Another relatively light week of London openings as the city gears up for the Olympics and thoughts turn to Edinburgh. Of the new work, this collaboration at the Royal Court looks particularly intriguing: Stephen Emmott – head of computational science at Cambridge University – and director Katie Mitchell will explore the future of life on earth in Ten Billion, in a Festival d’Avignon co-production which looks at the impact of population growth on the planet.
There’s also a chance to once more experience the first part of the Hotel Medea trilogy at the Hayward Gallery on the South Bank: an overnight, interactive theatrical experiment with live music – and, more importantly, hot chocolate – which explores the revenge myth of Medea. Divided into three chapters Zero Hour Market, Drylands and The Feast of Dawn, the production begins at midnight and finishes at dawn. You can read co-creator Jorge Lopes Ramos’ thoughts on the project in Catherine Love’s interview for Exeunt.
The National Theatre is staging Nicholas Hytner’s production of one of Shakespeare’s most enigmatic if timely plays, Timon of Athens. Simon Russell Beale, who previously starred as Stalin in John Hodge’s production of Collaborators, takes the title role. Derren Brown’s latest touring show, Svengali, returns to the West End. It’s not his strongest stage show certainly, but it’s perhaps his most theatrical, thanks in part to the fact that it’s directed by Polly Findlay – whose production of Antigone is currently at the National.
Matthew Bourne’s Play Without Words is revived at Sadler’s Wells this week as part of the 25th anniversary celebrations of his company New Adventures, while Tom McNab’s 1936 evokes the conflicts leading up to the Berlin Olympics at the Lilian Baylis Studio. The Superhuman exhibition at the Wellcome Collection – exploring the history and potential futures of body augmentation and physical transformation – is also one to catch in an effort to put the current Olympic excess into context.
At the Barbican, the character of Desdemona, from Shakespeare’s Othello, is given voice by Toni Morrison, the acclaimed opera director Peter Sellars and the Malian singer-songwriter Rokia Traore.
The Almeida Festival continues with new work by Greyscale’s Selma Dimitrijevic, Gods are Fallen and All Safely Gone, and Custom/Practice’s reworking of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Meanwhile, over at The Yard, their Theatre of Great Britain Festival continues with Patrick Ashe’s An Oasis in 5 Parts, a series of works about hometowns, and Michaela Coel’s one-woman play, Chewing Gum Dreams.
Ruth Sherlock, Paul Wood and Zoe Lafferty present their new verbatim piece, Fear of Breathing – Stories from the Syrian Revolution at the Finborough Theatre, a piece based entirely on reports from inside Syria.
Comedian Mark Watson and poet Lemn Sissay will be at the Tabernacle in Notting Hill as part of Book Slam‘s Sports Day special on the 19th July.