... My Night With Reg CRITERION KEVIN Elyot's play is the first show to go from the Royal Court's Theatre Upstairs to the West End. It won't be the last, but it'll take a good one to better it. It has been glibly dismissed by some as 'a gay Ayckbourn'. But My Night With Reg is more than the comedy of social manners you might expect. It's a play for today, about coming to terms with life in the ...

... Uwawi NOTTINGHAM AN AUDIENCE of gratifying numbers was treated to a brief curtain raiser, demonstrating how much the Salidummay company had been able to achieve in just one week working with local youngsters. The traditional song form Salidummay is today often associ ated with protest, and Uwawi (Lullaby) is a continuous narrative in a prologue and four parts which tells in song, dance and ...

... Dance Umbrella THE PLACE The work of choreographer Michel Kelemenis has a natural affinity with romanticism yet his style is modernist. Though the opening duet image was the least interesting of three works, overall there was a depth which, if it did not always engage the watchers in the way that Kelemenis might wish suggested a choreographer in transition, and one to watch. A ...

... Robert Hartford The Demon WEXFORD FESTIVAL OPERA Anton Rubenstein, pianist, academic and composer was Tchaikovsky's teacher. The Russians regarded him as more of a European on account of the influences he absorbed and his opera, The Demon, was a great success throughout 19th Century Germany and France. Now, it is only known in Russia and even there it is something of a rarity. Rubenstein's ...

... Tiebele and Her Demons LIBRARY THEATRE ONE OF the most striking theatrical events of Manchester's year as City of Drama was the visit of the Maly Theatre Company from St Petersburg which brought two stunning productions to the city. The company's director, Grigorii Dityatkovsky and designer Emil Kapelusch have been persuaded to work at the Library Theatre on the British premiere of Teibele and ...

... Brothers of the Brush GLASGOW WISEGUISE'S Scottish premiere of Jimmy Murphy's play bristles initially with lavatorial humour and acerbic wit before developing into more serious issues. The 'Brothers' are three Irish house painters exploited by their cost cutting boss Laurie Ventry a role played with cool assurance and sophistication, until he gets his come-uppance. Wages are low and Heno (Matt ...

... Sisters PSWICH A HUMDRUM beginning, mother and two daughters in a cosy domestic scene in a small suburban house, is almost beguiling. Gradually you are aware of the apprehension and tension that charge every moment. Dad comes in, and the home is engulfed in a wave of sick violence. Before our eyes the women are bullied, beaten, humiliated, stripped, deprived of warmth, food and comfort. Over ...

... The Office Party WATFORD FULL frontal nudity at the National is one thing but one might think that a quick 'mooney' at the height of John Godber's The Office Party at the Palace Theatre, Watford, might at least make the resident Edwardian ghost Aggie blush-- if not the audience. But the quick flash of bare flesh along with a few four letter words were taken in the spirit in which they were ...

... Dance Umbrella THE PLACE THIS year's Dance Umbrella festival has set high standards, producing an exceptional run of imaginative and polished performances. An evening amalgamating tne British company Ricochet and Vertigo from Israel underlined just how much quality work has been shown, by failing to match it. The problem was with Corpus Antagonus and the demands made by choreographer Russell ...

... Star Trek BROMLEY THE WORLD premiere of the adaptation for the stage of tele vision's highly successful Star Trek is having a bumpy ride at the Churchill, Bromley. This story the specially written episode of the spaceship Enterprise, lost in the cosmos and wandering unsuccessfully is encapsulated in the log of the captain of the craft, Jim Kirk. He records that after discovering a plot to ...

... Ham DERBY A SITCOM sequence of one-liners and farcical events, Ham is a world premiere at Derby Playhouse studio. Stock situations-- failing marriage and divided loyalties-- do not transform it into a play. But in the event it doesn't matter. It's gorgeously vulgar and scandalously funny, superbly performed by a top class cast and riveted together with songs, helped no end by David Roper and ...

... ENGLISH TOURING OPERA Orpheus and Euridice STEPHEN Medcalf's staging is modern dress, set in a Magritte room through whose window, boarded up in the Furies scene, coloured cloudscapes work on the emotions. Orpheus is pre sented as an obsessive singer/musician, Euridice as a fickle Muse too easily tempted into the social whirl. Hie chorus represent derelicts (the Furies) and the chattering ...