... YOUNG VIC 'MACBETH' Opened January 15 GRUESOME ingredients are as plentiful in the Young Vic's Macbeth as they are in the witches' cauldron. We certainly sup full with horrors for in Frank Dunlop's black vision of the play, everyone is tainted with evil. Not onlv do Macbeth and his Lady both become pos sessed by the dark spirits they summon; Macduff is also filled with demonic strength; ...

... 'Kennedy's Children' SHIRLEY ANNE FIELD has taken over the role of Carla in Kennedy's Children at the King's Head, Islington, and Pat Starr has succeeded to the role of Wanda. The rest of the cast. Don Parker, Deborah Norton, Richard Oldfield and Ray Harding, are the same. Kennedy's Children will run at the King's Head until the end of March, and a number of overseas productions are ...

... NEW END 'LAURA' BACK at the Theatre at New End, the Close Company this time offer a variation upon The Father of Strindberg lasting a little over an hour. Adapted and directed by Steven Dartnell, Laura is claustrophobic in its effect a succession of hammer blows without relief of tension which cause one to switch off one's own concentration in sheer self-defence from time to time. It is ...

... TWO Hull men have written a stage musical based on the life of Amy Johnson, one of the great pioneers in the history of British aviation. In spite of her fame, little has been written about her for the theatre, so Richard Green, a professional freelance producer, and Ian Butler, who teaches music in Hull, decided to have a go themselves. Richard Green wrote the script and Ian Butler composed ...

... EMLYN WILLIAMS AS CHARLES DICKENS R. B. MARRIOTT REVIEWS Opened February 4 IT IS almost a quarter of a century since Emlyn Williams first appeared in his solo performance as Charles Dickens reading from his novels. Since then he has taken the performance to many parts of the world and made several West F.nd appearances. He turns up again, at the Haymarket. with F.mlyn Williams as Charles ...

... ALDWYCH, 'TWELFTH NIGHT' Opened February 5 AN AIR of innocent ambivalence pervades the Royal Shakespeare Company production of Twelfth Night. It is set in a real dream world, in which the natives are a hotch-potch of national types and costumes. part-Italian, part-Greek, even, in the decor, a touch of Hungarian. The one thing they are not is English, Sir Toby Belch, for instance, being ...

... LIVERPOOL 'FUNNY PECULIAR' MIKE STOTT'S Funny Peculiar at Liverpool Everyman is a comedy worthy of the name. None of your flaccid domestic numbers, here is two and a half hours of gutsy, funny sex open-hearted and unrestrained. A new, original play, destined for popularity. It all starts in a Pennine village where shopkeeper Tre vor, his sights set on fellatio, sympathises with the local ...

... Judy joins Young Vic JUDY GEESON joins the Young Vic company for the first time to play Julia in Two Gentlemen of Verona, which opens on Fe bruary 19. Pip Miller returns to the company to play Proteus. Others in the cast are Michael Walker, Joanna McCallum, Michael Graham Cox. Alfred Lynch, Derek Fowlds, Darien Angadi, Hugh Hastings. Michael Menaugh. Peter O'Farrell, John Vine and Judy ...

... LANCASTER 'LILE JIMMY WILLIAMSON' THE fascinating story of little Jimmy Williamson, the former Lancaster linoleum tycoon, is unfolded with fine dramatic quality at the Dukes Playhouse Lancaster, in Lile Jimmy Williamson. By David Pownall, Lancaster's own playwright it enhances his reputation in such work. The play is carried out on two stage level, to depict the two time levels ...

... BRIGHTON 'THE ARTHUR HORNER SHOW' PHIL WOODS was commissioned by Foco Novo to write The Arthur Horner Show. which opened at Brighton's Gardner Centre for the Arts on February 4. Based on the emergence of the Miners' Federation later the N.U.M., as a body of political force, this rather-than-a-play shows how the miners' organisations have been in the forefront of the workers' struggles for ...

... Personality of the week IN THE memorable Peter Hall production of John Gabriel Borkman for the National Theatre Company at the Old Vic there are a number of fine performances, including those of Ralph Richardson, Wendy Hiller and Peggy Ashcroft, as Borkman, Ella and Gunhild, but there is a young newcomer to the company who is also outstanding: FRANK GRIMES who plays Erhart. It is a tribute ...

... GUILDFORD 'HAY FEVER' FIRST performed just fifty years ago. Hay Fever has been revived for the latest time at the Guildford Yvonne Arnaud. Noel Coward said it was tapped out in three days, but although still bearing some superficial appeal, it is now no more than a trivial light comedy pastiche. This production has the asset of a turquoise 'twenties set by Pamela Ingram complete with ...