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A Man For All Seasons: Seagull True Story - Marylebone Theatre

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It's not often that you see a play that tells you not so much a story but gives you a sense of how it feels to be in a situation, how it feels to be silenced, how it feels to be marginalised, how the dead hand of consensus stifles your creativity. However, in Seagull True Story, created and directed by Alexander Molochnikov and based on his own experiences fleeing Russia and trying to establish himself in New York, we have a chance to look beyond the headlines and understand how the war in Ukraine impacted a a group of ordinary creatives in Russia. And how the gradual smothering of freedom and freedom of expression becomes impossible to resist, except for the brave or the suicidal. Against the backdrop of Chekhov's The Seagull, which explores love and other forms of disappointment, it presents a gripping and enthralling depiction of freedom of expression in the face of adversity. After playing earlier this year in New York, it plays a limited run at the Marylebone Theatre . Fro...

This filthy world: Bakersfield Mist

Bakersfield Mist and its tale about forgeries in the art world might not be the most original piece of theatre, but the opportunity to see Kathleen Turner and Ian McDiarmid work together makes it a memorable night at the theatre.

A fan of her performance in Serial Mom, I have a soft spot for any opportunity for Kathleen Turner to  say filthy words. After a few minutes, when she said fuck about ten times I knew this was going to be a show I was going to enjoy.

But others may not be so indiscriminating.


Turner plays a boozy ex-bartender who is down on her luck. She is hoping that a painting she found in a car boot sale is a lost Jackson Pollock which finally might mean that something has gone her way. 

McDiarmid plays a snooty art inspector whose job is to determine whether it is real or whether it is a fake. 

But while the characters might appear to be stereotypes and it is fairly obviously plotted there are enough surprises in the material and Turner and McDiarmid make enough of the characterisations to give you a sense that you have seen something worthwhile.

The elaborate trailer set which serves as her home is also a boxing ring where the two characters spar for the duration of the piece, and by the end of it the two have more in common than they would care to admit. 

Written by Stephen Sachs, running only 80 minutes it is a perfect evening diversion to contemplate how someone else's life went so wrong.

It runs until 30 August.

And you can see Turner's previous foul mouthed performance on Youtube.

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