Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 21hJames Graham’s The Standard of Living is extremely enjoyable but it tries to be a takedown of the Bloomsbury Group, an Amadeus-style drama about Keynes’ rivalry with Hayek, and a passionate rallying cry for the value of art, and he should probably have picked just one www.timeout.com/london/news/...timeout.com‘Almost certainly the most enjoyable play about an economist ever written’ – James Graham’s The Standard of Living ReviewRory Kinnear is a delight as radical economist James Maynard Keynes in the latest from playwright Graham. 021
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 28/09/2026Tru at the Menier Chocolate Factory has an immersive set that totally blew me away and is so so impressive; the monologue is absolutely fine but it’s a series of letters and diary entries stitched together – it doesn’t tell a ‘real’ story www.timeout.com/london/theat...timeout.comTru, Menier Chocolate Factory review: The stunning immersive set slightly upstages star Jesse Tyler Ferguson in this Truman Capote monologueThis revival of Jay Presson Allen’s 1989 Truman Capote monologue was initially staged in the stunning House of the Redeemer in New York, the sort of opulent old 021
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 24/09/2026holy shit new Caryl Churchill starring Kate O’Flynn www.timeout.com/london/news/...timeout.comBritain’s greatest living playwright Caryl Churchill has just announced a new play starring Kate O’Flynn‘Widow’s Bay’ star O’Flynn will head up the legendary writer’s new play ‘Triumph’ 072
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 24/09/2026Sting’s The Last Ship is mostly a decent entry in the canon of 'nostalgic musicals about English deindustrialisation’ and has an incredible projected set from 59 Productions, but then the second half features some of the stupidest plotting I’ve ever seen in anything www.timeout.com/london/news/...timeout.com‘A plot that lurches from tender social realism to pure garbage’ – Review: Sting’s musical The Last ShipSting’s musical about the decline of the Tyneside shipyards finally makes it to London, with the man himself starring. 041
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 19/09/2026oooh missed this being published - I did a big bit asking why the golden age of commercial immersive theatre ended and whether it’s changed into something else 120
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 18/09/2026oh my god RIP Duncan Sheik - such awful news www.nytimes.com/2026/09/18/a...nytimes.comDuncan Sheik, Who Traded Pop Stardom for Broadway, Dies at 56Weary of the heartthrob label after his 1996 hit “Barely Breathing,” he pivoted to musical theater and won two Tonys for composing “Spring Awakening.” 031
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 17/09/2026looking at reviews of Thelma & Louise at the Young Vic a nagging 'are we the bad guys?' sense that female critics enjoyed more and male critics have been all 'wish it was faster and with more explosions’… nonetheless… I liked lots of stuff but thought it plodded www.timeout.com/london/theat...timeout.comThelma & Louise, Young Vic review: This musical adaptation of the feminist thriller is enjoyable but really needs to step on the gasThelma & Louise songwriter Neko Case interviewed: ‘the way we deal with sexual violence has gotten much worse’This musical version of Thelma & Louise has ma 011
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 16/09/2026Clifford Odets had the misfortune to be writing smack in the middle of all the great C20th American playwrights at their absolute zeniths and Golden Boy is not A View from the Bridge but it is good and I loved Sam Yates’ ostentatiously string-swept Almeida revival www.timeout.com/london/theat...timeout.comGolden Boy, Almeida Theatre review: Josh O’Connor returns to the stage in this ravishingly string-swept revival of Clifford Odets’ American tragedyAlmost a century on and I think we can be adult about the fact that 20th century American playwright Clifford Odets was never in the same league as the older Eu 012
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 14/09/2026spoke to Neko Case didn’t I? Spoke about Thelma & Louise, culture wars, and her love of Brixton www.timeout.com/london/news/...timeout.com‘The way we deal with sexual violence has gotten much worse’ – Neko Case on her ‘Thelma & Louise’ musicalThe alt-country superstar has written the songs for this season’s hippest musical 120
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 12/09/2026Man to Man at the Court = good play but main thing is how good a stage actor Tilda Swinton still is – she’s not exactly wasted last 40 years but would have been nice if she’d have junked a couple of the more whimsical projects in favour of a play? BUT GREAT SHE’S BACK www.timeout.com/london/news/...timeout.com‘Tilda Swinton has still got it’: Man to Man at the Royal Court Theatre ReviewThe legendary actor returns to the stage after almost 40 years with her mind-bending ’80s monologue 173
Reposted by Andrzej ŁukowskiMikel Reparaz @wikiparaz.bsky.social · 11/09/2026PAUL: What’s in the box? REVEREND MOTHER: Pain. [PAUL hesitantly puts his hand in the BOX, then FROWNS IN CONFUSION. He pulls out A BAGUETTE.] REVEREND MOHER: Hōn hōn, 6276872019
