THERE is no question that Venice makes an indelible impression, and that mixture of enchantment, beauty and menace was never better captured than by Nic Roeg’s 1973 masterpiece Don’t Look Now, with Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland at its heart. In 2007 playwright Nell Leyshon created a stage adaptation of the Daphne du Maurier short…
THE Elizabethan adventurer, explorer and some time Dorset resident, Sir Walter Raleigh, one of history’s most charismatic characters, comes to Dorchester Corn Exchange on 6th November in a Dyad theatre production. That Knave, Raleigh tells the astonishing highs and lows of his dramatic career. Andrew Margerison, who also wrote the play, plays a man who…
DRAGONS’ Den investor and entrepreneur Deborah Meaden will join business leaders, educators and representatives of small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) at North Cadbury Court near Yeovil on Thursday 6th November for Unlocking Somerset Talent, an event dedicated to exploring how apprenticeships and partnerships with education can help businesses thrive. The event has been organised by…
A VIRTUOSO trio of folk musicians, Jon Doran and the Northern Assembly, have a short tour with Artsreach, coming to the village halls at Shipton Gorge on Friday 7th November, Langton Matravers on Saturday 8th and Drimpton on Sunday 9th, all at 7.30pm. Shining a new light on old tunes and tales from the British…
GEOFF Norcott is that very rare thing in the UK comedy scene – he is a Conservative! But coming out as a right-winger hasn’t impeded his career too badly, and he is now on a new tour, Basic Bloke 2 – “There’s no Bloke without Fire” – coming to the Electric Palace at Bridport on…
THE Mowlem Theatre at Swanage has stood proudly overlooking the sea for almost 60 years, sometimes battered by winds, rain and even snow. But now the old roof is leaking and the theatre has launched an urgent crowdfunding appeal for £10,000 to stop the leaks and save the building. This much-loved community space has a…
A RISING star of the cello, 16 year-old Hugo Svedberg, joins the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra on Thursday 13th November, at Exeter University Great Hall, for a concert entitled Sunshine and Shade. He will be playing one of Tchaikovsky’s best-loved pieces, the Variations on a Rococo Theme, a work characterised by carefree charm, grace and the…
BATH is a beautiful city, delightful at any time of year, but late autumn brings one of its special treats, the annual Mozartfest. This year, running from 7th to 15th November, to brings outstanding musicians, including the Carducci, Consone, Castalian and Schumann string quartets, acclaimed soloists Imogen Cooper, Cedric Tiberghien and Jennifer Pike, and larger…
NOTHING explores the depths of emotion and drama like a great movie melodrama, and a new season of films at Poole’s Lighthouse arts centre, starting on 4th November, sets out to celebrate the genre with a programme that ranges from Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? to Baz Luhrman’s Romeo and Juliet. The BFI Film Audience…
BATH Theatre Royal hosts two double bills of opera and dance, featuring English Touring Opera and Rambert, from 3rd to 8th November, beginning on Monday 3rd with Benjamin Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia, an acclaimed production, directed by Robin Norton-Hale, which was awarded four star reviews in The Stage and The Times. In ancient Rome,…
AS I entered and exited Bristol Hippodrome, there was an eerie feeling of the ghost of the clergyman who organised a protest when Gracie Fields, on a visit to Bristol, closed her show with a version of The Lords Prayer. What he would have made of Trey Parker, Robert Lopez and Matt Stone’s irreligious satire…
When two members of Living Spit are overheard bragging about how good they are, Zeus, up there on Olympus, is enraged by their hubris and decides to teach them a lesson –join them as they bring Too Many Greek Myths to Dorset, Somerset and Wiltshire, and find out how the king of the Greek gods…
A MASTERPIECE of silent cinema, set in one of the world’s greatest cathedrals, will be screened in another – Salisbury Cathedral, on Saturday 15th November, when The Hunchback of Notre Dame will be shown, with a live organ score. Jonathan Hope, one of the most dynamic organists of his generation, will improvise a live organ…
A NEW stage adaptation of the hugely popular film The Greatest Showman comes to Bristol Hippodrome next year, from 15th March 2026 to 10th May, with a cast led by Oliver Tompsett and Samantha Barks. Based on the 20th Century Studios motion picture with story by Jenny Bicks, songs by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul…
EXETER’s Northcott Theatre has announced its first 2026 Made By Exeter Northcott production – Forever Young by Erik Gedeon is a musical play that blends big laughs, heartfelt moments and iconic songs. The cast will include South West actors from past Northcott productions and pantomimes and the production will be the first musical play to…
GALLOWS humour is a curious aspect of the human psyche – laughter is the best antidote to fear, probably. The laughs are dark and the subject matter even darker when Ha Hum Ah Theatre brings its new play, Making A Killing, on tour locally and coming to Dorset with Artsreach on 11th and 14th November….
