Robert Gore-Langton

“Theatre is in dire need of a hit and this isn't it.”

“Glorious, ghastly, and very funny, Abigail's Party is still a great invite.”

“Allam gives what is surely the comic performance of the year, partially delivered - as in all good farces - in his Y-fronts and a vest.”

“This is a feverish, thrilling night out - and a welcome return of the Bible belter to the West End after a long absence.”

“This show is too bland to make an argument one way or the other.”

“The experience is impressive, but it hasn’t got that snarling bite-your-leg quality that makes it such a repulsive and compelling work.”

“Even if you've seen it, this revival is still unmissable.”

“It’s a classic example of what’s wrong with the West End: a haven for musical cash-ins of hit films.”

“Tense and original, with a creeping dread, it comes across as a first-rate thriller and a top comedy too.”

“It's a great cast for this fascinating, if chilling, play”

“The Royal Court now has a smash hit on its hands.”

“This is sharp, funny, smile-inducing pleasure for rock-loving graduates of a certain vintage.”

“Don't miss this caustic classic.”

“Unashamedly pondering such big questions, the play does so with thoughtful wit and, astonishingly in Rachel Kavanaugh’s nostalgic production, a modest amount of spectacle.”

“Even if it feels contrived, it is a nostalgic and enjoyable antidote to the grim farce being staged by our current government.”

“The result is a weepie musical with an uncheapened humanity you can almost touch. Lovely.”

“It’s as impressive as the dissection of human heartbreak is flawless.”

“The evening has its moments, but as drama it’s slow on the draw.”

“Sheridan Smith, as the flawed, sarcastic and crushingly lonely mum, brings her own vivid humanity to a convoluted but bitterly funny farce.”

“I couldn't twist my mouth into a smile at any point, let alone laugh.”

“Now it seems a quainter museum piece, though the essential story remains a brilliant idea.”

“Paddington The Musical, Savoy Theatre (London) Truly this is a great bear. An Ursa Major, as former BBC astronomer Patrick Moore might have said. Or, as the kids of today might put it, the new Paddington musical is 'bear lit, bro'.”

“With the exception of The Weir, you won't find a better-acted play in the West End.”

“Quirks apart, the story is well told, the leads are on cracking form and the show thrums with an exciting voltage.”

“For Walker fans, the play is a must. But this undeniably brave piece left me feeling oddly uninvolved.”

“At the National Theatre, it feels below par.”

“Sarandon is a catch and it's a play with a gently devastating depth-charge effect. But it's also an evening tinged with frustration at the way it gets snagged on the complexities of its own construction.”

“Whatever the reaction, this production is a startling kick-off to Rubasingham’s new regime.”

“A total must-see for anyone who loves the art of storytelling.”

“But it's hard to disguise a play that's frisky tosh.”

“But to me, with its scripted improvisation, it often felt mawkish and shallow.”

“The evening is an absolute banger.”

“A bit stagey, perhaps, but Dominic Cooke’s period revival brings into partial view the vast cattle market Shaw so impolitely exposed, ensuring his play was banned (by men, of course) for almost three decades.”

“The turning of tables is riveting to watch.”

“Overall, I'd say this brokenback show is for Sondheim completists only.”

“But none of it gels. Blazing recriminations are interspersed with clotted dialogue that's achingly right-on.”

“The play’s moral neutrality is spineless.”

“It’s a total hoot with a tender heart.”

“Larson, with buzz-cut hair and a punk T-shirt, goes in for a one-note grump of a performance, unhelped by a verbose version by the poet Anne Carson.”

“It looks great but as a human drama, the discovery of the mother-son sexual relationship has almost no emotional impact.”

“This subversive comedy is now a posh panto, directed by Max Webster.”

“I can't think of a sweeter, more emotive show than this, its story relocated to a fishing village on the Cornish coast.”

“The good news is that it’s only 90 minutes long; the bad news is that’s still ample time to get fed up with it.”

“What it lacks is any fresh theatrical reinvention of the story for the stage - or any cutting edge.”

“This update parks itself like a bus between the audience and the satanic masterpiece Webster actually wrote.”

“Hats off to writer/director Robert Icke, who has turned this ancient play into an electric West End thriller. It left me burned.”

“The urn of ashes is constantly being decanted into a Ziploc bag in a tug-of-war that’s partly a farce, with Jerry Killick providing laughs as the sleazebag family friend. The shock revelation I can’t spoil. But while it’s compelling to watch, it’s got a feel of wilful obscurity and it lacks the stark, epic quality of the classic it vaguely recycles.”

“In all, it’s a great yarn, thrillingly told.”

“James Macdonald’s production has tender moments, it’s often funny and gives plenty of scope to Whishaw - occasionally channelling his inner Paddington Bear - to be endearing without ever being cloying.”

“Revisited, The Real Thing feels fake.”

“Staunton smashes it with sincerity and sass.”

“It’s never boring, but it’s only the satirical side that works.”

“I found it mean, but mean as in average.”

