Each year I'm one of thousands who don a bonnet and experience a taste of the author's world first hand

The creators of Olivier Award-nominated 'You Me Bum Bum Train' discuss their latest offering with one of this year's volunteers

Despite a decade’s experience as a theatre journalist, nothing prepared me for the daunting reality of getting a piece of new writing staged The first professional theatre review I ever wrote, in 2011, took me four hours – and it wasn’t very good.…

After a career in broadcasting, Clive Anderson is taking on his first acting role. He and writer Daniel Taub – a former diplomat – tell Emily Jupp how the play will challenge both actor and audience as they are immersed in a live peace process…

At just 11, Dritan Kastrati made the perilous journey from Kosovo with the help of people smugglers - and his troubles were just beginning In 2002, Dritan Kastrati was smuggled across Europe, aged just 11. It was after the end of the war in Kosovo…

The campaigner Josh Hepple, who has cerebral palsy, has inspired an award-winning play. He explains how dating works for him Josh Hepple sits in his wheelchair, legs crossed, and tells me he’s nervous about our interview. The disability and LGBTQI+…

First seen at the Donmar in 1985, Steven Berkoff’s dark one-man play about loneliness and isolation is perhaps even more relevant now. The UK was enduring a loneliness epidemic even before lockdown made isolation practically mandatory. Now, with…

The second of Park Theatre’s new-writing double bills features two very different shows that both expose the dark side of humanity and examine how we respond to extreme pressure. Does the habitually good person crumble and commit an evil act? Can the…

In this Christmas twist on Gustave Flaubert’s classic, tragic heroine Emma Bovary’s existential longing and illicit affairs become fodder for a comical romp. When Flaubert’s tale was first published in France in 1856, the author was prosecuted for…

Noor-un-Nisa Inayat Khan was the first female undercover wireless operator to be sent from the UK into occupied France during the Second World War, under the codename Madeleine. She was a pacifist, a Sufi Muslim, a storyteller, and a descendant of…

The internationally acclaimed director, known for running the Young Vic and later his global Shakespeare adaptations, tells Emily Jupp about returning to the UK ahead of his new project at the Marylebone Theatre – Dmitry, a play based on Schiller’s…

Grant Black – son of veteran lyricist Don Black and collaborator with Craig David, Van Morrison and Run DMC – had his own experience of checking into rehab 30 years ago, after a messy divorce and a taste for cocaine took their toll. This 1990s-set…

Fresh mix of hip hop and British Sign Language in need of tightening up Chris Fonseca is a Deaf dancer and choreographer who teaches dance to the Deaf community. When he performed on the BBC’s The Greatest Dancer, demonstrating how he feels the…

“In 2022 the Gregory Peck Atticus doesn’t work” Whether on stage or screen, the actor’s versatility has served him well in a successful and varied career. He tells Emily Jupp about not taking the path of easiest resistance into acting, why he likes…

Rachel Stockdale in Fat Chance at Pleasance Dome, Edinburgh One-woman show about overcoming fatphobia and working-class prejudices in the performance industry Born in Middlesbrough and living in Newcastle, when performer Rachel Stockdale was…

Kristiina Tammisalo and Inga Björn in Receptionists at Summerhall, Edinburgh. Photo: Bambu Part of From Start to Finnish, the annual Edinburgh Fringe showcase of Finland’s performing arts, Receptionists stars Kallo Collective’s Inga Björn and…

Georgina Fairbanks in The Unicorn. Photo: Michael Shelford Sam Potter’s new one-woman play about female sex addiction and sex clubs is uneven but enthralling Andrea is let go from her job, with a significant payout, after accusing her boss of…

Entertaining narrative about women’s sexuality and 1980s muscle men that packs in the puns Musclebound is about writer-performer and fringe veteran Rosy Carrick’s fetish for muscular men being beaten up, first sparked at the age of five when she…

A personal portrait of living with someone with a severe brain injury, told with humour and warmth As writer-performer Kristin Mcilquham nears her 40th birthday, she begins to consider the impact of her father’s traumatic brain injury – sustained…

Elena Voce in MOTHERLOAD! at Summerhall, Edinburgh. Photo: Thomas Voce-Siriani On a ridiculously hot day in Edinburgh, in a dark, stifling lecture theatre, an anthropomorphised Mother Nature, conceived as an American bag lady with an oxygen tube, is…