This year I have seen a round 200 productions, 70 of them reviewed for The Reviews Hub (previously The Public Reviews). My year may not be the same as everyone else’s – for example I saw Imelda’s Gypsy for the first time in 2014, so it is left out of my “best of” contenders, whilst I still have Sheridan Smith’s Funny Girl to look forward to.
BEST PRODUCTIONS (alphabetical order)
Assassins (Menier Chocolate Factory)
Hangmen (Royal Court Theatre and Wyndham’s Theatre from January)
High Society (Old Vic)
Husbands and Sons (National Theatre)
Kinky Boots (Adelphi Theatre)
Man and Superman (National Theatre)
Mrs Henderson Presents (Theatre Royal Bath and Noel Coward Theatre from January)
Oresteia (Almeida Theatre and Trafalgar Studios)
People, Places and Things (National Theatre)
Photograph 51 (Noel Coward Theatre)
To Kill a Mockingbird (Barbican Theatre)
The Winter’s Tale (Garrick Theatre)
Honourable mentions: As You Like It (National Theatre), Bakkhai (Almeida Theatre), Carmen Disruption (Almeida Theatre), Jane Eyre (National Theatre), Medea (Almeida Theatre), Rules for Living (National Theatre), Temple (Donmar Warehouse), The Homecoming (Trafalgar Studios),
BEST FRINGE PRODUCTIONS (alphabetical order)
A Girl is a Half-formed Thing (Traverse Theatre Edinburgh)
French Without Tears (Orange Tree Theatre)
Grand Hotel (Southwark Playhouse)
Lela & Co (Royal Court)
No Villain (Old Red Lion Theatre)
Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour (Traverse Theatre Edinburgh)
Swallow (Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh)
Sweeney Todd – The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (Harrington’s Pie Shop)
The Clockmaker’s Daughter (Landor Theatre)
The Grand Tour (Finborough Theatre)
The Royale (Bush Theatre)
The Sum of Us (Above the Stag)
Honourable mentions: And Then Came the Nightjars (Theatre 503), As Is (Trafalgar Studios), Hatched ‘n’ Dispatched (Park Theatre), In the Dead of Night (Landor Theatre), Little Malcolm and his Struggle Against the Eunuchs (Southwark Playhouse), Radiant Vermin (Soho Theatre), Wink (Theatre 503), Xanadu (Southwark Playhouse)
BEST PERFORMANCES
Male in a play: Ralph Fiennes (Man and Superman). Honourable mentions: Simon Russell Beale (Temple and Mr Foote’s Other Leg) and James McAvoy (The Ruling Class)
Female in a play: Lia Williams (Oresteia). Honourable mentions: Kate Fleetwood (Medea), Denise Gough (People, Places and Things) and Nicole Kidman (Photograph 51).
Ensemble in a play: Husbands and Sons
Male in a musical: Tie between Killian Donnelly and Matt Henry (Kinky Boots). Honourable mention: Jamie Parker (Assassins and High Society).
Female in a musical: Emma Williams (Mrs Henderson Presents). Honourable mentions: Natalie Dew (Bend it Like Beckham) and Kate Fleetwood (High Society).
Ensemble in a musical: High Society
OTHER BESTS
New (to the UK) play: Hangmen by Martin McDonagh
New (to the UK) musical: Mrs Henderson Presents
Director (play): Marianne Elliot (Rules for Living and Husbands and Sons)
Director (musical): Jerry Mitchell (Kinky Boots)
LAST AND VERY MUCH LEAST…
The year’s worst: A New Play for the General Election (Finborough Theatre), Bewitchment (Landor Theatre), d(ARE)/There Be Lions (Print Room), Dracula (Lion and Unicorn Theatre), Evening at the Talk House (National Theatre), How to Hold Your Breath (Royal Court Theatre), Muscovado (Theatre 503), Noonday Demons (King’s Head Theatre), Pardon/In Cuffs (Traverse Theatre Edinburgh), The Titanic Orchestra (Pleasance Theatre Edinburgh), Valhalla (Theatre 503), Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (Playhouse Theatre)
The Beast's Pen 