By Carron Stacey, A Humdrum Mum
WHEN?: Saturday 26 September 2026
Ally Pally, we swore we’d never return due to the walk and public transport … obviously we did, because, well PBS!
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: ****
WHEN?: Monday 28 September, opens 5 October and runs through 21 November 2026 RUNTIME: 135 minutes (including a 20-minute interval)
The most interesting thing about the new play Schnapp from Netflix’s Stranger Things has chosen for his stage debut is the dramatic rug pull it executes at the beginning of its 2nd act transforming the audience’s perspective.
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: *****
WHEN?: Saturday 26 September, opens 30 September and runs through 19 December 2026 RUNTIME: 210 minutes (including a 20-minute interval)
Gillian Anderson gave us the definitive Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire at the Young Vic on a revolving stage a decade ago and here performs a similar trick as Martha.
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: ***
WHEN?: Wednesday 23 September, opens 29 September and runs through 12 December 2026 RUNTIME: 150 minutes (including a 20-minute interval)
This is the story of John Maynard Keynes, considered one of the most influential economists of the 20th century, who turned his back on a life of homosexuality as part of the Bloomsbury Group and married a Russian ballerina.
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: *****
WHEN?: Monday 21 September, runs through 2 January 2027 Lolly Adefope plays Mary from 28 September 2026 RUNTIME: 80 minutes without interval
Monsoon (End Of The Rainbow, Soho Theatre Walthamstow) reprises her Broadway turn in this comic delight and reminds how twistedly funny she can be so rush to see her in this West End hit because her run comes to an end in it all too soon.
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: ****1/2
WHEN?: Saturday 19 September (matinee), runs through 31 October 2026 RUNTIME: 145 minutes (including a 20-minute interval)
Boxing or playing the violin?
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: ****
WHEN?: Saturday 19 September, opens 27 September and runs through 14 November 2026 RUNTIME: 85 minutes (no interval)
You join us in the New York apartment belonging to writer Truman Capote at Christmas in 1975 as Manhattan socialites who were once his confidants turn their backs on him when they recognise thinly-veiled versions of themselves in an excerpt of his new novel published in Esquire magazine.
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: *****
WHEN?: Friday 18 September, tour runs through 1 December 2026
Setlist: Tonight; Like A Motorway; Spring; Glad; You’re In A Bad Way; Shower Scene; Who Do You Think You Are?; Heart Failed (In The Back Of A Taxi); Pale Movie; Brand New Me; Mario’s Cafe; Take Me To The Pilot; Only Love Can Break Your Heart; DJ; Stormtrooper In Drag; He’s On The Phone/7 Ways To Love; Nothing Can Stop Us; The Last Time
Never has a band understood its fans better and reflected it back.
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: ****
WHEN?: Thursday 17 September, tour runs through 24 September 2026
Setlist: Remedy; Waiting On Nina; Fault Lines; The Thread; I Don’t Need Light; From Here To Nowhere; Three Moon Trail; Removed; Matter; Early Promise; DLR
Family Stereo ‘folkish rockery’ frontman Blake Watt is reflecting on this, his band’s 1st sell-out London show, and tells an amusing story about ‘survivors’ guilt’.
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: ***1/2
Andrew Scott (All Of Us Strangers) plays meteorologist James Stagg appointed by Churchill to advise Fraser’s Eisenhower when best to launch the Normandy landings to ensure success during World War Two.