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 11/09/2026I really love Jane Eyre which was probably the big problem when it came to Jane Eyre: A Musical, John Caird’s incredibly mid period romance take he’s been trying to make happen for 30 years www.timeout.com/london/theat...timeout.comJane Eyre, Southwark Playhouse Elephant review: This slick musical romance doesn’t capture the gothic darkness of Charlotte Brontë’s masterpieceHeavyweight director John Caird - most famous for the original production of Les Mis - has been trying and in many ways succeeding in getting his musical versio 110
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 11/09/2026Ava Pickett was basically unknown two years ago and now she’s fired out her fourth banger – Bloodsport at Stratford East is very good and does not really go where you’re expecting at all www.timeout.com/london/theat...timeout.comBloodsport: After Helen of Troy, Stratford East review: Ava Pickett’s superb new play is a rip-roaring dark comedy set in the aftermath of a British Trojan WarTOWIE meets Blasted by way of the Iliad in this breezily provocative fourth play from rising star playwright Ava Pickett. Bloodsport is both fresh but also plea 053
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 10/09/2026loved Kimberly Akimbo: existential magical realism, John Hughes influence, banging score that occasionally sounds like of Montreal, none of the WE’RE ALL IN A MUSICAL LET’S BE KNOWING ABOUT IT that’s blighted quite a lot of recent Broadway import, plus Maria Friedman www.timeout.com/london/theat...timeout.comKimberly Akimbo, Hampstead Theatre review: Maria Friedman is sensational in this sweetly existential Broadway musical about a teen aging at four times the usual speedKimberly Akimbo has the sort of outlandish premise that makes you wonder if it’s going to be another entry in the annals of ‘mad things that only Americans are 031
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 10/09/2026quite a lot of previously announced stuff but strong looking 2027 from the Nash – the fact we’re getting Tracy Letts as Willy Loman has kind of blown my mind www.timeout.com/london/news/...timeout.com‘West Side Story’, Paul Mescal, Emilia Clarke, Tracy Letts and more: the National Theatre announces a year of programmingNT boss Indhu Rubasingham has laid out her plans for 2027 061
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 10/09/2026a man in Tesco with a ‘dead paedophiles don’t reoffend’ t-shirt which seemed a bit much for 7.55 in the morning 031
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 09/09/2026a sad farewell to the Gate Theatre: the writing had very clearly been on the wall since it lost its ACE funding (if not before tbh) but fair play to them for making some good shows on the way out rather than just rolling over www.timeout.com/london/news/...timeout.comOne of London’s most beloved off-West End theatres has closed for goodThe Gate had struggled on without a building or an artistic director in the post-Covid era 156
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 07/09/2026ANOTHER SUBSTACK THING: what is going on with the Bridge Theatre/why critical consensus and the Edinburgh Comedy Award seem at odds/general musings on being old in theatre years andrzejlukowski.substack.com/p/what-is-go...andrzejlukowski.substack.comWhat is going on with the Bridge Theatre/the Edinburgh Comedy Awards/my inexorably advancing years?It’s a round-up of bloglets addressing the issues of the day!! 123
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 07/09/2026does anyone know what is actually supposed to be going into these enormous new Troubadour theatres? isn’t there an enormous Greenwich one due to open next year? 101
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 07/09/2026I caught up with Lyndsey Turner’s take on A Month in the Country at the Donmar which does spend at 10-15 minutes giving you Chekhov deja vu but really does take flight, in large part thanks to Sophie Okonedo www.timeout.com/london/theat...timeout.comA Month in the Country, Donmar Warehouse review: Sophie Okonedo is superb as a jaded aristocrat slowly ripping her own world apart in Lyndsey Turner’s take on the Russian classicIf it looks like a Chekhov play and it pines wistfully in the pre-revolution Russian countryside like a Chekhov play… that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a Chekh 020
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 05/09/2026for whatever reason somebody young asked me if I played Pac-Man when I was young today and I was like ‘no it was before my time’ and he somehow misunderstood and thought I was saying I was a child pre Pac-Man and he said I looked amazingly young and then got shitty with me when I corrected him 000
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 04/09/2026I found The Story at the NT thrilling but also fairly preposterous www.timeout.com/london/theat...timeout.comThe Story, National Theatre Olivier review: Letitia Wright heads up the cast of this gripping but overwrought journalistic thrillerTracey Scott Wilson’s US newspaper drama The Story is definitely more red top than broadsheet in tone. But there’s always a place for some thrills in the theatr 111
