Name: The Pillowman
Start: 2023-06-12
End: 2023-09-02
Location: Duke of York's Theatre

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The Pillowman [21329]

Genre: Play

The Pillowman Header LON

The Pillowman

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The Pillowman [21329] Product Media

In a totalitarian state a writer is questioned by the authorities about a spate of murders that bear similarities to her short stories. Is this life imitating art or something more sinister?

Born in London in 1985, Lily Allen is a multi-award-winning singer and songwriter, best known for hits including “The Fear”, “Not Fair” and “LDN”. In 2021, Allen made her West End debut in *[2:22 - A Ghost Story](https://www.londontheatre.co.uk/show/222_a-ghost-story)* at the [Noel Coward Theatre](https://www.londontheatre.co.uk/theatres/noel-coward-theatre).

Growing up, Allen was introduced to the performing arts from an early age. She lived in a theatrical family; the daughter of Keith Allen, who’s starred in plays including *Treasure Island* at [Theatre Royal Haymarket](https://www.londontheatre.co.uk/theatres/theatre-royal-haymarket), and of film producer Alison Owen. She made her television debut at the age of three, and a musical career was in her sights as a highschooler.

In 2005, Allen signed to Regal Recordings to produce an album. However, her career took off after she uploaded music onto MySpace, racking up thousands of views. Lily Allen has released four albums, *Alright, Still* (2006), *It’s Not Me, It’s You* (2009), *Sheezus* (2014) and *No Shame* (2018). Her number one hits include “Smile”, “The Fear” and a cover of Keane’s “Somewhere Only We Know”. To date, she’s received 31 awards for her music, including Best British Female Solo Artist at the BRIT Awards.

Aside from her musical career, Allen has also hosted her own BBC Three television series, titled *Lily Allen and Friends*. Throughout the season, she was joined by performers including Joanna Page, James Corden and [Danny Dyer](https://www.londontheatre.co.uk/actor-profile/danny-dyer).

In 2021, Allen made her professional stage debut in *2:22 - A Ghost Story* at the Noel Coward Theatre. Danny Robins' play saw Allen play a young woman that’s convinced ghosts inhabit her new home. Allen starred alongside Julia Chan, Hadley Fraser and Jake Wood. 

Lily Allen - LON

Age guidance: 14+ Please note the performance contains strobe lighting, flashing lights, loud sound effects, smoke effects and periods of darkness in the auditorium.

