ROBIN EDWARDS
London

The Other Naughty Piglet

I was looking for somewhere to have dinner with my friend Paul before we went to the theatre. As it happened the theatre we were going to had a restaurant and on checking it out online it looked really good. The Other Naughty Piglet is the sister restaurant of the The Naughty Piglet in Brixton. We started with two delicious ham croquettes, crispy on the outside and oozing on the inside. Then for main we had really interesting dish of duck breast with gooseberries and a bric pastry cylinder filled with confit duck leg. Delicious, definitely a cut above your usual theatre restaurant.

London

Six: The Musical

I’d heard good things about this small independent musical for a while. I’d wanted to see it at the Edinburgh Fringe, but sadly wasn’t able to get tickets for it. It’s based on the lives of King Henry the Eighth’s six wives, and is a modern retelling of their story done in the style of a pop concert. It received lots of accolades up in Edinburgh. It’s so nice when a small independent musical likes this takes off. It’s on at the Arts Theatre in Covent Garden which is quite a small venue. Despite being right in central London it’s considered an off West End production. As such the tickets for the show were really reasonably priced and we had great seats for not much money. I loved the show, really fun and well done. My favourite wife was Catherine Parr who had wonderful comedic timing. I can’t recommend this musical highly enough, really fun and a bargain for the price.

London

The Inheritance

Every so often a play comes along that gets almost universal glowing five star reviews. The Inheritance was one of these plays. Written by Matthew Lopez and directed by Stephen Daldry, it’s a contemporary take on the classic EM Forster novel Howard’s End. It examines love between gay men in New York a generation after the AIDS epidemic and asks what the current generation owes to its past. I had multiple friends describe it as one of the best play or possibly even the best play they’d ever seen, quite the reviews. It also won many awards and honours, including Best Play at the Evening Standard Theatre Awards. It initially started at the Young Vic before transferred to the West End at the Noel Coward Theatre. Tickets were pretty pricey at well over a £100 each, but we managed to get a deal and ended up paying just £50 each through TodayTix. This is a super long play, staged in two parts over different days, each part some three hours long. I was worried it might be a bit long and pretty heavy going, but it really wasn’t. I was utterly gripped the whole way through. It was a complete rollercoaster of emotions, i laughed, i cried, i actually felt drained afterwards almost barely able to speak. Truly an exceptional piece of theatre. I really can’t recommend this play enough, if you go to just one play this year, go to this. Amazing.