And yet, despite some dramatic shortcomings, this stage version of Zorro delivers entirely what is expected of it: epic romance, stimulating swordplay and an almost unsettlingly heavy dose of onstage fire, all while musicians among the cast punctuate it with European musical flair – I doubt audiences will be leaving the Charing Cross Theatre dissatisfied after watching this masked musical.
Read more

Durham’s production is a celebration of storytelling and he has gathered a diverse and multi-talented cast to pull it together. Benjamin Purkiss has the presence and stamina to master the title role. His Diego is a quick-witted clown, but in hero mode as Zorro, Purkiss oozes charisma.
Read more

A young cast of actor-musician-flamenco dancers clatter enthusiastically through a tale that’s jokily slapdash one minute, breast-beatingly po-faced the next. They bring more polish to the show than it deserves. There are more Hispanic clichés than you can shake a castanet at.
Read more

Okay, it's not Les Mis for all the parallels, but there’s plenty of scope for fun and a bit of exotic otherness – and, it must be said, wobbly Spanish accents. Some of it works, some of it doesn’t, which, if you’re going for a runtime of well over two and a half hours, is hardly unexpected.
Read more

The whiff of hamminess is never absent from the Zorro films and here both script and performances are endearingly alive to a sense of the ridiculous...The problem is that, aside from swaggering masculinity, the characters of the duelling antagonists feel more flimsily set up than the plywood facades of a spaghetti western.
Read more