2:22 A Ghost Story - Criterion - LON

2:22 A Ghost Story - Criterion

2:22 A Ghost Story - Criterion - LON Product Media

<a href="/actor-profile/lily-allen">Lily Allen</a> shrieks before she even says a word in <a href="/show/222-a-ghost-story">2:22: A Ghost Story</a>, which tips you off immediately as to the way Danny Robins's debut West End play is due to proceed. But the name-grabbing debut on view is, of course, singer-songwriter Allen, who was due some years back to be penning a major musical of Bridget Jones's Diary from which she parted company along the way.Instead, here Allen is, looking sleek and glam and very much forming part of the four-person ensemble that has been assembled by the director Matthew Dunster (of Hangmen renown, amongst other titles) in a putative scare-fest that is at heart the story of two couples in crisis. That shifting dynamic finds itself in thrall to numerous tropes of the genre - tricks of sound and light and sudden screams intended to elicit the same from the audience and which you'll either find nerve-shredding or cheesy, depending on your susceptibility to such things. To my mind, none of the jump-scare moments rival the frissons I recall from the comparatively undemanding likes of <a href="https://www.londontheatre.co.uk/show/the-woman-in-black">The Woman in Black</a>, but 2:22 A Ghost Story to its credit has far more on its mind, including a meditation on the debilitating legacy of loss that stays with you long after the collective nervous laughter from the crowd has ceased.Allen knows her way around a stage and is part of an acting family, so it's not much of a surprise that this isn't the deer-in-the-headlights moment some might have feared. (Madonna's Broadway and London stage runs, both of which I saw, have been cited by way of comparison but aren't really relevant.) In fact, Dunster keeps the actor whooshing around designer Anna Fleischle's attractive set, as Allen's character, Jenny, tries to make sense of footsteps she has been hearing in baby daughter Phoebe's room at 2:22 across successive mornings. (Quite why they don't simply bring Phoebe downstairs until the very final scene, rather than leaving her so long unattended, is left unanswered.)To try and make sense of this recurring conundrum, Jenny has enlisted over risotto and quite a lot of wine an assist from her sceptical, hyper-rationalist husband Sam (Hadley Fraser, the musicals veteran in expert form) along with Sam's longtime American psychoanalyst chum Lauren (Julia Chan) and her builder-boyfriend, Ben, who showed up to do Lauren's bathroom and evidently never left. That role seems intended as comic relief and is rather belligerently played as such by Jake Wood until such time as the character darkens and all bets are off. At one bizarre moment, Ben ends up in spiritualist mode rather like an EastEnders equivalent of <a href="https://www.londontheatre.co.uk/show/blithe-spirit">Blithe Spirit</a>'s Madame Arcati.Robins commendably has plenty on his mind, in marked contrast with usual shows of this kind: you don't expect societal commentary, for instance, from Deathtrap. But I'm not sure it's in the best of taste to compare ghosts to refugees, given the very real suffering experienced by the latter, and some of the angst is very clunkily expressed: "I want to be more than just a sponge," Jenny protests well into the second act, around the same time that we get the cod-philosophical "life is pointless and life is final."&nbsp;Elsewhere, Julia responds to the rising tensions by proffering herself as "Switzerland" in human form - evidence of a script that gathers humour into its fearful embrace.The evening is on stronger ground layering the strangeness on view in a stylish home whose skylight is singled out as a thing of beauty and whose sliding door seems to give way to a landscape of foxes whose piercing night cries (indices of copulation, we are told) are used several times to fearmongering effect. Add to all this a dodgy boiler, windows that seem mysteriously to open, and the unexplained presence of white spirit in the sink, and it's no wonder that Jenny is soon striding about with a hammer when, that is, one or another character isn't heard demanding the impossible from a mobile phone. (Alexa is given enough of a workout to merit inclusion on the payroll.)"This isn't The Exorcist," Sam maintains at one point, noting the absence of ectoplasm from an increasingly shouty narrative that wants to disturb on a human level well away from the familiar horror-landscape theatrics. (The film Ghost gets its own name check.) There's plenty said about the trauma of childbearing and class and marital tensions, not to mention the primacy in our psyche that is granted to fear over love, to command attention well before the sounds of thunder arrive seemingly on cue. If 2 22: A Ghost Story is remembered as the play that posited Lily Allen as a viable theatrical presence, its primary debt is owed less to the likes of, say, Andy Nyman's Ghost Stories than to the eternal challenge, at times truly fearful, that most of us will recognise inherent in simply being alive.<a href="/show/222-a-ghost-story">2: 22 A Ghost Story is at the Noel Coward Theatre to 16 October.</a>Photo credit: Julia Chan, Lily Allen, Hadley Fraser and Jake Wood in 2:22 A Ghost Story (Photo by Helen Murray)

Lily Allen makes an admirable stage debut in the scary and shouty '2:22: A Ghost Story'

Read our review of 2:22 A Ghost Story starring Lily Allen at the Noel Coward Theatre at London Theatre.

2:22 A Ghost Story starring Lily Allen Review | London Theatre

When the Criterion Theatre first opened in 1873, the space was designed as a concert hall. The Criterion Theatre is the only West End theatre to be situated almost entirely underground — even the Upper Circle is not at street level. 

The Criterion Theatre housed comic opera in its early years, including works by W. S. Gilbert and George Grossmith. A decade after opening, the theatre had to be renovated to meet the Metropolitan Board of Works standards for ventilation. This work also saw the installation of electricity to the theatre. The building surrounding the theatre was extensively rebuilt between 1989 and 1992, but the Victorian auditorium was well-preserved and still stands today. 

Notable shows at the Criterion Theatre include *The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged)* by the Reduced Shakespeare Company, the long-running play *The 39 Steps* and Mischief Theatre's *The Comedy About A Bank Robbery*.

## Criterion Theatre Seating Information

The auditorium has three levels – Stalls, Dress Circle and Upper Circle.

The front rows of the Stalls offers good views of the stage, though the seating is not raked steeply. 

The Dress Circle has specifically designated ‘restricted view’ seats due to the number of pillars supporting the Upper Circle in Row C.

The Upper Circle offers unrestricted theatre views.

Criterion Theatre - LON

Criterion Theatre

The Duke Of York’s Theatre opened as the Trafalgar Square Theatre in 1892.The playhouse received its current name three years later in 1895, in honour of the future King George V. 

