Review – Hangmen, Royal Court

Phil had an uncle whose job as a prison governor meant he was called on to witness some of the last hangings in this country. He also kept the autobiography of Britain’s most ‘celebrated’ hangman, Albert Pierrepoint, on his bookcase and Phil is led to believe, visited the pub that Pierrepoint ran after retiring from execution.

As a child, Phil looked on most of this with a mix of macabre fascination and horror, which was much the same reaction that he had to the first scene in Martin McDonagh‘s, Hangmen.

Review: In a Dark Dark House, Almeida Theatre

The Whingers have very few secrets left. Oh, it’s true that they know the locations of some dark, dark bars which they will never share with their clamouring, clamouring public; places where they can enjoy a bottle of red, red wine uninterrupted by the constant, constant throng of fans and celebrity hangers-on.

And Phil knows secret, secret things about Andrew that he wouldn’t dream of sharing with the world: he has after all seen him swilling his undie(sirables) in a Frankfurt hotel bathtub; he knows what Andrew looked like before his operation; and that Andrew’s middle name is Margaret. But he would never, never tell.

But the secrets unravelled in Neil La Bute’s In a Dark Dark House at the Almeida are altogether more controversial.