What's new in town
New York Broadway star and ballet dancer Leigh Zimmerman (pictured) as The Girl In The Yellow Dress in director-choreographer Susan Stroman's Contact. One of the original broadway cast of Chicago, Zimmerman has more recently starred as Velma Kelly on the London stage in Chicago alongside Denise Van Outen, and in The Seven Year Itch with Daryl Hannah. Her Contact costars include former principal dancer of the Royal Ballet Sarah Wildor and TV/film star Michael Praed (including Prince Michael in Dynasty and Robin Of Sherwood)
The Lying Kind
Ever since John Osborne caused a rumpus with Look Back In Anger nearly 50 years ago, the Royal Court has launched plays that stirred ripples of outrage and controversy. Anthony Neilson, whose The Lying Kind has been interestingly billed as 'an alternative Christmas show', is a true Court playwright in the sense that his plays frequently incite expressions of revulsion and dismay. And just now, what with this Court opening and a double bill at the Latchmere opening in December, Neilson's the drama man of the moment. From Penetrator, which probed into buggery and sexual repression, to the recent Stitching at the Bush, where a husband and wife own up to a weird, sad sexual history, he has proved himself a playwright with no holds barred.
His latest, in which two constables significantly called Blunt and Gobbel are charged with telling an old couple some terrible news, sounds like a dark comedy with a timely, social sting in its tale. For the two policemen are also caught up in a full-scale lynching operation by Parents Against Paedophile Scum.
Sleeping Beauty
The Young Vic is renowned for its Christmas shows and its latest, Rufus Norris's Sleeping Beauty based on Charles Perrault's 17th-century classic, and billed as suitable for those of us over six years of age, sounds splendidly oldfashioned.
- Fri 22 Nov-Sat 25 Jan, The Young Vic, 66 The Cut, SE1 (020-7928 6363).