Famous productions to play at the Duke Of York’s Theatre include David Belasco’s *Madame Butterfly* in 1900 – Puccini was in the audience and famously turned the story into an opera. J. M. Barrie's famous creation *Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up* opened at the theatre on 27 Dec. 1904.

Typically, the Duke of York's Theatre is home to short-running plays, with West End and Broadway stars appearing.

## Duke of York's Theatre Seating Information

The auditorium has three levels – Stalls, Royal Circle and Upper Circle.

The Stalls offer good legroom throughout, and the raking of the seats is very good, noticeably from Row D onwards. 

In the Royal Circles, there is no visual obstruction from the Upper Circle. 

The seats in the Upper Circle curve towards the stage. The final two rows of the Upper Circle are bench seats.

Duke of York's Theatre - LON

Duke of York's Theatre

Born in London in 1985, Lily Allen is a multi-award-winning singer and songwriter, best known for hits including “The Fear”, “Not Fair” and “LDN”. In 2021, Allen made her West End debut in 2:22 - A Ghost Story at the Noel Coward Theatre.

Lily Allen - Stars on Stage | London Theatre

Lily Allen - 124x124px

Steve Pemberton is best known for his association with The League of Gentlemen, the hit 1999 television series created by Pemberton, Reece Shearsmith, <a href="/actor-profile/mark-gatiss">Mark Gatiss</a> and co-writer Jeremy Dyson. The programme ran for 3 series on BBC2 and spawned a movie and a stage production in 2005.

Pemberton began his career on the fringe theatre circuit as a founding member of the 606 Theatre group, working with Tom Hadley, Gordon Anderson and producer Shane Walter. His television work includes guest appearances in Whitechapel, Shameless, Benidorm, Happy Valley and Doctor Who, and he has been seen on the big screen in Mr. Bean’s Holiday in 2007 as well as the previously mentioned The League of Gentlemen movie, The League of Gentlemen’s Apocalypse.

He made his musical theatre debut in 2007 as ‘Man in Chair’ in The Drowsy Chaperone which played at the <a href="/theatres/novello-theatre">Novello Theatre</a>, and he returned to musical theatre in 2011 at the <a href="/theatres/donmar-warehouse">Donmar Warehouse</a> in a production of the Tony Award winning The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. <a href="/reviews/the-25th-annual-putnam-county-spelling-bee">Read a review of&nbsp;The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee&nbsp;here</a>. In 2012, he then starred in&nbsp;She Stoops To Conquer&nbsp;at the <a href="/theatres/national-theatre">National Theatre</a>, and <a href="/reviews/she-stoops-to-conquer">you can read a review here</a>. He then starred in Dead Funny&nbsp;at the <a href="/theatres/vaudeville-theatre">Vaudeville Theatre</a> in 2016.

&nbsp;

Steve Pemberton - LON

Dead Funny [2648]

Dead Funny

Dead Funny [2648] Product Media

The Vaudeville Theatre opened in 1870, designed by C.J. Phipps. The Vaudeville Theatre is on the Strand, close to the [Adelphi Theatre](https://www.londontheatre.co.uk/theatres/adelphi-theatre) and the [Savoy Theatre](https://www.londontheatre.co.uk/theatres/savoy-theatre). 

Like many West End theatres, the Vaudeville has been closed for a prolonged period of time to allow for renovation work. The current theatre that stands opened in 1926, and has seen plays including *Hedda Gabler* and *Private Lives*. 

## Vaudeville Theatre Seating Information

The auditorium has three levels - Stalls, Dress Circle and Grand Circle.

The Stalls offers very good views of the stage. There is a light raking in the seating throughout the Stalls which helps with sightlines, and the legroom is good too.
T
he Dress Circle offers good views of the stage, and feels close to the action due to the intimate size of the theatre. View from Row G onwards are affected by the overhang of the Grand Circle.

Though the theatre is small, the Grand Circle feels quite far from the stage.

## Where is *Six* in London?

*Six* is at the Vaudeville Theatre in London. The Vaudeville Theatre is located on the Strand. It's close to West End theatres including the Savoy Theatre and the Adelphi Theatre.

Vaudeville Theatre - LON

Vaudeville Theatre

Steve Pemberton is best known for his association with The League of Gentlemen, the hit 1999 television series created by Pemberton, Reece Shearsmith, Mark Gatiss and co-writer Jeremy Dyson.

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About The Pillowman

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Lily Allen

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