Sophie Lieven

Snow is falling on New York City, forcing the usually dominant lights of Times Square and Broadway to compete with the best display nature has to offer. It has been a difficult few weeks for the city, shut down for several days following Sandy and the subsequent Nor’easter snow, but it is a good time for a newcomer to be introduced to what Broadway has to offer and to assess it during a rare period of quiet.

This is a wonderfully light frolic into the often staid world of Gilbert and Sullivan revivals. No clunking jokes or dodgy singing are in sight (or earshot); instead Charles Court Opera’s production is full of perfectly pitched froth and fantastically well timed joked which really do capture the qualities of comic opera. At the King's Head Theatre.

Shaky Isles Theatre have achieved the seemingly impossible: they have produced a genuinely funny, inventive and thought-provoking play on the most unpromising of subjects - miscarriage. Although not to everyone's taste, Waiting Room is worth seeing, if only for the hilarious game show host and the undignified poses the poor protagonists are forced to adopt at their weakest moments. At the Camden Fringe.

A sultry riff on film noir and the seedy world of 1930s America, the recently formed Blind Tiger Theatre Company have made an impressive start with this excellent production. It follows a private eye's attempts to solve a sordid mystery and reaches a satisfying, though suitably ambiguous, finale. The addition of pithy writing and live music makes this a near perfect and enjoyable folly. At the Space.

This new stage version of the classic story quite sensibly stays loyal to C S Lewis' original book and tells the children's adventure with charm and imagination. Add to the classic story a big top tent in the middle of Kensington Gardens and some wonderful puppetry and you have a sure fire treat. At threesixty Theatre.

Classical it may be but this is a flawed production of a pretty miserable play. It is a short but brutal story and Paul Vitty's direction does nothing to find the light and shade within the horror, giving the audience 90 minutes of unmitigated and high-pitched angst. At the Etcetera Theatre Club.

From the first dissonant notes of the live musicians to the leering face-pulling of the actors, this new musical gets off to a cracking start. Part Rocky Horror, part Sweeney Todd, the gruesome and darkly comic plot also manages to throw in a healthy dose of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest for good measure. At the Lion and Unicorn.

This is an unusual and far-reaching double bill, written and produced by its performers and director. As a result, the writing and performances are intimately linked and create quirky short pieces in which the actors seem to enjoy having a chance to use movement and mixed media in ways they would not have licence to in another context. Both plays succeed in being funny and touching. At the Pleasance Islington.

Sweating, bruised actors wrestling in the small space at Lion and Unicorn Theatre is pretty entertaining, if somewhat alarming. It certainly alarmed the people in the front row of this sweetly concocted production of one of Shakespeare’s most unusual plays. At the Lion and Unicorn Theatre.

This double bill of comic plays about religion and the vagaries of modern life enjoys varying degrees of success. MUJU’s aim is to bring together Muslim and Jewish performers, channelling their creativity rather than their perceived differences, and they do a good job of poking fun at all the likely suspects- disapproving mothers and cross-cultural love affairs included. At the Tricycle Theatre.