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 03/09/2026reviewed the bayeux tapestry didn’t I www.timeout.com/london/news/...timeout.com‘More penises than expected‘: The Bayeux Tapestry at the British Museum reviewOf course the world’s most famous tapestry lives up to a millennium of hype. 021
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 01/09/2026wow somebody up there really doesn’t want a London revival of Sunday in the Park with George playbill.com/article/jona...playbill.comJonathan Bailey Pulls Out of London Sunday in the Park With George; Producers Say Revival Will ContinueThe departure of the Olivier-winning star comes after a similar move from his on-screen Wicked co-star, Ariana Grande. 230
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 01/09/2026holy shit M&S bran flakes cost 65p a box?? I feel like I’ve unlocked the next tier of being middle class 020
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 31/08/2026surely historically the Fringe has often ended on the 31st, is it maybe just a weird knock on of the pandemic that it’s slightly passed out of folk memory 100
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 31/08/2026traditional last day of the Fringe shout out to the hardly souls doing a show on the final Monday 130
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 28/08/2026Patti Smith mourning Optimus Prime is a strangely touching thing up behold 3114
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 26/08/2026as ever I'm completely blindsided by the fringe comedy awards shortlist – not to say they’re ‘wrong’ or that I'm some comedy guru, just feels like very little bearing on buzz at the fringe (although the only one I did see I thought was pretty pedestrian) www.comedyawards.co.ukcomedyawards.co.ukEdinburgh Comedy AwardsCelebrating over 40 years of the Edinburgh Comedy Awards, recognising breakthrough comedians and generation-defining talent at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. 100
Reposted by Andrzej ŁukowskiMicah @rincewind.run · 25/08/2026dolly parton taught millions of children to read dolly parton raised millions of dollars for cancer research and disaster relief dolly parton stood by the lgbtq community her entire life dolly parton personally helped fund the moderna vaccine if there was a right side of something she was on it 18117054198
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 25/08/2026wrote some rambling general musings on the 2026 Fringe, veering from my fave shows!!!! to wanky stuff about climate change and the ongoing, ever mutating 'Fleabag effect’ andrzejlukowski.substack.com/p/some-thoug...andrzejlukowski.substack.comSome thoughts on the 2026 Edinburgh Fringe ft my top five showsI came, I sauna’d, I conquered 001
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 25/08/2026happy that Pride – which I finally saw last week! – is getting a transfer but intrigued by what this tells us about future of the Bridge: Ivanov would appear to have disappeared from its homepage although if you google it you can still find its page and buy tickets www.timeout.com/london/news/...timeout.comThe National Theatre’s hit musical ‘Pride’ is transferring to London’s West EndThe year’s most acclaimed theatre show will get a new lease of life as it moves into a much bigger theatre. 130
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 21/08/2026The nicest way of looking at the Pixie Lott-starring Who Killed Marilyn? is that it’s the stage equivalent of a trashy true crime drama (where the actor playing the victim turns to camera at the end and says 'yes, this is definitely how it happened’) www.timeout.com/london/theat...timeout.comWho Killed Marilyn, Emerald Theatre review: Pixie Lott stars as Marilyn Monroe in this stilted, exposition-mired conspiracy thriller‘But how did Marilyn Monroe really die?’ is not necessarily a question you’re expecting to have answered down the theatre in 2026, especially not via the medium 010
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 20/08/2026I had a solid time at new immersive experience Peaky Blinders: Underworld and would probably go to the pub there again! Crucially it is infinity times better than Peaky Blinders: The Rise, a real low ebb in my complicated relationship with immersive entertainment www.timeout.com/london/news/...timeout.comI went to London’s brand new Peaky Blinders experience – this is what it’s likeWith a 1920s pub and secret underworld. 110
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 20/08/2026an obscure part of my personal lore is that I have a mortal terror of saunas and thus it was I decided I would spend 3.5 hours in the Edinburgh Fringe’s Sauna Theatre in an effort to grow as a person, here is what happened etc (lowering tone of Exeunt again) substack.com/@exeuntmagaz...substack.comCan the Sauna Theatre cure our critic's terror... of saunas?The things Andrzej Łukowski will do for art 172
