theatre – The Map Room https://www.maproomblog.com Blogging about maps since 2003 Thu, 03 Oct 2024 22:51:39 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://www.maproomblog.com/xq/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/cropped-logo-2017-04-32x32.jpg theatre – The Map Room https://www.maproomblog.com 32 32 116787204 The Truth About Harry Beck: A Play About the Tube Map’s Creator https://www.maproomblog.com/2024/10/the-truth-about-harry-beck-a-play-about-the-tube-maps-creator/ Thu, 03 Oct 2024 22:38:15 +0000 https://www.maproomblog.com/?p=1834360 More]]> Cover image from The Truth About Harry Beck, a play now on at the London Transport Museum. It’s an outline cutout image of Beck with the London Underground map in the back.

The Truth About Harry Beck, a play about the designer of London’s iconic Tube map, is at the London Transport Museum’s Cubic Theatre through January. Writer and director Andy Burden spent years working on the play. So far reviews have been mostly positive: Theatre Vibe’s Lizzie Loveridge found it “charming,” Everything Theatre “warm,” and Broadway World calls it “as reassuring as a comfy pair of slippers,” whereas The Arts Desk’s take is more mixed and The Standard dismisses it as “chock-full of mugging, direct address and chuntering dimwittery.” BBC News coverage.

Not coincidentally, it’s the 50th anniversary of Beck’s death. London map dealer The Map House has an exhibition to mark the anniversary: Mapping the Tube: 1863-2023. They’re a map dealer so the displays are for sale, including a draft copy of the map and one of only five remaining first-edition Tube map posters. Runs from 25 October to 30 November, free admission.

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