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

Multiple good musicals have first passed through the Lowry in promising embryonic form. This clumsy love letter to Madchester is not one of them

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Theatre by the Lake has one of the most stunning settings of any theatre in the country, especially in yesterday’s early autumn sunlight. And this lovely adaptation of the Helen Rebanks memoir suits it perfectly

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

A few too many ideas attempted at once here, and the pacing could be tighter, so it lacks the pay-off you’d hope from a 3h15 production of Miller’s tragedy www.whatsonstage.com/news/death-o...

whatsonstage.com

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

The north’s wannabe Jamie Lloyd roughs up another Shakespeare play beyond all sense and coherence. But Russell Kane fares OK

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Liverpool’s Royal Court once again can’t help itself but turn a local story into an onstage soap. Thankfully, it has a couple of likeable central performances to save it this time

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

They don’t write plays like August Wilson any more, which is probably not a bad thing considering his speechy style. But it’d be hard to beat Daniel Bailey’s production. Another great show from Headlong

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Reposted by Matt Barton

David Eldridge @deldridgewriter.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Wishing the Royal Exchange Theatre a very happy 50th birthday 🙏🏻❤️🎈🎂5️⃣0️⃣👌🎂😘 It’s been a privilege and honour to play this extraordinary theatre in the great city of Manchester three times over the years. A cauldron, a genuinely shared experience and a room where magic happens.

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

How, aged 82, Alan Ayckbourn has the energy to not just write a 92nd play, but to also direct it, design the sound for it and make the whole thing three hours long is beyond me. But he could do with someone to rein him in here with this interesting enough but wildly bloated play

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

It’s not quite as good as the original production, if we’re comparing, but there are some nice new touches and above all the play just remains brilliant – until the ending

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

So Lear yet so far for Ian McDiarmid. He throws everything he has at this – often all at once – while the production around him has nothing really to offer in return www.sheffieldtribune.co.uk/king-lear-re...

sheffieldtribune.co.uk

King Lear — and yet so far

Reviewer Matt Barton argues the Crucible's casting coup proved a poisoned chalice

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

My Edinburgh reviews have started making their way up on Exeunt, beginning with Stockard Channing and David Westhead’s swift and pathos-light Krapp’s Last Tape exeuntmagazine.substack.com/i/210336403/...

exeuntmagazine.substack.com

Edinburgh Festival Fringe reviews 2026

All of our reviews, as we get 'em

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Arrived in Edinburgh to mop up as many of my Exeunt colleagues’ leftovers as I can. The drizzly weather has almost made the sauna theatre an inviting prospect

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

Enjoyed hearing Phelim McDermott philosophise on the creative process, bringing wonder to the theatre and reviving MIF (and now West End) hit Tao of Glass

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

Magnificent and maddening, epic and exhausting – this Game of Thrones adaptation sometimes lumbers, but when it finds its rhythm and fires on all cylinders, it’s knock-out

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

Baffling how many Cleansed reviews claim no point or purpose comes through the play. Rebecca Frecknall’s production might not perfectly balance the real and the abstract, but Kane’s exploration of love’s endurance and our tolerance of atrocity comes through with searing force

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

A Cate Blanchett VR ASMR session evolved into an increasingly tedious 45 minutes of woo-woo guff you wouldn’t even say while tripping out observer.co.uk/culture/thea...

observer.co.uk

Evolver – a VR journey around the body that is more mind ...

The immersive show at Wales Millennium Centre featuring narration by Cate Blanchett is visually hypnotic but fails to tell a story

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

I pretty much swooned over Sweeney

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

Reviewed The Cherry Orchard, where Helen Hunt gives a tepid, blandly nondescript performance in a production that’s more starchy than starry. Still, she might not summon much feeling, but at least Ken Bran can observer.co.uk/culture/thea...

observer.co.uk

The Cherry Orchard – RSC’s Chekhov yields a barren harvest

Tamara Harvey’s conventional Chekhov production boasts a starry cast, but a fusty new adaptation lacks heart and vigour

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

Bechdel’s graphic novel is probably a masterpiece, so I felt slightly disappointed by this musical bellowing the subtext at us (maybe a flaw of musicalising this material?) and the inescapable sense of emotional manipulation in the production. Fun, but it didn’t floor me

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

The Oldham Coliseum CEO has been making lots of noises on social media, so it’s great to see The Mill dig rigorously into what she’s actually delivering (which seems to be just an eye-watering expenses bill)

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 29/06/2026

I do wonder when AD Elizabeth Newman is going to challenge herself directorially, as this is about as safe and harmless as you could get. But if you fancy swaying along idly to some Cliff Rich classics, Sheffield’s the spot for it

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

A dance tribute so underwhelming, even a couple of the Factory International staff were on their phones throughout the second half

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

Liverpool’s Royal Court seems to have two modes: solid, sincere local stories (Boys from the Blackstuff, Girls Don’t Play Guitars, Conteh) and… this

