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The Standard West End

David Tennant, Imelda Staunton and Starlight Express take top theatre awards

Andrew Lloyd-Webber’s musical Starlight Express came out on top at the 25th annual WhatsOnStage Awards, taking home seven out of its nine nominations.

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The Standard West End

Teen arrested after Met Police raid recovers 16 stolen phones and e-bike in Camden

A 16-year-old has been bailed pending further enquiries, police said

West End | The Guardian

National Theatre’s shift from repertory plays risks ‘eroding culture’, says David Hare

Playwright calls for return to theatre’s founding vision and to stop ‘angling for West End’ The National Theatre risks “eroding the culture” by shifting away from its founding principles and putting on “semi-commercial” plays “angling for the West End”, the playwright David Hare ha...

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West End | The Guardian

Elektra review – Brie Larson makes a fearless West End debut in punk tragedy

Duke of York’s theatre, LondonThe Captain Marvel star is a magnetic frontwoman in Daniel Fish’s radical rewiring of the ancient play‘There’s nothing more dangerous to a warrior than emotion,” Jude Law’s Kree commander tells Brie Larson’s Captain Marvel in the film that secured her Holl...

The Standard West End

Sitcom stars lead tributes to ‘wonderful’ Man About The House actor Brian Murphy

The actor was also known for George And Mildred.

The Standard West End

Elizabeth Debicki to ‘shatter’ Ewan McGregor’s life in new play

She will portray a woman who arrives suddenly at the party of McGregor’s character.

West End | The Guardian

Elizabeth Debicki will return to the stage in London this summer

The Crown actor and Kate Fleetwood will join Ewan McGregor in Lila Raicek’s My Master Builder, inspired by IbsenAustralian actor Elizabeth Debicki, best known for playing Diana, Princess of Wales in The Crown, is to return to London theatre this summer.Debicki, whose last London role was in the th...

West End | The Guardian

Inside No 9: Stage/Fright review – slick chills in Shearsmith and Pemberton’s creepy West End comedy

Wyndham’s theatre, LondonThe double act transfer their TV hit to the stage in an ingenious edge-of-your-seat, one-step-ahead show which is in love with old theatres and their ghosts‘We finally ran out of ideas!” jokes Reece Shearsmith towards the end of this maiden stage outing for the hit hor...

West End | The Guardian

My heart will go onstage: Céline Dion and Dolly Parton celebrated in outlandish musicals

The comedies Titanique and Here You Come Again pay homage to two superstars in quirky style. Actors Lauren Drew and Tricia Paoluccio explain what it’s like to portray their idols – and take on their iconic songsMost biodramas about musicians sing from the same hymn sheet: chart the rise to fame ...

West End | The Guardian

Just Stop Oil activists interrupt Sigourney Weaver performance in The Tempest – video

The Hollywood actor was stopped mid-scene as a man and a woman climbed on stage at London's Theatre Royal Drury Lane. Hayley Walsh, 42, a lecturer from Nottingham, and Richard Weir, 60, a mechanical engineer from Tynemouth, set off a confetti cannon and held up a banner referring to the 1.5C global ...

The Standard West End

Holly Willoughby dons pink for Wicked style on Dancing On Ice

Co-presenter Stephen Mulhern appeared as the green-skinned witch.

West End | The Guardian

Why is Sophocles storming the West End? Because in our extreme times, his plays say the unsayable | Charlotte Higgins

The Greek tragedies ask unpalatable questions. That is why they’re enjoying a revival in 2025West End theatre is in a weird and unsettling place. It feels as though something that might once have been good and exciting is coming to an end. Many of the big shows, the ones that might have posters on...

West End | The Guardian

‘Completely staggering’: how Shirley Henderson mastered Like a Rolling Stone

In Girl from the North Country, Bob Dylan’s songs fuelled a tale of 1930s America. Todd Almond, who starred in the play on Broadway, revisits one of its most electrifying numbers in this extract from his oral history of the showTodd Almond (actor in Broadway transfer): The song Like a Rolling Ston...

West End | The Guardian

Jack Lowden joined by Martin Freeman in alcoholism drama The Fifth Step

Lowden first appeared in David Ireland’s two-hander in Edinburgh last year. For its West End run, he is paired with his ‘hero’ FreemanSlow Horses star Jack Lowden is to reprise his role in The Fifth Step, a play about addiction, faith and masculinity, in a new West End production co-starring M...

West End | The Guardian

Nina Conti: Whose Face Is It Anyway? review – masterful ventriloquist’s sublime silliness

Apollo theatre, LondonConti is in supreme command of her comedy chaos, devising voices, ad hoc songs and daft scenariosThe early phase of Nina Conti’s career was marked by restless boundary pushing, as she – and her sidekick Monkey – twisted ventriloquism into ever-surprising new shapes. Its r...

West End | The Guardian

Claire van Kampen, theatre director and composer, dies aged 71

Wife of actor Mark Rylance worked in various roles at Shakespeare’s Globe and had been diagnosed with cancerClaire van Kampen: a world-class theatre composer and bright star of Shakespeare’s GlobeThe director and composer Claire van Kampen, the wife of the actor Mark Rylance, has died at the age...

The Standard West End

‘Just call me Joan’: Beloved star of stage and screen Dame Joan Plowright

The widow of Lord Olivier was one of the outstanding actresses of her age.

The Standard West End

Award-winning actress Dame Joan Plowright dies aged 95

The widow of Lord Olivier won Golden Globes for Enchanted April and Stalin.

The Standard West End

Linda Nolan’s family ‘heartbroken’ by death of ‘inspirational’ singer

She died surrounded by her family.

West End | The Guardian

Laurie Holloway obituary

Composer, pianist and musical director on popular TV shows such as Parkinson and Strictly Come DancingIn 1971, when the BBC chat show Parkinson began, its host, Michael Parkinson, asked his friend Laurie Holloway to be the musical director. “I unfortunately had to refuse because I was engaged to b...