Cormac Richards

5***** 7 December 2021 It is maybe strange that it took until 2000 for the 1954 film of WHITE CHRISTMAS to be transferred to the stage. The much-loved movie is a regular feature of seasonal television and carries with it legions of fans. Ok, it’s not the greatest story ever put on the silver screen […]

3*** 30 November 2021 The film version of 9 to 5 became a huge hit when first released in 1980. The story of three female office workers rebelling against the misogynist male boss made for a film of great fun whilst making a statement veiled in broad humour. The film marked the big screen debut

5***** 16 November 2021 If there is a better living storyteller for the stage than Sir Matthew Bourne then I will be most surprised. His NUTCRACKER – celebrating its 30th Anniversary with a spanking new production – has such a lucid narrative you could be reading a book or watching a stage play instead of a

3*** 4 November 2021 In his 1966 novel ‘The Comedians’, Graham Greene set a story of ‘innocents abroad’ against a background of the brutal dictatorship of Papa Doc Duvalier on the island of Haiti. By turns the novel is amusing, violent and disturbing. As a prelude to that tale, ‘Our Man in Havana’ (written in

4**** 27 October 2021 There is patently a reason why Sir Kenneth MacMillan’s version of this ballet is still a staple of ballet companies across the world after over 50 years – it is very good! From the stylised and formal presentation of the nobility to the cheeky teasing of Mercutio and the tender and

4**** 19 October 2021 I will admit it from the off, ‘The Dresser’ is one of my favourite plays; that said, I haven’t seen it on stage many times, but the storyline, the humour, the pathos, the insight it offers about the theatre, the roles….all conjoin to create a play of great depth and humanity.

2** 21 September 2021 NHS – THE MUSICAL began life in 2006 at the Drum Theatre in Plymouth. Not having seen it then, I cannot comment on that version of the show, but I can only imagine it was quite different from the revival, now on the main stage of the Theatre Royal. Then a

3*** 20 September 2021 There can’t be too many people who haven’t played a game of Cluedo in their lives and maybe it was only a matter of time before a stage version was created – but it did take until the early 1990s. The result is CLUE – The Musical; something of a 1930s

5***** 9 SEPTEMBER 2021 ‘SAILOR, BEWARE!’ is one of those plays which, having been a huge hit when first produced in the West End of London, may make the occasional appearance on the amateur stage and the film version may crop up of Talking Pictures TV. It can be deemed old-fashioned and full of stereotypes.

4**** 26 August 2021 The Occult, mental health issues and drug addiction. Not your usual subject matters for a comic thriller or, indeed, for a work by Agatha Christie, but they all feature in ‘Spider’s Web’. Margaret Lockwood was a luminescent British film star of the 1940s and 1950s; in films like ‘The Wicked Lady’