Lyn Gardner's Weekly Picks
Published on 15 June 2026
Not everyone warmed to Tom Stoppard’s plays, some of which were just too clever for their own good and the good of the audience. But his very best plays combine wit and heart in equal measure, and Arcadia is very good indeed. It has got gardening and chaos theory too. Carrie Cracknell’s Old Vic revival transfers to the Duke of York's, offering a partial in-the-round examination of one of the great plays of the 20th century. It’s one that pulsates with ideas but also compassion at our human urge to keep dancing despite tragedy and even as the world grows cold.
Opening this week at the London Palladium, before transferring in the autumn to the Theatre Royal Drury Lane, comes Timothy Sheader’s revival of Jesus Christ Superstar. Yes, you may have caught it at the Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre pre-Covid or at the Barbican, but this is a staging which has real legs, plenty of barnstorming moments, and also subtleties, not least in the way it explores religious and political fanaticism and state expediency. It bears repeated viewings. On this outing Sam Ryder plays Jesus, Tyrone Huntley is Judas, and you can take your pick of Herods with Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Richard Armitage, Boy George, Layton Williams and Julian Clary all popping by on various dates during the run.
Produced by Franchesca Moody, who spotted the potential of Fleabag and Baby Reindeer, Ben Ockrent’s Relics at the Lyric Hammersmith on the surface scratches familiar dramatic territory. In the wake of their mother’s death, four siblings gather together to sort her belongings. But there are secrets lurking in the wardrobe, not just old clothes, and even when you have long grown up, the resentments of childhood and patterns of behaviour and birth order can still surface. Ben Ockrent’s comedy is directed by former Donmar artistic director Michael Longhurst and stars Charly Field, JJ Feild, Sally Phillips and Sam Swainsbury as the brothers and sisters coming to terms with their inheritance and finding it uncomfortable.
Arriving at the Adelphi in October comes Robert Icke’s adaptation of The Lives of Others, Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s tension-filled 2006 movie set in East Berlin in the mid-1980s before the wall came down. It was a time when East Germans were under constant surveillance by the Stasi. Keira Knightley plays actress Christa-Maria, girlfriend of playwright Georg (Luke Thompson), who is trying to further her career by sleeping with a party official. The pair come to the attention of Stasi officer Gerd (Stephen Dillane). He starts listening in on Christa-Maria's and Georg’s lives, and soon he is obsessed. Don’t expect a facsimile of the movie (which is wonderful in its own right); do expect something probing and disturbing from writer/director Icke in a retelling of a story which pits art against totalitarianism.
By Lyn Gardner
Lyn Gardner is an acclaimed theatre journalist and former critic with decades of experience covering British theatre, from off-West End and fringe theatre to major West End productions.