... Role models VAUDEVILLE Reflected Glory RONALD Harwood's new play poses the question of whether an author is entitled to ransack his family's lives to provide material for a stage work, a matter which is presumably of particular significance to him, because he himself did so in Another Time. He also, of course, used personal ence, though not on a tamuy level, m his most successful play. The ...

... The Virtuoso BARBICAN PIT THE Swan at Stratford, where this production was first presented last year, was built to show there is a rich seam of English dramatic literature quite apart from Shakespeare. Greedily, one is always hoping the RSC are going to uncover there another Congreve or Wilde, though the chances of a further Way of the World or Importance of Being Earnest languishing ...

... John Mills Entertainments TORQUAY By DAVID LOWE RAIN LEAKING through from the roof and onto the stage; freezing temperatures in the auditorium and dressing rooms, and a request by the promoter of the event for a portable stage extension, denied because of lack of advance notice despite the promoter having offered a team of his own staff to assist in the assembly of the unit. These ...

... Trick or treat GLOBE Man of the Moment WITH THE exception of Roger Glos- sop's Mediterranean villa setting, in which we set a wide patio complete with the swimming pool on stage, there is nothing tricksy about Alan Ayck- bourn's latest play, no evidence of one of those puzzles that Ayckbourn allegedly sets himself to solve in rical terms. But that is not quite the truth, because beneath the ...

... THE PLACE Spring Loaded IT SAYS a great deal for Union Danci that for three out of four years it ha: opened the annual dance festival Spring Loaded, at The Place. Th ...

... The Crucible OLIVIER THIS splendid version of Miller's 1953 masterpiece, his finest play and perhaps the finest play in American drama, gives us uniformly good per formances, with striking acting from Tom Wilkinson as John Proctor and Zoe Wanamaker as his falsely accused wife Elizabeth. If the William Dudley set, all gleam ing new wood, is overfussy and does little to suggest the light and ...

... Waltz of the Toreadors NIAGARA-ON-THE-LAKE THE EXQUISITELY wrought production of The Waltz of the Toreadors at the Shaw Festival by the English director-designer team of David Giles and Kenneth Mellor made one feel that an Anouilh revival was nigh. Not that the master French playwright has exactly gone out of fashion--his Eurydice is being done this season at Chichester but one almost felt ...

... The Big One Cockpit IN A self-conscious, world, not very far away from where most of us reside, live Debbie and Phil. They take an eternity to fall for each other, and their romance is mirrored by the onscreen relationships of two supposedly more perfect couples, played admirably deadpan, by the same performers. Marrying live theatre with film footage isn't the easiest of tasks, but ...

... Return Journey LYRIC STUDIO BOB Kingdom was 12 years old when he first heard Dylan Thomas' voice on a radio programme in his home town of Cardiff. This broadcast began a lifelong fas cination with the poet and his work. Later he was to say of his voice: To me it is the oral equivalent of words printed on the finest vellum or sharply etched in marble. In collaboration with Anthony Hopkins, ...

... Madness In Valencia GATE WITH a set consisting of three Brechtian curtains swishing back and forth on washing-lines, the Gate works its usual magic on this, its seventh Spanish Golden Age production. Paul Russell has also designed the chiaroscuro lighting that lends such eloquence to Lope de Vega's vivid satire on the madness of romantic ardour. The densely plotted story is ren dered even more ...

... Ninagawa's native approach confuses the Western eye BARBICAN The Tempest YUKIO Ninagawa's fantasy-Noh version of Shakespeare's The Tempest caused a sensation when first staged in Britain at the 1988 Edinburgh Festival. The vastly inventive approach, the controlled emotionalism, the almost magical use of sound and lighting, the awesome scope of the set (a huge tem ple filling the stage), and ...

... The Snow Queen THE YOUNG VIC THE YOUNG Vic's decision to rerun its acclaimed production of The Snow Queen will delight children of all ages, especially those old enough to know better! Directors Karen Stephens and Chris White create a magical land peopled by trolls, giant flowers, talking swallows and a sad and stately rein deer. The latter is irresistibly portrayed with big eyed sobriety ...