The Hive, from fledgling company Human Zoo, takes its lead from the dystopian fantasies of Huxley and Orwell. The Hive is the last subterranean bastion of human kind, the world above poisoned by war and conflict. Guided by the system controller’s desire to avoid conflict, each individual lives alone in an 8’ x 8’ ‘cell’, […]

At its best the work of Hofesh Shechter, director of this year’s Brighton Festival, can feel almost shamanistic – an overwhelming spectacle of pounding sounds, visceral movement and visuals. When I saw 2012’s Political Mother as part of last year’s Derry City of Culture programme, the arena was set up for a gig and hundreds […]

Into the Spiegeltent, her ‘foulard’ billowing behind her, prances the compact, black-clad Lucy Hopkins, Artist. The stage platform is attained with intentionally awkward grace and our hostess introduces herself with grandiose prose, precise annunciation and enormous disdain for us, her captive audience. What follows is a beautifully constructed hour of playful interrogation into what it is […]

Copperdollar have been creating immersive theatrical events since 2008, their work crossing performance and music genres to effectively appeal to the increasingly interdisciplinary festival scene. The Back of Beyond was originally created for Glastonbury in 2011 and is a great choice to open the Fringe festival, plunging its audience into a hedonistic atmosphere that brings […]

Aerial company Gravity & Levity present a show tackling current political events around the war with Afghanistan by drawing parallels with World War I. The emphasis on narrative and characterisation ritualises key moments in the lives of two soldiers: Private George Ellison and John Smith, who died in the First World War and the war […]