Hampstead Theatre

There may be a big Old Vic revival of Arcadia just around the corner, but it does feel a bit odd that this is the first production of a Tom Stoppard play since his death at the end of November. For the last three years Hampstead Theatre has been staging lesser-revived Stoppards over Christmas, and for Stoppard fans it’s been fun to see them come to life. But Indian Ink is a deep cut. A vehicle for his former partner Felicity Kendal, Stoppard wrote it first as a radio drama called In the Native State and then expanded and enriched it into this version, which premiered in 1995. Reviews didn’t rave about it back then, and never really have since, and Jonathan Kent’s production doesn’t get around the problems that, despite moving moments, remain in the bones of the play.Split across two(ish) timelines, it tells the story of poet Flora Crewe: first we meet her in India in 1930 where she encounters local painter Nirad Das, who does a portrait of her while she is slowly dying from TB; second, sixty years later, Flora’s ageing sister Mrs Swan reflecting on her letters with an academic trying to write a biography, as well as Das’s son Amish.Ruby Ashbourne Serkis plays Flora with an accent that could cut diamond – think Kiera Knightley but posher – Bette Davis eyes and the kind of easy grace that throws back to golden age Hollywood stars. She’s breezy, sexually free, with a huge smile. It’s a very strong lead performance. While she romanticises India – blithe about the brewing...

A big coup for Hampstead Theatre here, as it bags the UK premiere of the wildly acclaimed US indie musical Kimberley Akimbo. Created by composer Jeanine Tesori and writer David Lindsay-Abaire, it’s an all-singing adaptation of Adams’s relatively obscure 2000 play of the same name, which follows the eponymous heroine, a 16-year-old girl afflicted by a rare/essentially magical disease that makes her age four times faster than usual. This means she has the appearance of an elderly woman while essentially being a teen. And apparently it’s wonderful! It bagged multiple wins at the 2023 Tony Awards – including the all important best new musical – and ran for a year-and-a-half on Broadway. Now it’s headed over here, albeit in a brand new production from Michael Longhurst, who did such a bang up job at the same address a few years back with Tesori’s Caroline, or Change.