A ROUNDELAY is a circular dance, or a song with a line repeated as chorus, or anything circular, and this new work from Alan Ayckbourn is certainly at least one of those three; an evening of circular entertainment. Part of the Brechtian nature of Ayckbourn is that he sometimes likes us to see the scaffold,…
TISBURY Arts Group moved back from Nadder Hall to the more intimate surroundings of the Victoria Hall in the town centre for this year’s pantomime, Peter Pan, and the Saturday matinee packed every seat in the house, balcony included. This home-written version of the famous story (by an uncredited author) has Nana as a human…
THERE are three essential ingredients for a successful village pantomime – a good script, talented performers and a strong sense of community. If you get all three coming together well you hit the jackpot, which is pretty much what Tarrant Valley Players did with Treasure Island at Tarrant Keyneston’s Ann Biddlecombe Hall. The Tarrant villages are…
FARNHAM Maltings’ It’s a Wonderful Life is a reworking of Frank Capra’s classic 1946 film of the same name. The production, which has been touring England and Wales over the past month or so, was brought to North Cadbury Village Hall by Take Art, Somerset’s highly enterprising arts charity. Skilfully directed by Gavin Stride and…
VILLAGE hall pantomime is a uniquely British rural art form. It has a few essential rules. You must know most of the people on stage. There must be some local jokes. Children from the village will come and dance and sing. The costumes will be colourful. Lots of things will go a little bit wrong,…
THE forecast for the next couple of weeks is cold, cold, cold – snow in some places, and bitter winds everywhere. Definitely batten-down-the-hatches weather. But as soon as the sun comes out, the depths of winter are a wonderful time to go for a walk, and there are few parts of the world more beautiful…
WHEN I worked at the Evening News in London, my friend Laine and I used to spend all our spare money on tickets for the National Theatre (at the Old Vic) and then we’d put out all our clothes on the beds in the flat we shared and perform our favourite plays, grabbing the costume…
BERLIN Cabaret came to Castle Cary last night in the form of singing duo Sasha Herriman and Tami Tal, aka The Bluebirds. The show, which is on a short tour, was co-promoted by Take Art, Somerset’s enterprising arts charity, and hard-working local promoters Judi and Oliver Morrison. With the Caryford Hall suitably transformed for the…
by Simone Sekers WE had our Christmas feast well on into the New Year, for various complicated reasons. It was hard work waiting for it, as we had splashed out on a free range goose from my favourite poultry supplier and we knew how good it was going to be. There it was in the…
BACK in 1972, Shaftesbury Arts Centre performed a version of Edward Lear’s famous nonsense poem, adapted for the stage by Sheila Ruskin and David Wood. And in their audience were Sue and John Cadmore and their young son, who was delighted by the show. So when Sue was invited to direct this year’s “Christmas” show,…