Lyn Gardner’s Weekly Picks
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The big opening of the week is *[One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest](https://www.londontheatredirect.com/play/one-flew-over-the-cuckoos-nest-play-tickets)* at the [Old Vic](https://www.londontheatredirect.com/venue/old-vic-theatre-london). **Ken Kesey**’s iconic story of how the arrival of chancer Randle P. McMurphy on a psychiatric ward sparks rebellion gets a major revival from director **Clint Dyer**. His casting and approach may offer a slightly different spin on the famous tale, offering an edge, exploring America’s colonial legacy through the lens of Black men’s mental health, cultural difference, and forced subjugation. **Aaron Pierce** plays McMurphy, **Giles Terera** is Dale Harding, and **Olivia Williams** is replacing **Michelle Gomez** as the hated Nurse Ratched, a woman intent on exerting authority in a predominantly male world.
The school holidays begin this week, so if you are looking for a family-friendly show that will give adults as much pleasure as the kids, look no further than [*Matilda*](https://www.londontheatredirect.com/musical/matilda-the-musical-tickets) ([Cambridge Theatre](https://www.londontheatredirect.com/venue/cambridge-theatre-london)), still as ebullient as ever after 15 years, or the wonderfully imaginative staging of [*My Neighbour Totoro* ](https://www.londontheatredirect.com/play/my-neighbour-totoro-tickets)at the [Gillian Lynne](https://www.londontheatredirect.com/venue/gillian-lynne-theatre-london). Children deserve great theatre and these shows deliver.
It’s your last chance to see [Unfortunate](https://www.londontheatredirect.com/musical/unfortunate-tickets) ([Other Palace](https://www.londontheatredirect.com/venue/other-palace-london)), a smart piece of musical theatre doing for sea witch Ursula in *The Little Mermaid* what [*Wicked*](https://www.londontheatredirect.com/musical/wicked-tickets) does for the witch Elphaba. It’s an evening that’s part panto, part cabaret, and is delivered with a good dose of heart.
Just announced is the arrival of [*Trainspotting*](https://www.londontheatredirect.com/musical/trainspotting-the-musical-tickets), a new musical version of **Irvine Welsh**’s novel peppered with a vibrant cast of Edinburgh-based junkies, scam artists, and psychos, which has previously been seen in Walsh’s own stage version. Now for the show, which will be at the [Theatre Royal Haymarket](https://www.londontheatredirect.com/venue/theatre-royal-haymarket-london) from mid-July, he’s teamed up with songwriter **Stephen McGuinness** to create original songs that will sit alongside **Iggy Pop**’s Lust for Life and **Lou Reed**’s Perfect Day. Renton, the heroin addict who thinks he might want to quit—**Ewan McGregor** in the 1996 film version—will be played by **Robbie Scott**. Renton, of course, would be well into middle age by now, suggesting that this new iteration of the story may have both a nostalgic appeal for those who were there the first time around but also has its eye on a younger crowd new to Welsh’s disgustingly compulsive, vomit-drenched underbelly odyssey.