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We are an arts and entertainment review and recommendations site, where we will try and give you our very best recs of what you must see (and also the heads-up on what to avoid).

Bull, Mike Bartlett's brutal 2013 play about office politics, gets a timely revival as a regional tour

The award-winning 2021 film, Firebird, which features a forbidden love affair on an Air Force Base in Soviet-occupied Estonia at the height of 1970s Communist rule, comes to the stage ...

Spend Spend Spend – Manchester Royal Exchange ★★★★★

The Manchester Royal Exchange revives the late Steve Brown and Justin Greene's evocative musical Spend Spend Spend

Two stage and screen legends power a slight, but ultimately winning, house share dramedy, The Roommate

The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe (touring) ★★★★★

The revival of the 2017 production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, in its original home at Leeds Playhouse, couldn’t be more welcome or more timely

[title of the show] is a four-person meta musical that follows its own creation

A Streetcar Named Desire – Royal Lyceum ★★★★

A year on from its first outing, at the Pitlochry Festival Theatre, Elizabeth Newman’s vision of A Streetcar Named Desire has arrived in style at Edinburgh’s Royal Lyceum.

RuPaul’s Drag Race UK winner Ginger Johnson swaps her crown for a crash helmet on her UK tour

Sebastian Faulks’ magnum opus, Birdsong, is rendered beautifully in Rachel Wagstaff’s adaptation for stage.

A Raisin in the Sun – Leeds and touring ★★★★

Headlong's production of Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun begins a limited tour in England

Can Marlow and Moss beat the curse of that difficult second musical with Why Am I So Single?

Kynren aims to tell the entire history of Britain from the perspective of the North East - in just ninety minutes!

Scottish Opera – Britten’s Albert Herring ★★★★

Scottish Opera brings Britten’s Albert Herring to the Lammermuir Festival ahead of a short tour

Talent show winners and hit parade-conquering unit, Girls Aloud, reunite for a UK tour to honour the life of their departed band mate.

Scottish Ballet’s A Streetcar Named Desire ★★★★★

Scottish Ballet’s evocative interpretation of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire returns to London for the first time since 2015.

National treasure Julian Clary meets the Wild West in his latest UK stand-up tour, A Fistful of Clary

Count Arthur Strong – And It’s Goodnight from Him (touring) ★★★★★

Comedy legend Count Arthur Strong embarks on his farewell tour (or at least the first part of it)

GISELLE: REMIX offers an anarchic, punk-reimagining of the classic ballet

Scottish Ballet's take on the timeless, iconic Swan Lake makes a long-overdue return to Scotland after its sell-out 2016 debut

Susie McCabe – The Merchant of Menace (Glasgow International Comedy Festival) ★★★

The popular Scottish comedian, Susie McCabe, debuts her latest show, The Merchant of Menace, at the Glasgow Comedy Festival.

Fascinating Aïda (Glasgow International Comedy Festival) ★★★★★

Cabaret stalwarts Fascinating Aïda play Glasgow’s Comedy Festival to herald 40 years of musical mayhem.

BBC's Breaking the News star Jay Lafferty spins the unlikely combination of comedy and pole dancing in the tour of her Edinburgh Fringe hit, Bahookie.

The Royal Ballet's 2023 take on The Nutcracker is an unmissable delight

Matthew Bourne’s Edward Scissorhands ★★★★★

Matthew Bourne’s evocative dance reinterpretation of the Tim Burton classic movie runs at Sadlers Wells ahead of a UK tour

‘A Letter to Lyndon B Johnson or God: Whoever Reads this First’ is the latest offering from award-winning New York duo Xhloe Rice & Natasha Roland

Pop Off, Michelangelo is a brand-new musical by Dylan Marcaurele, based on the rivalry of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci.

Mhairi Black: Politics Isn’t for Me ★★★★★

In Politics Isn't For Me, former SNP MP Mhairi Black recounts her life in politics and why she’s decided to (temporarily?) abandon it.

Suitcase Show is an anthological production about suitcases and the stories they hold.

Darkfield's latest shipping-container show Flight is set in absolute darkness within an Airbus 320 economy cabin

Gigglemug Theatre present a new musical about the legal case attempting to settle finally the argument ‘is a Jaffa Cake a cake or a biscuit?

These Are The Contents of My Head (The Annie Lennox Show) ★★★★★

Salty Brine picks out Annie Lennox's 1992 album Diva from his Living Record Collection and gives it a spin...

An Evening Without Kate Bush: Edinburgh Fringe 2024 ★★★★★

An Evening Without Kate Bush pays homage to the music, the fans and the mythology of Kate Bush

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Download Magazine Articles Click on the link below to download individual articles from The Recs

Download Magazine Articles Click on the link below to download individual articles from The Recs

The Recs Magazine: Edinburgh Fringe Special 2023

Download Magazine Articles Click on the link below to download individual articles from this years

Arnold Schwartzman Architecture Books ★★★★★

Oscar-winning film-maker and noted graphic designer Arnold Schwartzman retraces 60 years of photography to showcase beautiful architecture across the world.

ABBA AT 50 is a deep dive into a half century of success for the Swedish supergroup.

The Boy Who Sat by the Window by David Hodge ★★★★★

There are few people in this world who have experienced the hedonistic glamour of an

Nita Prose cleans up with her debut murder-mystery novel, The Maid.

Alice Walker's classic novel The Color Purple hits the big screen in musical reinterpretation

One Life, the true story of Sir Nicholas Winton who helped rescue 669 children from the Nazis in the months leading up to World War II, feels a timely cinema ...

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny fails to unearth any treasure in the archeological adventurer's dismal final outing.

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry ★★★

Jim Broadbent stars as retired pensioner Harold Fry who goes on an extraordinary journey

Leading flamenco guitarist and Latin Grammy Award winner Vicente Amigo comes to London as part of Sadler's Wells Flamenco Festival

Midge Ure – Voice and Visions Tour ★★★★★

Midge Ure's Voice and Visions tour revisits two of Ultravox's albums from the 1980s and finds some gems!

Celebrating Yazoo’s Upstairs At Eric’s at 40

Upstairs at Eric's by Yazoo is 40 years old today. The Recs pays tribute to Alison Moyet and Vince Clarke's influential 1982 album and looks at what made it such ...

Today marks the 80th birthday of global superstar Barbra Streisand. The Recs decided to pay tribute to this enduring and formidable singer-actress-activist.

A very rich luxuriant take on the chicken pie that anyone could make - it's as easy as...pie!

Here at The Recs we like to give back so in an act of complete selflessness, we blind taste-tested six Edinburgh Gin Liqueurs for you. Research at its finest!

We taste test an Italian Fiano - is it worth its pricey tag?

It's sunshine in a glass. We discover the amber-hued history of this popular Italian liqueur.

The Recs

Bull (Touring) ★★★★

Firebird – King’s Head Theatre

Spend Spend Spend – Manchester Royal Exchange ★★★★★

The Roommate ★★★

The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe (touring) ★★★★★

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