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New Moon is nothing if not an international advertisement for the hungry virtues of virginity and young people can’t get enough of it
The Twilight Saga: New Moon
Theatre
A smart, prickly and rewarding view of sexual and emotional confusion
Cock
Restaurants
Kitchen W8 is a bargain for this area, if such sophistication is what you crave
Kitchen W8
Too long and drawn out but very entertaining with excellent special effects
This is a peculiar play and does not work for me. Some of it is very funny but there are real flaws
Alex has a strong powerful voice and was faultless, she is far better now than she was on the X-Factor
London,
Fiona Mountford's rating
Reader rating
Dir: Melly Still.
Cast: Barry Aird, Matthew Burgess, Jim Findley, Cassie Friend, Matti Houghton, James Keane, Helena Lymbery, Victoria Moseley, Richard Simons, Joseph Traynor, DAniel Williams
Description: Rona Munro's adaptation of Richard Adams's classic story about a warren of rabbits forced to flee their home, directed by Melly Still.
Trains: Tube: Hammersmith 
Phone: 0871221 1722
Website: www.lyric.co.uk
Email: enquiries@lyric.co.uk
Watership Down: lacking in rabbitiness
The 2006 season of festive family entertainment kicks off, not with the boos and whistles of pantomime, but the burrows and whiskers of Richard Adams's much-loved book. Yet, oh my fur and facial features, where is the actors' all-important distinguishing rabbitiness? A few woolly bobble hats do not adequate bunnification make.
"What's happening?" asked the sparky 11-year-old sitting next to me at one particularly confusing moment of Rona Munro's frustratingly impressionistic adaptation. It's something many will have been wondering at the start, as the running, tumbling, trampolining ensemble charge about like headless bunnies.
There's a warren in danger, procreation in jeopardy, but so frantic are the opening exchanges that no sure sense of scene and, crucially, character are established. Without this, it's impossible to respond to Adams's hard-hitting message of constant peril.
All of which is a particular shame, as great things were expected of director/designer Melly Still, who worked such wonders with Coram Boy at the National last year. For too long, Still relies on fleeting moments of individual beauty: a bouncy space hopper of a lettuce, a hula hoop representing a rabbit hole, a bird's eye view of the land comprising model railway and miniature houses.
Yet gradually, belatedly, the woes of the warring warrens come into sharp, shocking focus. Barry Aird makes a chilling SS-style General Woundwort, determined to crush the want-away instincts of Helena Lymbery and Victoria Moseley's fine, cowering does, appropriately got up like leftovers from the home front in the Second World War.
The stylish kung-fu kicks of the nine actors land harder as the stakes go ever higher within the circular, grass-covered playing area. In this animal kingdom, a world away from cloying Disneyfied anthropomorphism, Still reminds us that "Don't worry" is entirely the wrong message.
Until 23 January (08700 500 511, www.lyric.co.uk).
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
I really enjoyed this adventurous and ambitious adaptation of a story I have not revisited since reading the book 30 years ago. A brilliant interpretation with all the pathos, tension of the original and with humour. Not a tale for the squeamish so above eight is about right. I loved the atmosphere created especially the innovative instrumentation of the score. The action moves convincingly between green fields and subterranean caverns as the rabbits venture from disaster through danger, despair and on to deliverance.
- Glyn Morgan, Forest Gate, London
I found this one of the most joyless pieces of theatre I have ever seen. But most worrying was the representation of danger - cats and foxes in gimp masks with flick knives and stanley knives. It sounds funny but this idea was spectacularly misjudged, especially in light of current campaigns to ban knives and yet another violent knife murder in the news today. To just throw these images into a kids show was a mistake and I would not take any children to see it unless you want to give them nightmares for days on end. One character having it's throat cut by a large kitchen knife was one image too far.
- Michael, London
I really enjoyed this production. I found it moving and terrifying, a very bold production for children. It is Defiantly suitable for adults unaccompanied by kids. I’d never read the book or seen the film, but I feel inspired to do both now.
- Anita, London
