Tim Crouch performs An Oak Tree at the Soho theatre last year. Photograph: Tristram Kenton
While there are plenty of treats in London, it could well be the regions that have the pick of the bunch this week. That's partly because the Arches theatre festival is kicking off in Glasgow and boasts some of my favourites, including Tim Crouch's wonderful An Oak Tree - a show that shouldn't work at all but almost always does, brilliantly - and a return visit from 2004 Aurora Nova hit-makers Teatr Novogo Fronta with the physically brilliant Dias de las Noches.
The Arches festival begins with two shows directed by this year's winners of the Arches award for stage directors, Rob Drummond and Daljinder Singh. Definitely worth a look, and while you're there check out Graeme Miller's heartbreaking installation Beheld, which through 10 fragile glass bowls and a soundscape vividly gives a sense of lost souls - would-be migrants - who fell to earth from the undercarriages of airplanes. I saw it in Edinburgh and haven't been able to get it out of my head since. It's a very simple and very moving memorial to the dead, some of whom remain nameless. I also rather like the sound of David Leddy's Pater Noster, a 10-minute sonic experience in total darkness for an audience of one, and after enjoying New Art Club's piece for Probe at the Place last weekend, I'd love to see their 100-year history of dance, This is Modern.
Further south, Dreamthinkspeak - one of the earliest site-responsive companies, who produced the brilliant Don't Look Back and are now in huge demand around the globe - are briefly back in the country creating a new piece at Liverpool's Anglican Cathedral. One Step Forward, One Step Back is inspired by Dante's Divine Comedy and considers the global economy and regeneration. In Leeds, Delirium is a new show - still in its early stages - from physical theatre specialists Theatre O. It's based on The Brothers Karamazov in an adaptation by Enda Walsh, a writer who is as poetic as he is funny. Kaite O'Reilly's The Almond and the Seahorse, a play about memory and loss which Elisabeth Mahoney raved about last month, stops off for two nights only at Manchester's Contact. If you've never seen Bryony Lavery's Frozen, head for the Library theatre in Manchester. It is a wonderful, compassionate play but, I warn you, almost unbearable to watch.
DV8 have a show about tolerance, To Be Straight With You, at Nottingham Playhouse. It is out on tour before arriving at the National Theatre in the autumn. I'm going to take a look. I wish I could see The Special Guests' time-specific show Nightfall which is at Aberystwyth Arts Centre on Thursday only. If anyone catches it or saw it in Bristol do let me know what you think.
Back in London, don't forget the Ravenhills or the continuing Spring Loaded festival at the Place. Howard Barker has a new one at the Jerwood Vanburgh Theatre on Malet Street. I Saw Myself goes back to the theme of the subversion of public art explored in Scenes from an Execution, one of my all-time favourite plays. Bliss at the Royal Court sounds really good, and I'd love to see the new one from Melanie Wilson, Enter the Dame, at BAC. I also fancy some of the Human Geographies season at Shunt, but I won't be getting to any of those this week as I have dates with The Internationalist at the Gate, John Moran at Soho and the Tiger Lilies at the New Players.