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 19/06/2026

I reviewed Atlantis, heading to Chichester, which makes a lot of noise about the climate emergency and political inertia, without having much really to say (which I don’t think is the same as avoiding easy answers). It has a nice, more intimate idea that’s sadly drowned out

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 16/06/2026

Factory International unveils its “autumn/winter programme”: joining prev announced It’s a Sin are a new play running for all of two nights, an art exhibition and yet another Lightroom experience imported from London

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 09/06/2026

The Everyman’s commitment to new writing is admirable, but this piece needs a lot of work. Play, production and performer all trundle along in a low, humdrum gear, with only one real theatrical flourish that lasts maybe six seconds

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

The audience interaction is plainly unnecessary and Green’s apparent personal identification with Woolf never lands as anything other than ludicrous. But she’s so hard to not like as a performer that she just about gets you past those flaws

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 22/05/2026

I missed the original run of 1536, so was glad to catch the West End transfer of a rightly celebrated and scorching play that would be terrific for anyone to have written, let alone a debut writer

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 21/05/2026

There are undeniably moving things in Rory Mullarkey’s warm and sincere new play. Even so, the lack of structure and specificity to the city (plus a long, rambling opening monologue that just didn’t work for me) leaves it falling short of shattering

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 13/05/2026

This is good to see, as many of their prev tours have forced regional audiences to compromise with largely recast productions. But it’ll be interesting to see which productions end up being selected over time - i.e. realistically it’s not going to be your Cate Blanchett-starring shows…

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 12/05/2026

This show can’t always see the wood for the trees narratively, but is so full of delicately crafted visual wonder that it’s a delight. Off to Sadler’s Wells East next, then Blackpool Grand

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

Love being blindsided by a new play, and this Hilary Mantel adaptation @liveveryplay.bsky.social did exactly that

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 09/05/2026

Didn’t love Madge’s aggressively jaunty new musical, with its crazily chaotic first half and naff depiction of a northern community. It ultimately feels like a big TV ad for the bank, but at least has a show-stealing villain from Samuel Holmes

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

The new Nyman/Dyson show is short on scares, if not ideas, and never manages to summon the magic of their previous hit, Ghost Stories. Frances Barber’s performance is a treat, but by the end, it’s more hammy than horror

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

Ahead of his new show with Jeremy Dyson which opened in York last night, I spoke to Andy Nyman for @theipaper.com about how he was nearly Derren Brown, why he loves magic and horror (and why others don’t), and what draws people to the supernatural inews.co.uk/culture/arts...

inews.co.uk

The magician who turned down Derren Brown's job: 'I'm not interested in fame'

Illusionist, writer, director and West-End star, Andy Nyman talks about his new play, a thriller about a defamed TV psychic

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Enchanting design and a nice central idea. But the delivery is muddled rather than magical

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 25/04/2026

Aron Julius’s new play clearly stems from a personal fascination and fandom towards Conteh, so much so that he takes the role himself. But as warmly as that comes across, he has not managed to shape that into a massively interesting, illuminating or well-written play

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 13/04/2026

Plenty of worthy messages that, jumbled together without enough kid-friendly dazzle, never quite achieve lift off

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 09/04/2026

Apparently one of the biggest hits in the New Vic’s history, this musical’s 60s/70s pop hits go down well with the old crowd. It’s essentially a three-star show, but good golly the shoddy storytelling is so all over the place that it becomes an incoherent slog

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 07/04/2026

I clearly drew the short straw in the Exeunt reviews round-up: National Theatre special, covering The Authenticator, which I found naff, muddled and misleadingly marketed

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

Private Lives is a problematic play and I don’t really know why you’d revive it in 2026 (if McIntyre does have an answer, it doesn’t come through). But I thought this is about as good a production as you can stage, and Steve John Shepherd is particularly great www.whatsonstage.com/news/private...

whatsonstage.com

Private Lives at the Royal Exchange Theatre – review

Blanche McIntyre’s revival of the Noël Coward classic runs until 2 May as part of the theatre’s 50th anniversary programme

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

Three hours, five decades, one brilliant Liz White. Leo Butler’s ambitious new play is overlong (ending at least six times), baggy and with a clumsy, cursory approach to politics. But with an edit, it could be a fantastic state-of-the-nation drama

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 21/03/2026

It’s a short (85-minute) walk up the garden path for a starchy staging that’s more concert performance than true musical. The songs are well performed, and I gave some of the ropey direction the benefit of the doubt, but it doesn’t really unlock the story’s magic

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 18/03/2026

It gets a little slow and laboured towards the end of its 3+ hours, but I thought this production from Matthew Xia was really irresistibly lovely – and better than the National’s, for my money

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Matt Barton @matt-barton.bsky.social · 14/03/2026

The design and central performance are reasonably effective, but losing so much of the psychology as a result of condensing the novel makes this a punishingly dreary evening www.thestage.co.uk/reviews/crim...

thestage.co.uk

Crime and Punishment at Chroma-Q Theatre, Leeds: endless gloomy

Read our review of Crime and Punishment review at Chroma-Q Theatre, Leeds: Dostoevsky’s huge novel is compressed into a gruelling and confusing two-hour production

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