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Breaking the Code fails to crack the character of Alan Turing — review

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 12d

Worth catching when it heads to Soho Theatre in November

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 12d

Cracking new (albeit Mamet-indebted) comedy with fangs where Alastair Michael’s professor and Matt Holt’s Dean, who moves twitchily like a velociraptor, play an absurd game of brinksmanship that spirals as they devolve into beasts, finishing with one of Foley’s characteristically brilliant endings

Tim Foley @verbatimfoley.bsky.social · 13d

We have our first preview of JURASSIC today! It’s a closed one for freshers and students. I’m buzzed that our first showings for this are on a university campus, it’s taking my Oleanna With Dinosaurs premise to a whole new level…

A flyer for Jurassic by Tim Foley (artwork: a dinosaur with a human head being menaced by a mosquito) on a shelf covered in cool colourful busy stickers.

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 15d

A man with the imagination of Alan Turing is given a production with little theatrical imagination. A potentially riveting drama becomes a patience-tester about the code-breaker

www.ft.com/content/e795...

The mathematician’s dazzling life is flattened in Royal & Derngate, Northampton’s revival of Hugh Whitemore’s play

The Grand Babylon Hotel at New Vic Theatre: Claybody Theatre's madcap adaptation

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 16d

Wasn’t sure what to expect with this, but it was great - so much thought and effort clearly gone into the clever production design and vivid detail of the performances. Michael Hugo a particular hoot

The Stage @thestage.co.uk · 16d

★★★★ Review: The Grand Babylon Hotel — Accomplished adaptation of Arnold Bennett’s novel is packed with clever comedy 👇

Read our review of The Grand Babylon Hotel at the New Vic Theatre, Deborah McAndrew's clever and funny adaptation of Arnold Bennett’s novel, directed by Conrad Nelson

www.thestage.co.uk

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 16d

Tribune readers once again by and large absolutely outraged that I’ve dared to find imperfections in a production at their local theatre. This time inexplicably referring to me as “Barton” like a boarding school headmaster

The Crucible's next chapter opens

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 16d

Back in the Sheffy T reviewing Elizabeth Newman’s first show as AD: a production whose main problem is that it’s a production of Dancing at Lughnasa, a play that makes you think it must’ve been a fallow year when it won its Olivier

www.sheffieldtribune.co.uk/the-crucible...

'Yes, big things happen because of the big capital P[olitics], but really your life changes in a room with your family.'

www.sheffieldtribune.co.uk

As three Darkfield shows open around Manchester, Matt Barton asks if they make for transporting theatre – or just a thrill ride?

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 21d

Reviewed Manchester’s Darkfield triple bill; I’m yet to see the light with their shows

Exeunt Magazine @exeuntmagazine.bsky.social · 22d

As three Darkfield shows open in containers around Manchester, Matt Barton asks if they make for transporting theatre - or just a thrill ride?

What we see in the dark

open.substack.com

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 25d

A certain irony sat in the NT waiting to see a show about how the manosphere and toxic masculinity take root in young men while flag-bearing rally-goers flood in to use the loos. (“What’s this place then, a casino?” one asks)

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 26d

A nice touch: Peake has a necklace of pearls to clutch.
A very odd touch: bringing out “gay Jesus” for one of the most awkwardly miscalculated endings I’ve seen in a while.

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 26d

Felt this treated the damage Whitehouse caused a little too lightly, and found its efforts to take equal sides a bit exhausting and messy. But Samuel Barnett’s performance(s) were powerful, tender and upstaged Peake’s pretty one-note turn

www.ft.com/content/fe0b...

The Last Stand of Mrs Mary Whitehouse theatre review — Maxine Peake is all steel as the conservative crusader

Caroline Bird’s drama reflects the human impact of Whitehouse’s campaigns on the gay community but lacks opposing voices

A Moon for the Misbegotten review: Doesn’t quite shine brightly enough

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · Aug 2

Just out of Giant - a towering piece of theatre and performance from Lithgow. The way he pouts - somewhere between a sneer and a sickly-sweet pucker. Dragon-like, then retreating into feeble wincing with his ailing back, both sly and pathetic. And equally crafty, needling writing

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · Jul 27

Caught up with the Almeida’s Moon for the Misbegotten last weekend, which, despite a nice performance from Ruth Wilson, on the whole for me felt destined to be forgotten

upstagereviews.wordpress.com/2025/07/27/a...

