Behind the curtain: what really goes on in theatre dressing rooms?

Ahead of next month’s Olivier awards, photographer David Levene reveals the secrets of life backstage in London’s West End, capturing the likes of Steve Coogan, Vanessa Williams, Paapa Essiedu and John Lithgow as they prepare for performance

Lightbulb-wreathed mirrors, wigs and makeup artists, a sense of faded glamour: the backstage dressing room has its very own lore in Theatreland. It is a private space for a company of actors to gear up or wind down, in between slipping into character, but it’s so much more than that. Films such as All About Eve and John Cassavetes’s Opening Night, as well as plays such as Ronald Harwood’s The Dresser, show this space bristling with tension, vulnerability and rivalries. And Judi Dench has spoken about the fun to be had in this other, unseen side of the proscenium arch (including accidentally flashing Kenneth Branagh).

Denise Gough (centre), who plays Emma in People, Places and Things, chats with her fellow Emmas during the interval at the Trafalgar Studios theatre.

Topics

What’s really behind Trump’s abrupt pivot to Russia?

The president has shocked allies by opening talks with Moscow and criticising Ukraine. Will this dramatic shift in US foreign policy hold?
Financial Times - Feb. 21
Super Micro’s stock surges. Here’s what’s really behind the big rally.

An end to Super Micro’s delisting drama is welcome news for “fast money” and quantitative investors. But one analyst says institutional investors are still avoiding the stock.
MarketWatch - 2d
119-year-old bottle found behind crown above theatre stage

A theatre-lover was "astonished" to find a 119-year-old message in a bottle during a tour.
BBC News - Feb. 22
What's behind the jump in coffee prices

Coffee bean prices have jumped nearly 20% since the beginning of the year after severe drought and flooding over past two years in Brazil and Vietnam have crippled bean production. Kelly O'Grady ...
CBS News - 12h
Here Are the Digital Clues to What Musk Is Really Up To

What will DOGE do with access to personal data on almost all Americans?
The New York Times - Feb. 21
What Musk’s Chain Saw at CPAC Was Really About

Waving a chain saw onstage at CPAC, Elon Musk showed how he has emulated a right-wing leader.
The New York Times - Feb. 21
What is Trump really thinking with his Ukraine policy?

President Trump's recent inflammatory rhetoric towards Ukraine is likely motivated by his desire to cultivate strategic unpredictability and his perception of Ukraine as a less important ...
The Hill - 2d
What it was like in the room during Oval Office shouting match

BBC reporters witnessed the extraordinary exchange between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky firsthand.
BBC News - 16h
The big idea: what do we really mean by free speech?

Social media bosses are suddenly all for it, but can we take their enthusiasm at face value?. Free speech is in permacrisis – or so some would have you believe. Complaints that freedom of speech is ...
The Guardian - 5d

More from The Guardian

Zelenskyy says ‘crucial’ for Ukraine to have Trump’s support in lengthy statement following Oval Office argument – live

Ukrainian president has landed in the UK and will hold talks with PM Keir Starmer later. ‘He defended our honour’: Ukraine reacts to Zelenskyy’s clash with Trump Ukraine has destroyed 103 ...
The Guardian - 30m
‘He defended our honour’: Ukraine reacts to Zelenskyy’s clash with Trump

Back home there was widespread support for Ukraine’s president, but also dismay at his car-crash encounter in the Oval Office. Live reaction to Zelenskyy’s clash with Trump and Vance ...
The Guardian - 2h
How JD Vance emerged as the chief saboteur of the transatlantic alliance

Vance snaked his way in first to the row between Trump and Zelenskyy, his second intrusion this month after Munich. Live reaction to Zelenskyy’s clash with Trump and Vance JD Vance was ...
The Guardian - 7h
‘Free world needs a new leader’, says EU foreign chief after Trump Zelenskyy row

The EU foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, said ‘the free world needs a new leader’ and that it was up to Europeans to take this challenge. Live reaction to Zelenskyy’s clash with Trump and ...
The Guardian - 15h
Gunshots and a surge of panic: footage shows last moments of boy, 12, killed in the West Bank

Two children a week are killed in the West Bank. Two cameras recorded the circumstances of one such death. The last time Nassar al-Hammouni talked to his son, Ayman, it was by telephone and the ...
The Guardian - 9h