You, dear reader, are given the chance to vote in 17 categories from October this year to tell us your favourite theatre, music, TV, film and podcast of 2026.
By Aline Mahrud
WORTH A LOOK?: ***
WHEN? Friday 28 August, opens 3 September and runs through 24 October 2026 RUNTIME: 150 minutes (including a 20-minute interval)
The best thing about this revival of a 2003 US play inspired by a 1981 scandal in which a journalist won a Pulitzer Prize for writing about an inner city child only to later admit the story was fraudulent is the promising performance of Letitia Wright (pictured centre above) at its heart.
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: ****
WHEN? Monday 24 August, opens 2 September and runs through 3 October 2026 RUNTIME: 140 minutes (including a 20-minute interval)
Sophie Okonedo (Medea, @SohoPlace) is the beating heart of this revival of Brian Friel’s (Dancing At Lughnasa, National) take on this very Chekhovian tale of an 1840s Russian landowner’s wife’s infatuation with her son’s young tutor.
You, dear reader, are given the chance to vote in 17 categories from October this year to tell us your favourite theatre, music, TV, film and podcast of 2026.
We last saw Anderson resplendent on a revolving London stage at the Young Vic in A Streetcar Named Desire and here she stars in the classic Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf? opposite Billy Crudup (High Noon, Harold Pinter Theatre) at the intimate @SohoPlace. Directed by Marianne Elliott (Les Liaisons Dangereuses, National Theatre) runs 21 September through 19 December 2026. Tickets
WORTH A LOOK?: ****1/2
Tracklist: Hey Saint Jude; Intruder; Oh No You Don’t; Lost Time; Jump In; Giddy In A Good Way; Cut Me Dead; Cast A Stone; Pretenders; Paper Planes; Leaving The Scene; Pollyanna Says
Same Sun/Same Sky is the 1st new album for 34 years by The Darling Buds and it draws on the best of the many styles of the band’s 1st trio of LPs to underline why they were so underrated.
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: ****1/2
WHEN? Thursday 9 July, runs through Saturday 11 July 2026
Festival organisers are giving away free sombreros as temperatures surpass 40 degrees – the highest recorded for 112 years – and Suede compliment this vast crowd on their enthusiastic singing along.
By Carron Stacey, A Humdrum Mum
WHEN? Sunday 5 July 2026, Duran Duran tour through 3 November 2026
This must be the 8th time we’ve seen them; the last a year to the day at Chelmsford Racecourse. And I always say “They’re better than ever before”.
Blanchett (The Seagull, Barbican) stars opposite Nina Hoss (The Cherry Orchard, Donmar) in Benedict Andrews’ (Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, Apollo Theatre) production fusing ancient myth and modern psychology at the Lyttelton at the National 19 August through 10 October 2026. Tickets Our review
By Neil Durham
WORTH A LOOK?: ****
WHEN? Sunday 21 June, opens 24 June and runs through 22 August 2026 RUNTIME: 90 minutes (no interval)
We really weren’t expecting to love this new musical as much as we did and we wonder whether it is its creators’ fondness for the awkward British humour of Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant and the Pythons that won us over.
