Monday
Kneehigh’s version of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca plays Birmingham Rep this week. It’s your last chance for Anna Karenina at the Royal Exchange in Manchester, although it is also heading for Leeds. Do not miss Carmen Disruption at the Almeida in London, a remarkable, all-enveloping, fractured aria to disconnected lives in a dying Europe.
Tuesday
Coney theatre company’s Early Days of a Better Nation brings interactive theatre to the Behaviour festival at Glasgow’s Arches. The show then moves to The Mac in Belfast on Friday. Cheek by Jowl’s fine Russian-language version of Measure for Measure is well worth a look at Oxford Playhouse, where it plays until Saturday. Ella Carmen Greenhill’s delicate and touching play about autism and sibling relationships, Plastic Figurines, is out on tour, at Whitby Hall in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, tonight and then Wigan and Barnsley later in the week. The troubling and highly textured Lippy goes into Clwyd Theatr Cymru. Idle Motion’s photography-inspired Shooting with Light is lovely, and it’s at the North Wall in Oxford tonight. Alan Saunders’s bilingual play A Good Clean Heart explores identity and language at the Other Room in Cardiff from tonight. Ross Sutherland’s Standby for Tape Back-Up at Shoreditch Town Hall in east London uses found footage to explain his life. Check out Dog Kennel Hill Project and Natacha Bryan as part of the Now 15 festival at The Yard, also in east London, or see The Yard’s production of Alexander Zeldin’s devastating Beyond Caring, which opens in the National Theatre’s Temporary Space in London tonight.
Wednesday
Lorne Campbell’s revival of Cyrano de Bergerac moves to Northern Stage in Newcastle. I love the look of Amy Hodge’s dance piece 7-75 at The Place in London tonight, in which five women from seven to 75 share their stories. Ontroerend Goed’s Fight Night puts democracy to the test at The Unicorn. Circus Geeks’ Beta Testing goes into The Underbelly later in the summer, but you can catch it first at Jackson’s Lane in Highgate, north London, tonight and tomorrow. Inua Ellam’s basketball-inspired The Spalding Suite, directed by Benji Reid, is at the Southbank Centre in London from tonight.
Thursday
We Can be Heroes is a story of growing up and confronting your fears, at Arc in Stockton-on-Tees tonight only. The brilliant The Money continues at Battersea Arts Centre in London, where you can also see Love Letters to the Home Office, which tells the stories of families separated by the 2012 family immigration rules legislation, which means that your family’s right to live with you in the UK is dependent on how much you earn. James Graham’s story of 1970s cuts and activism, The Angry Brigade, comes into the Bush theatre in west London.
Friday and the weekend
Figs in Wigs are at Soho theatre in central London with Show-Off, which is terrific fun. Transform takes place at West Yorkshire Playhouse in Leeds, and tonight includes workshop showings of new work by Chris Goode and Rashdash. Dance meets juggling in Gandini’s wonderful 4x4 at Cast in Doncaster. The Brighton fringe festival is under way from today. It’s best to just dip in, but here are a couple of tips: the vampire inspired Cuddles and Mirando, the Gay Tempest. The Brighton festival starts on Saturday and has a terrific opening weekend of theatre. You won’t go wrong with anything in the Paines Plough Roundabout season, but I particularly recommend Duncan Macmillan’s Lungs. You can also catch Circa’s Beyond, Richard Nelson’s The Apple Family Plays from New York’s Public Theater, and get a first glimpse of this year’s Without Walls commissions of outdoor theatre. On Saturday night, Deborah McAndrew’s One of Each, a story of fish and chip rivalries, is at Marsden Mechanics hall in Huddersfield on Saturday as part of Mikron’s latest tour.
