Things to do in London this week

Rising star Jordan Fein’s sumptuous revival of Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods is the first actual proper major Sondheim revival to be staged in this country since the great man’s passing. It’s a clever send up of fairytales that pushes familiar stories into absurd, existential, eventually very moving territory, but it’s also a fiddly musical with a lot of moving parts. You need to get it right, and Fein smashes it, largely thanks to exceptional casting. The whole thing looks astonishing: Tom Scutt’s astonishingly lush, vivid woods are glistening, eerie and primal. The costumes are similarly ravishing. It’s just great, really, a sublime production of a sublime musical with a sublime cast.

Kerry James Marshall is an artist with a singular vision. He has become arguably the most important living American painter over the past few decades, with an ultra-distinctive body of work that celebrates the Black figure in an otherwise very ‘Western’ painting tradition. This big, ambitious show will be a joyful celebration of his lush, colourful approach to painting.

Lee Miller lived many lives. Starting her career as a model, she went on to become the muse for Man Ray and the Surrealist movement, starred in films, and then pivot into a famous photographer before traversing war-torn Europe as a daredevil journalist. Later, she settled in Sussex and became a celebrity chef. All of those eras are up on the Tate Britain’s walls for the gallery’s blockbuster exhibition. Dividing Miller’s extraordinary career chronologically, it’s a time-travelling experience as well as a showcase of her technical and compositional skills.

If you boil a sauna down to its nuts and bolts, it’s essentially just a really hot room and some water to create steam with. Wild, then, how much of a positive affect those two simple ingredients can have on our bodies, healing weary muscles, doing wonders for our skin, and helping all the horrible toxins we insist on putting in our insides get back out. There are a wealth of top saunas around the city. From plunge pools and infrared therapy rooms to Finnish-style homages and ones soundtracked by DJ sets, you’ll find the steam sesh for you in the capital.

Look, we love London. But even so, we can't deny that this city is devilishly good at coming up with ways to drain your bank balance. As Time Out editors, we’ve become experts at hunting down ways to enjoy the city on a shoestring. Lots of us started out as broke students here, and since then, we’ve scoured every corner for cheap things to do before payday hits. Read on for some fab, free ways to make yourself (and your bank balance) very happy indeed. 

Cecil Beaton was a jack of all trades and master of many, bringing his inimitable touch to the worlds of fashion illustration, photography, costume design, writing and more. While most exhibitions covering his glittering career touch on all sides of his creative world, none has ever looked solely at his ground-breaking fashion work – until now. ‘Cecil Beaton’s Fashionable World’ will do just that via some of his most dazzling outfits that defined the Jazz Age or shone on screen in the likes of ‘My Fair Lady’.

It's no longer impossible to find tasty and satisfying alternatives to pints at London’s pubs and bars – in fact, some of the no-alcohol options on offer right now are even better than their boozy cousins. And they come with an added bonus of leaving you hangover-free. These bars cater to non-drinkers for Dry January and beyond. We've got buzzing drinking dens that also specialise in alcohol-free cocktails, completely dry tasting rooms and pubs with a penchant for low-and-no beers. These zero-percent champions are 100 percent fantastic. 

American cinema’s fake-it-til-you-make-it brigade – Catch Me If You Can’s Frank Abagnale Jr, Moses Pray in Paper Moon, Rizzo in Midnight Cowboy, Uncut Gems’ Howard Ratner, Barry Lyndon and all those other hustling antiheroes – has a dazzling new addition. But, with his skittish chutzpah and pathological lack of self-doubt, Timothée Chalamet’s ever-calculating ping pong player Marty Mauser has something most of those others lack: real talent to back up the front. In Josh Safdie’s sports movie-cum-crime caper, Marty is a gifted but impoverished ping-pong player who’s only an inch or two from conquering all. By the terms of his own cutthroat world, he’s a loser who lives within touching distance of glory. One more push could make all the difference. Or get him killed. This is a stunning achievement, a breathless yet precisely controlled joyride full of vivid characters, hairpin turns and did-that-just-happen moments.  