★★★☆☆ 19th July 2025 • Almeida Michael Shannon (Jim) and Ruth Wilson (Josie). Photo: Marc Brenner The first sign of how it’s all going to end for Jim and Josie – the pair who, like opposing magnets…

upstagereviews.wordpress.com

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · Jul 26

Glad to have caught the penultimate perf of this (well, the last one before they perform it at actual 4:48am). It managed to make a long, oblique howl feel naturally conversational and direct. Contemplative but studded with dark bite. “Remember the light and believe the light”

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · Jul 24

A talky play and a shouty production that thankfully eventually relents to allow for a neat conclusion. Set on a stage where, cleverly, shapes interlock to form a growing island

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · Jul 24

Catching up on Liberation (or, as it’s otherwise known, Manchester International Festival’s entire theatre programme for 2025)

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · Jul 12

Caught up with Till The Stars Come Down after missing its NT run. A stunningly good play, especially its faultless first half. The kind of show that would work brilliantly in the round at the Royal Exchange, if only it consistently programmed more new writing

The Sordid Life of Theatre Critics

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · Jun 20

My contribution was a toss-up between ‘the time Jason Manford commented his own 1* review of my review of his performance in Curtains’ and ‘the time I got shat on by a seagull on my way to a press night’. The seagull seemed classier

Exeunt Magazine @exeuntmagazine.bsky.social · Jun 20

From vomiting black sludge to being hosed down in your underwear, being dumped at press drinks or having your review eviscerated by the director… Exeunt writer share their least glamorous moments as a critic

It’s catharsis, ok?

Or, when bad things happen to good critics

exeuntmagazine.substack.com

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · Jun 5

Happy birthday @millmedia.bsky.social

Hamlet Hail to the Thief is a discordant union of Shakespeare and Radiohead

Reposted by Matt Barton

FT Weekend @ftweekend.com · May 8

Hamlet Hail to the Thief is a discordant union of Shakespeare and Radiohead

https://www.ft.com/content/17bc7914-34e7-4498-afc6-073c1847b69f

News, analysis and comment from the Financial Times, the worldʼs leading global business publication

Hamlet Hail to the Thief is a discordant union of Shakespeare and Radiohead

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · May 8

Radiohead chief bleaksmith Thom Yorke has (co)created this doomy bleakfest for everyone who thought Hamlet could do with being more bleak and doomy. I wasn’t convinced it gains as much as it loses

www.ft.com/content/17bc...

There’s more madness than method to an ambitious adaptation at Aviva Studios, Manchester

Takeaway at Liverpool Everyman Theatre – review

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · May 1

I think if you’re going to get away with programming your own play to open your first season, it probably needs to be better than this. But it has a couple of nice performances and a vibrant set

www.whatsonstage.com/news/takeawa...

Nathan Powell’s production runs until 17 May

www.whatsonstage.com

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · Apr 22

My May rec (avoided picking the obvious FI/RSC Hamlet adaptation because I’m countercultural) + spotlight on the most promising director in Manchester for my money

Exeunt Magazine @exeuntmagazine.bsky.social · Apr 22

We're back after taking the long weekend off, feeling refreshed and ready for some more theatre...

From an on-stage garden at The Bush to a play in a car park in Hull, Exeunt writers share their top tips for May!

Exeunt recommends...

Tudors, trees, and takeaways – it's the pick of the crop of shows on in May, plus a spotlight on director Oliver Hurst

substack.com

Manhunt review: Raoul Moat evades Robert Icke

Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · Apr 13

I thought Manhunt's final act was strong, after a clumsy start. But I'm not sure it had enough to say to justify making it - I'm sure Icke's said art shouldn't offer easy answers, but that's largely what I feel we got here upstagereviews.wordpress.com/2025/04/13/m...

★★★☆☆ 8th April 2025 • Royal Court Samuel Edward-Cook and Trevor Fox. Photo: Manuel Harlan Can Robert Icke catch Raoul Moat? This is, in a way, the real manhunt that unfolds in Icke’s new pla…

upstagereviews.wordpress.com