Ellie Nielsen

Zinnie Harris’s adaptation of Eugène Ionesco’s Rhinoceros, in this Spinning Plates production at fortyfivedownstairs, opens on a sombre wasteland setting, bathed in eerie yellow light. In a sudden blaze of colour, a raucous rabble of ordinary characters, rendered extraordinary by Dann Barber’s bold and anarchic costumes, invades the stage. The energy is starkly at odds with Jacob Battista a ... (read more)

Since its première in 1947, Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar Named Desire has become one of the twentieth century’s most celebrated plays. The demanding role of the tragic Southern belle Blanche Dubois has been played by some of the world’s great actresses, including Vivien Leigh, Cate Blanchett and Isabelle Huppert, in Polish director Krysztof Warlikowski’s extraordinary reimagining at t ... (read more)

Jeremy Herrin’s London production of Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey into Night opens with a scene of such quiet intimacy it is tempting to think that the audience has been admitted early. Actors Brian Cox and Patricia Clarkson are as great a drawcard as the play itself. This is a perfect pairing for a work whose reputation as a masterpiece continues unabated. Theirs is a performance o ... (read more)

There can be few superlatives left to describe Sarah Snook’s performance in Kip Williams’s London staging of Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray – for the simple reason that she’s that good. Three days after I saw the play, at the Theatre Royal Haymarket, Snook was awarded the Olivier Award for best actress. According to the Guardian’s Lanre Bakare’s summation of the awards on 1 ... (read more)