Lander 23 is something completely different from immersive theatre legends Punchdrunk. The ‘stealth-based exploration game’ based on ‘videogame mechanics’ that will see audiences deployed in teams of four onto an alien planet to try and find out the fate of the titular landing vehicle, which has disappeared mysteriously. As it’s based on videogames, it’s possible to ‘die’ in it (you’ll come back to life though), and the set will be a ‘modded’ version of the Trojan cityscape from The Burnt City. 

In a city where eating out seems to be getting pricier by the minute, this list remains one of Time Out London's handiest guides. We've given the list a seasonal spin and here you'll find some of the cosiest (and best value) meals for embracing winter in London, such as Durak Tantuni's comforting Turkish meat wrap, a champion curry at Indian YMCA, and a visit to the Oyster Shack in Epping Forest - perfect to cap off a woodland walk in the wilds of the suburbs. 

The much-feted Sam Grabiner’s second play – following last year’s Olivier-winning Boys on the Verge of Tears – is a dark, dark comedy about a jaw-droppingly dysfunctional British Jewish family. It is an anarchic meditation on the British Jewish psyche, that is really very fearless about ‘going there’ with certain political issues. It is about the British tradition of having a massive ding dong on Christmas Day. And it’s a comedy about living in London. Clearly it is likely to speak to a British Jewish audience most directly. But its depiction of a Christmas Day lunch spinning horribly out of control is – with intentional irony – a universally British concept. 

Even we culture-mad London superfans have to admit that every once in a while, it’s nice to have a little break from it all. When the capital’s hustle and bustle leaves you feeling a little drained, you can find some escape from the crowds and hordes of tourists by getting up and getting out just for a day. In dire need of crisp country air, a relaxing spa day or a gorgeous, long walk? These day trips from London are all under two hours from Zone 1 and will give you the relief you need this winter.

There are few things that we’d willingly brave the chill for during winter in London. But ice skating is one of them. Ice rinks decked out towering Christmas trees and twinkly fairy lights fill London’s squares and courtyards, hosting everything from DJ takeovers and kids’ skating lessons to date nights and family outings over the festive period. Pretty soon you’ll get to pretend you’re in a festive London rom-com, as you romantically glide (or awkwardly stumble) with your loved ones under the backdrop of landmarks like Somerset House, Battersea Power Station and Hampton Court Palace. 

For the last three years Hampstead Theatre has been staging lesser-revived Tom 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 and then expanded and enriched it into this version, which premiered in 1995. Here is Felicity Kendal returning to Indian Ink so many years later, but playing the elderly Mrs Swan rather than the young Flora Crewe. And in a play about looking back, and the lives of artists, and making sense of past romances, she watches Ashbourne Serkis bring alive the lines written for her by her old lover just weeks after his death. That in itself is very moving, even if the play remains one for the Stoppard pilgrims.

Unless you’re fluent in turn-of-the-twentieth-century Hiberno-English, John Millington Synge’s The Playboy of the Western World requires proper, eyes-wide-open concentration. And even more so in this NT revival, in which director Caitríona McLaughlin celebrates the lyrical language of the play in all its glory. At its best, hers is a production that rewards attentiveness, weaving in beautiful, affecting images of County Mayo folklore alongside some standout acting performances. 
Most of the audience will likely have bagged tickets to see the outstanding Nicola Coughlan, and they will not be disappointed. The Bridgerton megastar looks right at home as the feisty barmaid Pegeen, while Lorcan Cranitch, as Pegeen’s alcohol-fuelled father, gives a convincing, powerhouse interpretation. 

The groanworthy title sets the tone for this fun re-telling of Dracula via close harmony singing and a stream of winkingly awful puns. Co-writers Dan Patterson (Whose Line Is It Anyway?, Mock the Week) and Jez Bond, also directing, feed an irreverent combination of Bram Stoker’s novel and Francis Ford Coppola’s 1992 film version through a Mel Brooks musical mangle. This production may be gothic in origin but is panto in spirit. The actors are perfectly attuned to the show’s loudly enjoyable silliness while bringing powerhouse musical theatre chops to the singing.