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 19/08/2026How the Other Half Loves at the Old Vic is maybe the first time I’ve actually found an Alan Ayckbourn comedy funny ha-ha, in large part thanks to some truly deranged line-reads from Laura Elsworthy and Adam Gillen, plus Roger Allam’s shorts www.timeout.com/london/theat...timeout.comHow the Other Half Loves, Old Vic review: Hilarious performances power an excellent revival of Alan Ayckbourn’s surprisingly wholesome infidelity comedyIf it hasn’t necessarily always been entirely clear why Matthew Warchus decided to reconfigure the Old Vic to an in-the-round set up for his final year in charg 311
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 18/08/2026back in London and I caught up with DEATH NOTE: THE MUSICAL, which is gloriously lurid and manga faithful, but is also a group of unsympathetic sociopaths playing with a magic book for 2.5 hours when it could surely have been tweaked into a much more human tragedy www.timeout.com/london/theat...timeout.comDeath Note the Musical, Barbican Centre review: This musical adaptation of the smash manga about a killer notebook should have been braver with the source materialDeath Note: The Musical is a remarkably faithful adaptation of Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata's classic mid-’00s Death Note manga, which concerns Light Yagami, 010
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 17/08/2026feels vaguely silly to comment on Ivo van Hove’s Angels in America almost 20 years after it debuted but anyway: it took me a while to get my head around the aggressive minimalism but once you do it’s obviously great www.timeout.com/edinburgh/th...timeout.comAngels in America, King’s Theatre review: Ivo van Hove’s minimalist five-hour take on Tony Kushner’s trippy AIDS epic takes a while to warm up, but it’s worth itA minimalist Dutch version of Tony Kushner’s maximalist New York epic Angels in America? I’d have my doubts except for the fact that Ivo van Hove’s production f 031
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 17/08/2026Bella Hull definitely my stand-up 'discovery' of the Fringe (to be clear lots of people discovered her before me, I was simply ignorant) just very funny, very acidic www.timeout.com/edinburgh/co...timeout.comBella Hull: Mad Cow Disease, Monkey Barrel Comedy review: Bracingly acidic stand-up from this Gen Z star in waitingIf the advent of Saturday Night Live UK has offered an Edinburgh Fringe boost for the stars of the show performing here then it’s also offered a calling care to 010
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 15/08/2026sitting in Brooke’s in one of the partitioned booth things and a woman asked if she could join me (they’re big booths) and she immediate dived down and went to sleep, absolutely elite stuff 010
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 15/08/2026Larry Dean’s Hellbent contains a slanderous passage about Birmingham, is all you really need to know www.timeout.com/edinburgh/co...timeout.comLarry Dean: Hellbent, Pleasance Courtyard review: Slick soul-baring and spot-on accents from the Scottish stand-up starLarry Dean is the great workhorse of Saturday Night Live UK: the Glaswegian comic didn’t necessarily get the kudos of the show’s breakout stars like George Four 000
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 15/08/2026Paddy Young’s Will Sir Be Laughing Alone? is very funny and weird, starts with a joke so inappropriate it would probably get him fired from SNL UK if it ever escaped containment, also the only SNL UK-er here to make any jokes about SNL UK www.timeout.com/edinburgh/co...timeout.comPaddy Young: Will Sir Be Laughing Alone?, Monkey Barrel Comedy Review: The dashing ‘SNL UK’ star makes an alarmingly persuasive case that he’s a massive creepy loserPaddy Young is annoyingly handsome and – after years of cultier success – has one of the best gigs in British comedy, being the co-anchor of SNL UK’s Weekend Up 010
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 15/08/2026for some reason Hannah Maxwell’s big tech takedown Turn Your F*cking Phones off didn’t really agree with me, it just seemed unfocussed and weirdly half-leveraged on the admittedly great story of the time she kind of worked as a spy www.timeout.com/edinburgh/th...timeout.comHannah Maxwell: Turn Your F*cking Phones Off, Summerhall review: Theatremaker Maxwell spins a cautionary yarn out of her spy yearsChipper provocateur Hannah Maxwell’s new show leans heavily on an autobiographical account of her secretive work in ‘strategic communications’ during the pandem 110
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 15/08/2026more fringe reviews - I enjoyed The Distance at Summerhall, a story about finding your place in the world and then being kicked out of it… how 'true’ is it? dunno but it feels like the physical exertion involved in the piece by Ben Norris gives it integrity? www.timeout.com/edinburgh/th...timeout.comThe Distance, Summerhall review: Ben Norris’ athletic, poetic fictionalised account of the life he never got to live is moving and muscularBen Norris has had a decent career as a poet, actor and writer: notably, he’s played Ben Archer in The Archers since 2018. But in The Distance he looks back to 010
Andrzej Łukowski @mrlukowski.bsky.social · 15/08/2026assume there was no wildfire alert in Edinburgh because it’s been pissing it down although it could also be because 5G has apparently been revoked here 021
