Monday
Are you a good person? Lucy Hutson explores the difficulties of ethical living in the terrific Britney Spears Custody Battle vs Zeus in Swan Rape at the Bike Shed theatre in Exeter. Mike Kenny adapts the late, great Siobhan Dowd’s Solace of the Road, a teenage road trip, at Derby theatre until 14 March.
Tuesday
The resurgence of wrestling in the UK and its fanatical fanbase is explored in Lardo at the Old Red Lion in London. Spandex promised. Cardboard Citizens are out on tour with their latest forum theatre-inspired production, Benefit, about the welfare state and at Pleasance London. In Infinity Pool, Bea Roberts takes inspiration from Madame Bovary to create a play with no actors at Exeter’s Bike Shed until 7 March. Sectarianism is explored in Football Colours Allowed, a season of short plays at the Tron in Glasgow.
Wednesday
Ivo van Hove directs Juliette Binoche as Antigone at the Barbican. Van Hove’s transfer of Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge may be making a splash at Wyndham’s, in London. But for those beyond reach of the West End, a new touring production of Miller’s drama goes out on a national tour from Nottingham Theatre Royal directed by Stephen Unwin. Sick! festival has a terrific lineup of performance, discussion and film alternating venues between Manchester and Brighton. The festival includes Christopher Green’s Prurience, at Manchester’s Methodist Central Buildings tonight, a piece that invites you to join a self-help group for porn addicts; it goes on to play Fabrica in Brighton on Friday. Gecko’s Missing, which sees one woman trying to discover her past is at Battersea Arts Centre, in London, from tonight. Bucket Club’s small but charming contemporary production of the Selkie Bride story, Lorraine and Alan, is at the Ustinov in Bath, and then touring. Jenny Sealey directs Graeae Theatre Company’s revival of Blood Wedding by Lorca, in a new version by David Ireland, at Dundee Rep. Finland produces some great circus, and Circus Uusi Maailma make their London debut with Globally Wanted, a story told through acrobatics and parkour at Jackson’s Lane, in London.
Thursday
The wonderful Sprint festival begins tonight at Camden People’s Theatre, which includes new pieces from some of the UK’s most interesting established and emerging artists, including Jamal Harewood’s The Privileged coming up on 14 and 15 March. No Guts, No Heart, No Glory is a punchy look at the hopes and aspirations of female teenage Muslim boxers. It’s part of the Women of the World festival at the South Bank, in London, until 8 March. Peter Whelan’s lovely The Herbal Bed, about Shakespeare’s daughter, Susannah, is revived at Clwyd Theatr Cymru. Vincent Dance Company celebrate their anniversary with 21 years/21 Works at London’s Shoreditch Town Hall. Non Zero One ask you to question your past and future in Mountaineering at Salisbury Playhouse. Office work gets a circus makeover in the work Strike! at the Arc in Stockton tonight; a small but entertaining look at the constraints of work. Also in north-east England, Tangled Feet set out on tour with a new show about parenthood, Kicking and Screaming, which is at Arts Centre Washington tonight (followed by a tour).
Friday and the weekend
The fabulous and always surprising Forest Fringe are at the Place, in London, tonight and tomorrow. The Sarah Kane season continues at Sheffield Crucible Studio, with Crave playing from tonight in repertoire with Kane’s final play, 4.48 Psychosis from tomorrow until 21 March. On Friday, head to the Wagon and Horses pub in Lancaster to see Drunken Chorus’s triple bill of free performances inspired by the British pub. Also on Friday, Little Cauliflower set off on tour with Cell, a musical-puppet and physical theatre show about a dying man’s adventure of a lifetime. It’s at the Hazlitt in Maidstone, Kent, tonight, then touring. Saturday sees the first preview at Leicester’s the Curve of the new musical based on Sue Townsend’s The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13¾. Theresa Heskins adapts Dracula and includes flying sequences at the New Vic, Newcastle-under-Lyme. David Leddy’s clever, bamboozling Long Live the Little Knife is at the Traverse, Edinburgh, for one night only on Saturday.