SOMERSET artists James and Kate Lynch, who live on a hill overlooking the Somerset Levels, have both had work selected for The Life of the Fields, a major exhibition at St Barbe Museum and Art Gallery in Lymington, one of the most adventurous and prestigious galleries in the area. The exhibition runs to 10th January…
WELSH storyteller Shon-Dale Jones is back on tour with a new show, Stories From An Invisible Town, with dates until 18th November across the south and west. Shôn is first and foremost a storyteller. He’s honest, inventive, and deeply human … curious, restless, wide-eyed, offbeat and resonant. His work combines heartfelt, funny and insightful stories….
THE critically acclaimed Nick Dear stage adaptation of Frankenstein is the choice of Street Theatre for its production at Strode Theatre, Street, from 12th to 15th November. This version of Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, had its world premiere at the Royal National Theatre in February 2011. The production was directed…
ONE of the country’s finest chamber choirs, The Tallis Scholars come to St Mary’s Church, Dorchester, on 11th November, in a programme that celebrates the 500th anniversary of the birth of one of the greatest musical figures of the Renaissance, Giovanni Pierluigi Palestrina. Over the past five decades, Peter Phillips and The Tallis Scholars have…
SINGER song-writer Louise Jordan, who specialises in telling the hidden histories of women over the past couple of centuries, takes audiences back to the dark times of occupied France and the courageous women of the Special Operations Executive in her new show, which has a four-date Artsreach tour, on 7th November at Broadwindsor Comrades Hall,…
SOMERSET’S world famous Guy Fawkes Carnival circuit is under way, with its first outing on Saturday 1st November at Bridgwater. The spectacular, colourful, noisy and inventive carts are devised and built over 11 months of the year, ready to be unveiled to their astonished and delighted audiences filling the streets of the eight towns, this…
UNTIL a few months ago, the names of Moth and Raynor Winn provoked respect and admiration, and the their story was filmed as The Salt Path, with a stellar cast featuring Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs. That critically-praised film is the most-requested on Moviola’s November programme. In July, The Observer newspaper broke the story which…
THE recent media circus and general clamour around the former prince Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, the younger brother of King Charles III, is by no means the first time that the future of the monarchy has been in question. A new play by Gavin Egan, at Dorchester Arts on Tuesday 4th November, looks at the fate…
STORY Weaver Becky Burchell is inviting women (and men!) to take part in one of a series of four Dark Skies walks on Cranborne Chase, ending on 15th November. The creative arts producer originally created Women of the Dark Skies “to invite women to walk in the footsteps of the female ancestors of this land….
THE West front of Salisbury Cathedral is one of the glories of Western architecture – and it makes for an astonishing backdrop as Luxmuralis return from 4th to 8th November with a breathtaking spectacle of light and sound – Sarum Lights: Lost Worlds. This innovative light and sound show will take viewers on a journey…
THERE is apparently a powerful connection between medicine and comedy – look at the number of doctors and other medics who have combined stand-up with their work, or moved over entirely from the operating theatre to the performing theatre. Take Georgie Carroll, a nurse who has been playing to sell-out audiences for some years. Her…
THREE leading local galleries all have exciting exhibitions for the autumn – The Art Stable at Gold Hill Organic Farm, Child Okeford, has a retrospective on the work of the late David Gommon. Sladers Yard at West Bay celebrates mother and daughter Marzia Colonna and Fiamma Colonna Montagu, and the Slade Centre at Gillingham looks…
AN exhibition, at Somerset Rural Life Museum, Glastonbury, from 27th September to 10th January 2026, A Life Outside: Hope Bourne on Exmoor, offers a new appraisal of the work and life of the Exmoor writer and artist. Created in partnership with The Exmoor Society, which cares for The Hope L Bourne Collection, the exhibition considers…