”Remember me,” growls the ghost of Hamlet’s father exiting through the cellarage as dawn sends him back to torment. Bur what of the Hamlet; will he (or she) be remembered? Live theatre performance is ephemeral, that night’s performance survives only in the memory of those who saw or performed it, though film and sound technology… Continue reading Re-Member Me
Month: May 2023
Three new outdoor shows for Heartbreak
Warwickshire-based Heartbreak Productions is presenting three new plays as part of its 31st year of taking outdoor theatre experiences to audiences across the UK. The plays are Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen, MacHamLear by Michael Davies which pits Shakespearean tragedies against one another in a battle of the Bard, and David Walliams’s Bad Dad. Maddy Kerr, executive director of Heartbreak Productions,… Continue reading Three new outdoor shows for Heartbreak
The Beauty Queen of Leenane
Emma Jordan’s meticulous revival of Martin McDonagh’s darkly discomforting The Beauty Queen of Leenane, co-produced by Belfast’s Prime Cut Productions and Lyric Theatre, is a masterly display of Irish theatre at its best. Last seen at the Lyric in 2009, its return comes fortuitously in the wake of McDonagh’s recent film success, The Banshees of Inisherin, with… Continue reading The Beauty Queen of Leenane
Oduba and Peters lead Northampton Snow White cast
Strictly Come Dancing winner Ore Oduba and actress Wendi Peters will head the cast of Northampton Royal and Derngate’s 2023 panto Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Oduba was crowned Strictly champion in 2016. His musical theatre career has included roles in Grease and the West End production of The Rocky Horror Show. He will play Prince Charming in Snow White. Peters, who… Continue reading Oduba and Peters lead Northampton Snow White cast
Eddie Izzard Performs Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations
Charles Dickens always had a passion for theatre and performance and, had he not become a popular writer, he could well have been a popular actor. His literary success began in 1836 with the publication of the Pickwick Papers and the creation of the character Sam Weller. Dickens’s highly auditory prose, emotional and comic, makes… Continue reading Eddie Izzard Performs Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations
Whyman unveils her final season at RSC
Erica Whyman has revealed details of her final season of work as acting artistic director of the Royal Shakespeare Company before she steps down. The season includes two new productions in the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, while in the Swan, there will be the return of an Elizabethan classic and a première as well as a… Continue reading Whyman unveils her final season at RSC
Il Corsaro
Opera Festival of Chicago is dedicated to presenting fully staged productions of Italian opera masterworks that rarely grace the stage in the United States. Verdi’s Il Corsaro was part of their 2022 season. Lord Byron’s epic pirate poem, The Corsair, dashed off in ten days, sold 10,000 copies on the very first day of publication in 1811. The… Continue reading Il Corsaro
Conference to promote rural touring
Organisations and individuals interested in rural touring are invited to an annual conference which aims to “help level the playing field for those living in remote areas by providing access to professional performances at affordable prices”. Integrate, a three-day conference organised by the National Rural Touring Forum, will take place over three days in Shrewsbury.… Continue reading Conference to promote rural touring
Yours Unfaithfully
When Miles Malleson wrote this play about an open marriage in the early 1930s, he could draw on personal experience, for he had shared his first wife with philosopher Bertrand Russell. It comes with a first-hand freshness. On the one hand, it shows the clash of conventional morality, represented by C of E Canon Gordon,… Continue reading Yours Unfaithfully
Patriots
A dramatisation of some of the leading Russian political figures over nearly forty tumultuous years would be a challenging task for anyone, but the entertaining writing of Peter Morgan’s Patriots, fluently directed by Rupert Goold with an eye for the memorable image and gesture impressively conveyed by a fine cast, does just that. Perhaps it’s inevitable… Continue reading Patriots