The spy who came in with a vacuum cleaner

GRAHAM Greene had a dry sense of humour, never better shown than in Our Man In Havana, which has been adapted for the stage by the actor and writer Clive Francis. The new comedy of a vacuum cleaner salesman caught up in espionage in pre-revolutionary Cuba comes to Salisbury Playhouse from 14th to 18th July…

Read more...

Powerful modern classic comes to Bath

THREE acclaimed actors – Toby Stephens, Amanda Abbington and Noah Valentine – play the leading roles in Peter Shaffer’s dark, probing masterpiece, Equus, which comes to Bath Theatre Royal from Tuesday 14th to Saturday 25th July, in a production directed by Lindsay Posner, which received rave reviews when it premiered at the Menier Chocolate Factory….

Read more...

Fawlty Towers, the play, Bath Theatre Royal

FOR those of us of a certain age, it seems incredible that the television series Fawlty Towers had only 12 half-hour episodes when it was first shown in 1975 … more than 50 years ago. Its set-piece scenes and catch phrases – and of course Sybil’s laugh – fast entered the Comedy Hall of Fame,…

Read more...

Classic TV comedy at Bath

IT is hard to believe that there were only 12 episodes of Fawlty Towers – and almost as hard to find that it is just over 50 years since the BBC showed this absolute classic of English rudeness and gentility at the seaside. Now it comes as a stage play, adapted by creator John Cleese,…

Read more...

Your Move, Really Truly Theatre Company, Frome Festival

POLLY Lamb’s latest play, Your Move, was sold out before it opened at the Town Hall, playing for the first three days of Frome Festival 2026. Once again, town councillor and fair housing advocate Lamb has created a play that taps into the concerns of the 2020s, focussing on the “new” ways we live and the…

Read more...

Hands Across the Sea and Still Life, Studio Theatre Salisbury

NOEL Coward’s dazzling wit and uncompromising insights into human behaviour rightly won him the title of “The Master”, and his legacy is a collection of brilliant plays set in a time before political correctness and the “classless” society we now claim. That means they need a very careful and specific style to ring true and…

Read more...

Murder, mayhem and a Joe Orton classic

PICTURESQUE Sidmouth is not only a delightful seaside resort and home to the country’s oldest folk festival, it also has the longest-running traditional summer rep season, at the Manor Pavilion theatre, this year continuing to Saturday 19th September. For three months, with a week out for Sidmouth Folk Festival, the theatre has a weekly professional…

Read more...

Silver jubilee celebrations at Frome

FROME celebrates the 25th anniversary of its multi-arts festival this year – and the festival opens on 3rd July, just two days after the funeral of Martin Bax, the actor, former town and district councillor and mayor, who became one of Frome’s most loved and valued citizens. A former actor with the Royal Shakespeare Company, Martin…

Read more...

The Secret Garden at Bath’s Egg

THE adventurous Egg theatre at Bath Theatre Royal is premiering a new adaptation of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s beloved classic The Secret Garden, from Thursday 2nd to Sunday 26th July. The new disability-led production is celebrating the Egg’s 21st birthday, with a series of initiatives to support emotional wellbeing. The venue, which opened in 2005, will…

Read more...

Moviola in high summer

THE two top films for Moviola screenings in this region in July and August are both serious – H is for Hawk and Hamlet. H is for Hawk is a biographical drama, directed by Philippa Lowthorpe, who co-wrote the screenplay with Emma Donoghue, based on the 2014 memoir by naturalist Helen MacDonald. It stars Claire…

Read more...