Monday
If you find festive theatre turns you into a grouch try James Graham’s intelligent political drama about the workings of Westminster, This House, at the Garrick, London. Or you could sample Michael Frayn’s Chekhov rewrite, Wild Honey, at Hampstead; or Saint Joan starring Gemma Arterton, which opens tonight at the Donmar. In Derby, Mike Kenny’s updated Alice in Wonderland is the antidote to too much tinsel. For children, Puppet State Theatre’s brilliant environmental fable, The Man Who Planted Trees, opens in the Royal Exchange Studio in Manchester today. The three- to seven-year-olds will love Little Bulb’s The Night That Autumn turned to Winter at Battersea Arts Centre until 8 January.
Tuesday
Black Beauty got a galloping five-star review and is at the Traverse in Edinburgh until Christmas Eve. There are two Snow Queens vying for your attention, both wickedly good: Theresa Heskins’s version is a winter warmer at the New Vic in Newcastle-under-Lyme, and Vivienne Franzman’s rewrite is deliciously scary at the Bristol Old Vic. Also in Bristol, Sally Cookson’s Cinderella: A Fairytale is a pleasure and a half at the Tobacco Factory. The best and worst of Victorian entertainment is celebrated in A Little of What You Fancy, which brings songs, melodrama and magic to Salisbury’s Salberg Studio from tonight into the new year. The Ugly Duckling is rewritten for family audiences by Le Gateau Chocolat in Duckie at London’s Southbank Centre.
Wednesday
If you are looking for something sophisticated, sexy and subversive, you won’t go wrong with La Soirée, which effortlessly rises above the tack in Leicester Square. Equally swanky – and only for the over-60s and their guests – is Duckie’s The Posh Club at the Bishopsgate Institute today at 11am and 3.30pm bringing spectacular entertainment and a high tea to elders. Dress code: very posh.
Thursday
You have until 31 December to catch New International Encounter’s lovely reimagining of Beauty and the Beast at Cambridge Junction; it’s a nifty little storytelling package including music and delightful performances. David Walliams’s The First Hippo on the Moon should draw the crowds at the Royal Hippodrome in Eastbourne over Christmas and the new year. The New Adventures of Snow Mouse is a hit for the Egg in Bath. Sally Cookson’s staging of Michael Rosen’s We’re Going on a Bear Hunt will bring pleasure at Arts Depot in Finchley, where Oily Cart are also in residence with the delightful In a Pickle.
Friday and the weekend
Little Angel’s production of Wow! Said the Owl is at Home in Manchester. Nikolai Foster’s staging of The Witches is a nasty delight at West Yorkshire Playhouse. Rent is flawed but boasts a stunning cast in a fine revival at the St James theatre. Mother Goose with Roy Hudd at Wilton’s Music Hall, is a pleasure. Alexander Zeldin’s impressive devised show, Love, at the National’s Dorfman stage, reminds us of the need for compassion in world where the divide between rich and poor is widening.
