EIF 2026 - Angels in America at the King's, or, A Puzzling Reputation

Note: This is a review of the performance on Tuesday 18th August 2026.

 Let us start from first principles. I have never got on with the work of the much praised director Ivo van Hove (should you so wish you can find my previous reports on his work via this piece on his NT Network and click through to earlier experiences from there). This is so much the case that I've pretty much reached the point of just not booking for his shows any more. I made an exception for this show because the Usher Hall was dark for two nights in a row, playwright Tony Kushner has apparently described this as "his favourite version of the play", and I was curious to see if Ivo van Hove could find anything approaching the power in the work that Marianne Elliott's superb, moving 2017 staging at the National possessed. After a first half when positives and negatives were fairly evenly balanced, things deteriorated after the interval and by the end this had become something of an endurance test.

In the first half van Hove and regular collaborator Jan Versweyveld (Set & Lighting) seem to be approaching the play with a minimalist vision. The only thing on stage is a square box-like object front stage right on which sit a couple of turntables and what turns out to be a projector and beside which stand some speakers. There are two flats at the back, on to which various images are projected, and two rows of strip lights in blackish boxes running lengthways to the back of the stage. There is no attempt, in contrast to Elliott, to suggest physical illness - so when for example Prior lifts his top to show Louis his lesions, there are no lesions visible. This is a reasonable choice but, as we'll see, van Hove hasn't the discipline to stick to it. For most of the time the actors are positioned near the front of the stage. There is some effective work in terms of physical movement and interaction, though the quality of the ensemble is more variable than in the NT production.

EIF 2026 - Four Walls and a Roof at the Studio, or, An Interminable Lecture

Note: This is a review of the performance on Monday 17th August 2026. 

The best excuse that can be made for this gracing the EIF programme is that it fits this year's theme of "examining the ideas and impact of the USA" - unfortunately what it has to say about that theme is rarely illuminating.

Creators Lina Majdalanie and Rabih Mroue believe themselves to be triple threats. They have written the script, they perform it, and they direct themselves. If nothing else they would have benefited from a rigorous editor. The play uses Brecht's exile first from Germany and later from the United States as a jumping off point to examine various historical questions and current political topics. For example, did the House Un-American Activities Committee's anti-communist witch hunts make the US like Nazi Germany? Is Trumpian America fascist? There are also segments on current debates around antisemitism and the plight of the Palestinians. On none of the contemporary political topics does the piece find anything fresh to say.

EIF 2026 - [seagull], or, Lacking the Courage of Its Convictions

Note: This is a review of the performance on 10th August 2026. 

At the start of this show Masha and Medvedenko (unfortunately the freesheet fails to identify which roles are played by which cast members) get into a tub at the side of the stage, pour buckets of water over each other, and then step onto the stage proper. The stage directions, consulted online afterwards, simply state they enter "returning from a walk". Perhaps we're supposed to assume they have jumped in the lake (which is mentioned in those directions) fully clothed. But if that's the intention it was totally unclear to me why they should have done so. This is symptomatic of the major issue I had with this show. Too often it tipped over the line into stage business that made me raise an eyebrow, or stare about the stage in puzzlement trying to work out what the intention was.

Part of what is driving this is a lack of trust on the part of director Stijn Van Opstal in his own set up. The play is, largely, performed in Flemish sign language - though there are some spoken elements late on. As we get deeper into the play it is more selective about how much is put in the supertitles - until in the last Act we get nothing (but there are other problems here we'll come on to). But for much of the time I felt (and a glance through an online copy of Chekhov's original afterwards seemed to confirm this) we got the vast majority of the text translated for us. I mention this because the captions are described as "creative" in the freesheet. Thinking about it afterwards my recollection is that the Globe used the same term for its Globe to Globe season of foreign language Shakespeare which included, I think, a sign language show. In the small number of shows in that Globe season that I saw that text was much reduced compared to this, and it really therefore depended on the performers working to connect with the audience to transcend the language barrier. Here, I ultimately felt that Van Opstal lacked confidence in the ability of the show to transcend that barrier.

EIF 2026 - Mazzoli's The Galloping Cure, or, In the Shadow of Past Glory

 Back in 2019 the EIF brought Mazzoli's opera Breaking the Waves to Edinburgh. I found that work a powerful dramatic experience and have been keenly looking forward to this new commission. Although this new opera starts strongly I'm afraid I found it increasingly unpersuasive as a drama. 

In this case Karen Russell (story) and Royce Vavrek (libretto) place us in small town America where for reasons that never become entirely clear all the inhabitants are unwell, and local doctor Theresa Hart (Daniela Mack) is overwhelmed. I assumed that the authors wanted to hint at associations with Trumpified America and at post-Covid distrust of medical professionals but the treatment remains perhaps just a shade too generic to really hit home. Into this situation arrives Lucky Mack (Justin Austin) a very recognisable American huckster. He has a merry-go-round, rides on which seem to miraculously cure all the townsfolks' ailments. Clearly from the pre-publicity, though I'm much more doubtful that the work establishes this without that pre-publicity, this is intended to speak to the opioid crisis. There's also I think a broader comment intended on our dependence on isolating technologies through the HomeHorse of Act Two. Finally we have the subsidiary plot of Hart's difficult relationship with her teenage daughter Noy (finely performed by Gabrielle Turgeon) and struggle to care for her baby grand-daughter Rose.

EIF 2026 - Tansy Davies's Passion of Mary Magdalene at the Queen's Hall, or, An Undramatic, Unmoving Passion

 I didn't arrive at this show with high hopes. Back in April I listened to the Radio 3 broadcast of the world premiere performance of this work in London and, had I heard the broadcast before I booked my EIF tickets, I doubt I would have booked for this show. However, I bore in mind the fact that hearing a work live can be a very different experience to hearing a recording, and I hope I tried to approach the performance with an open mind. Sadly it did not change my views.

The work is unquestionably performed to a very high standard by an ensemble consisting of the Dunedin Consort, with two soloists - Marcus Farnsworth (Christus) and Anna Dennis (Mary Magdalene) - the whole directed by John Butt. The many exposed instrumental lines are all very well taken (though the instrumental writing did not, to my ear, have enough in it to sustain the length of work), and the chorus are strong both as a collective whole and in the many smaller solo parts. Similarly, both Farnsworth and Dennis do their best to make the work live. Dennis in particular has two extended sequences of highly virtuosic solo and performs them outstandingly.