“Lindsay Posner’s excellent, un-tricksy production of the Arthur Miller classic comes with a slatted wooden set and a terrific cast.”

“This harrowing play reaches places other shows can't.”

“The star of this, the no-face creature (Hikaru Yamano), is a shimmering presence of utter loneliness that gives the show its eerie poetic undertow.”

“Ebbing, swirling and bleak, it’s a beautiful downer of a show.”

“Watching these fine actors bring to life a family wrecked by addiction, their love for one another corroded by hatred, is sad but also weirdly uplifting.”

“I am beginning to think this Van Hove bloke couldn't direct a seagull to the coast.”

“Crudup pulls it off in a play that’s enjoyable but no masterpiece.”

“The play is thrillingly directed by Rufus Norris with inventive designs and a stage that’s teeming.”

“But I soon wanted to shout: ‘Oi, Time Lord, put a sock in it!’”

“The presence of servants and words like ‘bally’ and ‘lawks’ date it. But the characters all seem so real. Particularly Fenny (memorably played by relative newcomer Bessie Carter), whose unspoken love for buffoonish master Nicholas (Billy Howle) is an open family secret.”

“You'd need a heart of stone not to tap a toe to these old bangers and not be moved by this huge collective effort to do some good in the world.”

“But as an evening it's an astonishing feat, and Snook magics Wilde's lurid yarn into high-definition life.”

“It's a play of beauty, heat and pain, all built on a shattered dream.”

“A cracking evening, very funny and wholly recommended.”

“As it is, this first big opening of the year is a damp firework that splutters and goes phut.”

“I liked this play when it opened earlier this year. Now I love it.”

“For all its mega-dollar hubris, Stranger Things: The First Shadow has a visceral impact.”

“For all its tragic ending, it's a plod of an evening, surprisingly cool (it's meant to be baking hot) and with an added layer of trowelled-on feminism.”

“The good news is that this musical adaptation is true to Dahl's anarchic, grobblesquirting spirit.”

“Nothing else catches fire, though — certainly not this babyish script, which should have gone in the recycling bin before it got near a paying audience.”

“A flawed show, then, but one that is easily amiable enough to make you love it back a little.”

“Emily Barber memorably doubles up as a sitcom actress and a bonkers aristo. But my abiding memory is of the QM serenely holding a dildo-shaped sculpture made by a fake African prince. It’s all just froth - but there’s a dash of bitters at the end to keep this comic cocktail from cloying.”

“On the evidence here, Branagh also needs a good director.”

“Scott flits between characters, male and female, sounding off as the bitter Vanya, demurely twiddling a necklace as the lovely Helena. Meet, too, the handsome doctor, Michael, an eco-bore who drinks, and the sad, on-the-shelf Sonia. Emotions here are raw, crushes are unrequited and all hopes are dashed.”

“The effect of George Bernard Shaw’s play is, to me anyway, still one of delight - at its cleverness, its sense of fun and its sheer energy.”

“In all it's a very clever play, definitely worth seeing, but it's terribly brainy.”

“A harrowing, important piece of theatre.”

“The trump card is Al Murray’s randy, merry monarch - imagine the late Leslie Phillips in a spaniel wig with the vowels of our current King Charles: the crown is a crine as the opposite of a smile is a frine.”

“But this time around it left me indifferent and bored.”

“I can’t remember a musical in which I chuckled pretty much the entire way through.”

“Funny, shrugging, sad - Lipman was born to play this exhausting feat of a part.”

“What stands out from this frankly daft daisy chain of dalliances is the passionate score: sinuous, very beautiful and evoking love, wine and roses.”

“It's a well-acted show but it's stagebound.”

“The evening is bathed in charm and quiet desolation but it seldom rises above the merely watchable.”

“My feeling is that, yes, it is still fun but there's now a hint of stale buns about the case.”

“But it filled me with utter gloom at the soul-crushing pointlessness of seeing these sufferings at such length.”

“Even by West End standards, the show's recipe of warm hearts and life lessons is sugary.”

“Firing the gags right at the audience, Smith also evokes a note of sorrow at her 'unused life' I'd never felt before.”

“A crack cast makes this soapy saga all the more enjoyable.”

“A journey down the decades of raw, American capitalism, it’s a financial saga you can’t afford to miss.”

“The show is sheer, nerve-shredding escapism - I jumped out of my skin several times.”

“I found the evening twee, contrived and implausible - a bit of a lemon, in fact.”

“She speaks her mind (a lot) and runs a struggling Spanish-themed restaurant in smug ‘Walthamstow Village’. In walks a recently widowed, dithering Leftie middle-class lecturer, Stephen, father to a grieving, woke student Alice (Kitty Hawthorne in a terrific stage debut).”

“A larky, optimistic evening fully exploiting Corrin's magnetism but one that's Rizla-thin.”

“This version is hot on relevance but it’s never ravishing.”

“The evening manages to be compelling and irritatingly voguish at the same time.”

“This dodgy charmer is a glorious creation.”