1536 Ambassadors Theatre, WC2

THREE WOMEN AND A DISTANT QUEEN Ava Pickett’s breathlessly exciting début play won, at the Almeida, both a prestigious prize and mixed reviews. As a first-timer, seeing its transfer to the West End, I can say that it well deserves the move, and that it keeps all the unsettling intimacy and power that split the critics. And it’s piquant to have a more sobering reflection on Anne Boleyn running here: seven minutes’ walk from the latest cast raving through the riotous SIX on the Strand. So I liked it a lot: beautifully set amid reedy grass and stunted trees in the Essex countryside , three young women meet, gossip, and express their daily concerns and fears . Gradually the news comes in about the arrest of Queen Anne Boleyn and her imprisonment, trial and death. The passage of days, sunsets and a terrible distant bonfire of celebration is achieved with Jack Knowles’ remarkably fine lighting; Lyndsey Turner’s direction keeps it moving, and the characters are firmly distinct, recognizable…

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