The Angry Young Men of the 1950s were more of media phenomenon than a coherent movement

Can theatre habituate us to extreme violence? Blasted is both a denunciation of the horrors of war and maybe a domestication of them

Favourite stage direction: “The funeral procession of Queen Elizabeth II goes past.”

Peter Morgan’s award-winning story of Putin’s triumph is vivid, but lacks real complexity

Populist show is now on its sixth cast, but despite some noisy shocks it fails to chill the blood

Playwright or director? Who is ultimately responsible for a piece of theatre? Our Critic attempts to find out

Text of the day: “But it was no good.”

One of the most important characteristics of contemporary British new plays is that they aim to provide a forum for the discussion of ideas.

Tom Stoppard’s 1993 masterpiece revived in a highly enjoyable, often luminous, production by Carrie Cracknell

In the Brexit era, this site-specific revival of Agatha Christie’s 1953 courtroom drama works like a treat

The love affair between playwright and actor lasted far beyond their early divorce

Take an imaginative ride through 400 years of British theatre with our fictional guides

The Royal Court’s international season continues with savage Ukrainian play about women and war

Artificial Intelligence is much hyped — but can it review a theatre show?

New play about zero-hour contracts is powerfully authentic, but also rather depressingly unentertaining

Suzie Miller’s follow up to her massive hit Prima Facie stars Rosamund Pike, whose dazzling performance makes up for the questionable writing

New epic drama set in Dubai is adventurous, original and well-written, if slightly slender

Let us remember the radical acts of 50 years ago.

Text of the day: “There are good days and bad days.”

Grace Barnes’s excellent new book is both provocative and illuminating

Ace! Revival of Joe Penhall’s brilliantly written contemporary classic is superbly staged and brilliantly performed

Star cast give energy to a superb, if old fashioned, play about the anti-Semitism of Roald Dahl

As a new production of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot is about to open in London’s West End, I was lucky enough to get the chance to watch The Impossible Itself (2010), Jake Ad…

Leo Butler’s wonderful new one is not a play, but a passionate book about a writer’s life and the craft of playwriting

Favourite stage direction: “Jade steps forward, out of the “picture” from behind the curtain, and puts on the record player.”

Here is a sample from the introduction to my latest book about postwar British theatre — an alternative history

Excellent revival of Ryan Craig’s 2011 play about an British-Jewish family in crisis — still timely and thought-provoking

The poet laureate’s verbatim play about Brexit sinks into journalistic and untheatrical banality

The death of David Bowie provokes the Critic to take a trip down the motorways and side alleys of memory

Autobiographical show about the Middle East is a wry take on insoluble antagonisms, and prefers utopian longing to political engagement

Bad stuff and change in a time of pandemic: a derivative lockdown poem

Martin Crimp’s Not One of These People has been staged using help from AI — but what does AI think of the show?

Adaptation of the John le Carré Cold War thriller is a tense courtroom drama, but could do with some more fleshing out

Nick Stafford’s sturdy beast rides again — and retains its colt-like freshness and wild beauty

Lucy Prebble’s latest tells the story of the murder of Alexander Litvinenko, but prefers buffoonery over analysis

Joseph Fiennes is mesmerizing as Gareth Southgate in James Graham’s sport-of-the-nation docu-drama

A few days ago, I watched the National Theatre At Home streamed recording of Michaela Coel’s award-winning Chewing Gum Dreams.

News Flash: my latest book about contemporary British theatre, new writing and beyond, is now available

The longest-running play in world history is in good shape, despite the lackluster and mechanical cast

New two-hander about a contrasting pair of gay Pakistanis is beautifully written and superbly staged

Can the stranglehold of naturalism and social realism in British theatre ever be broken?

Feminist account of British imperialism is energetic and passionate, but rather slender — is it a play or a lecture?

Censorship appears to be simple, but is actually quite complicated.

The classic TV serial takes to the stage like a politician to a pay rise, but lags a bit behind reality

Explore the work of a handful of British theatre’s brightest and most exciting writing talents

More overviews of British new writing from the In-Yer-Face Theatre archive.

Maxine Peake struggles to make the voice of reason heard in a rather reactionary feminist history play