DRAMA students at the Arts University Bournemouth are performing a devised version of Charles Dickens’ masterpiece Bleak House at their studio theatre this week. It is an ensemble piece directed by the mime expert David Glass, and the students have the good fortune to be working with his mercurial inspiration to bring this tumultuous melodrama…
by Simone Sekers A WEEK or so ago the excellent Guardian mid-week food page ran a piece about how to pick a good restaurant, written by an anonymous inspector. He, or she detailed the ways you could spot a ‘real’ restaurant from one that buys in food from food manufacturers. Be suspicious of over-designed menus…
Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 4 Elgar: Symphony No. 2 Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, leader Amyn Merchant Vassily Sinaisky: Conductor Kirill Gerstein: Piano RADIO 3 listeners, as well as a full audience at the Lighthouse, were treated to a concert in which Russians were in charge both on the podium and the piano stool. Standing as it…
SO many of the phrases from Fawlty Towers – now incredibly celebrating its 40th anniversary – have found their way into everyday language that we feel we know the staff and customers at the Torquay guest house as well as we know our own friends. In Yeovil, where the Civic Players have been entertaining audiences…
MIKE Bartlett’s play King Charles III is half-way through a 20-venue UK tour, and filling Bath’s Theatre Royal until Saturday 28th November. The prolific 35-year-old playwright who brought the climate change play Earthquakes in London to the National Theatre, was commissioned by Rupert Goold to write this 2014 play, which sold out at the Almeida…
IN these days when “soshul meejah” rules many lives and the importance of celebrity seems to depend more and more on appearance, Bec Applebee’s clever take on the story of Cinderella is a timely tale. Ella has been brought up on the farm by her devoted parents and a chicken for a chum. When her…
IT’S an incredible 11 years since Yeovil Youth Theatre burst onto the scene with an unforgettable production of Les Miserables at The Gateway, and during the intervening years the company has introduced many young performers in a challenging variety of roles. This year’s show, at the Octagon Theatre last week, was Annie, a perennial favourite…
FRANCE is currently in the news for such terrible reasons that it is a welcome pleasure to be reminded that for most of us French culture is synonymous with sharp intelligence, wit, style and romance. French drama is particularly renowned for its sparkling romantic comedies, often satirical, frequently sexy. From Moliere via Marivaux to Feydeau,…
AGATHA Christie’s 1958 play The Unexpected Guest is typically densely plotted and full of red herrings, but it hasn’t stood the test of time as well as some of her other works. It depends, like all murder mysteries, on perfect timing, and that is impossible to achieve if principal members of the cast are relying…
THREE F words go automatically together, French, Farce and Feydeau, and that’s the combination which audiences at the Ustinov Studio at Bath’s Theatre Royal can enjoy until 19th December. Director Laurence Boswell has chosen Kenneth McLeish’s clever translation of the 1892 play Monsieur Chasse!, renamed The One That Got Away, for the second of his…