London: Culture and Comfort

Dim sum at Yauatcha.

PHOTO: Herbert YPMA

Fall in London is a season for culture and comfort food. City sophisticates just back from languid holidays on the Riviera are itching to go to the theater and try the town's newest eateries. Of course, a great play should be an evening's highlight, but two hours in, you can detect those who wrangled post-performance bookings at Cipriani wriggling in their seats. Run by Arrigo Cipriani—who has imported several suave staffers from Harry's Bar, in Venice—the new Mayfair restaurant, at 25 Davies Street, is relaxed chic, serving simple, excellent Italian food. On any given night, the colorful Bellini-sipping crowd may include Flavio Briatore, Italian multimillionaire general manager of the Renault Formula 1 Team and one of the restaurant's chief investors; Naomi Campbell, his former girlfriend; and David Tang, Hong Kong's charismatic tycoon of style, who designed much of the Cipriani's interior.

After-theater diners tend to crave unfussy, light and delicious fare, like that found at the thrillingly perfect Yauatcha, at 15–17 Broadwick Street, in Soho, just behind the theaters of Shaftesbury Avenue. There, dim sum has been reimagined by Alan Yau, the man behind the still-hot Hakkasan—the only Chinese restaurant in the United Kingdom to earn a Michelin star. At Yauatcha, prawn-and-date dumplings, stir-fried vegetables in a smoky Szechuan sauce and roast-venison puffs are all winners. Incandescent cocktails emerge from a bar that's concealed by a large fish tank. It's incredibly cool.

The must-see play of the moment is Alan Bennett's The History Boys, at the (nationaltheatre.org.uk). Set in northern England in the early 1980s, the comic drama focuses on a group of teenaged boys preparing for their Oxford and Cambridge entrance exams. The play considers whether education is about nourishing the soul or force-feeding facts; it embraces the work of writers from W. H. Auden to Noël Coward with warmth and humor and is the most brilliant play to debut in London so far this year.

Sir David Hare's Stuff Happens opens in September at the National Theatre; his plays are always controversial causes célèbres that reflect current social debate. This one tackles the knotty subject of foreign intervention in Iraq. For those in search of something a little less cerebral, Sir Ian McKellen descends from his role as Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings to play Widow Twankey in the Christmas pantomime of Aladdin, directed by Sean Mathias, in December at the Old Vic (oldvictheatre.com). You haven't experienced true Englishness until you've "done" a traditional burlesque-style holiday pantomime, in which female roles are often played by males and vice versa. Mary Poppins, which begins previews at the Prince Edward Theatre (london nationaltheatre.org.uk) on December 6, is the hottest ticket because it was written by Julian Fellowes, winner of an Oscar for Gosford Park.

After you've exhausted yourself rushing around to theaters and shops (Blossom Mother & Child, at 164 Walton Street, in South Kensington, has the best gifts for babies and mums-to-be), take a beautifying break. A first for London are the speedy salon services at Groom, at 49 Beauchamp Place, in Knightsbridge (groomlondon.com), where two therapists work on you in tandem to move things along. Go ahead, spoil yourself: you can always tell friends you were at the Raphael exhibition at the National Gallery (October 20 through January 16; nationalgallery.org.uk).