (by Flick Isaac Chilton) are also pitch-perfect, helping to break up the linear storytelling and evoke mood and time really effectively.

There’s also something genuinely exciting about the fresh talent involved in this production. Three of the cast are new graduates, two are French (which feels fitting, given the source material), and the video designer is also just starting out. It’s fantastic to see new artists being given this kind of platform, and I really hope we see more from them in future. Kudos to the Finborough Theatre for providing a platform for them to showcase their talents.

Am I glad I saw it? Absolutely. Despite its flaws, it’s made me want to read the novella and dig deeper into both de Beauvoir and Lacoin’s lives so in many respects, the purpose of the exercise has been achieved. It's also important to support new work to maintain the health of our theatre ecosystem.

Playing until 10 May at Finborough Theatre (5 minutes walk from Earls Court tube, Warwick Road exit) https://finboroughtheatre.co.uk/production/the-inseparables/

The Inseparables - by Grace Joy Howarth, based on the novella by Simone de Beauvoir translated by Lauren Elkin

Cast & Creatives:

Cast: Alexandre Costet-Barmada, Lara Manela (Andree), Ayesha Ostler (Sylvie) and Caroline Trowbridge

Director: Anastasia Bunce / Set Designer: Hazel Poole Zane

Lighting Designer : Abraham Walkling-Lea / Sound designer: Flick Isaac Chilton

Movement Director; Daniela Poch / Video Designer: Jessica Brauner

Intimacy Coordinator: Justin Stirewalt / Stage Manager: Kiara Atkinson