CIRENCESTER’s exciting little theatre, the Barn, is making a name for its adventurous programming, with new plays that go on to tour the region or nationally. Now the Barn’s hilarious production of I’m Sorry, Prime Minister is headed for the West End, and will be at the Apollo Theatre from 30th January to 9th May…
ONE of the world’s favourite authors, Alexander McCall Smith, the man behind The No 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series, is coming to Bridport on Thursday 23rd October, as a curtain-raiser event for this year’s Bridport Literature Festival, which runs from 2nd to 8th November. The best-selling author, who was knighted last year for services to…
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…
WELSH National Opera’s A Night at the Opera should not be confused with the Marx Brothers’ first film, made in 1935, when they left Paramount Pictures to join the always high production value studio of MGM. But WNO’s show has one major feature in common with the Marx Brothers film – it sets out to…
ALMOST 25 years on, it is still impossible to avoid a tearful gasp at the thought of the events of 11th September 2001, when almost 3,000 people were killed in four co-ordinated attacks on the USA by Islamist terrorists. But in a resilient world, inevitably there were good outcomes for the lucky few, and among…
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…
some will always book when the cast includes a star not for the content RALPH Fiennes brings his 2025 Bath Summer Season to a close with Rebecca Lenkiewicz’s commissioned play Small Hotel, and, like the rest of the productions of the season, it has evoked vehemently differing responses. The intention was always to present two…
ANNE-Marie Casey’s vivid, energetic and passionate adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s classic story Little Women comes to Salisbury for the first showings of the second leg of its 2025 tour, with a largely new cast and all the atmosphere and delight of its Pitlochry debut back in 2022. A judging colleague of mine says nothing…
RUSSIAN playwright Nikolai Gogol perfectly captured the pomposity, predilection for back-handers, flirtatious peccadillos and general self-aggrandisement that is universally noted in local (and national) government in his 1836 play The Government Inspector. The reality of political corruption is as timeless as it is international. There have been many adaptations of the original (just called Inspector…
CELEBRATE Voice, Salisbury’s exciting autumn music festival, returns this year, from 22nd October to 1st November, with a programme that ranges from a new production of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly to the golden era of Hollywood, from a singalong Mikado to the ancient Greek myth of Orpheus and his quest to retrieve his wife from the…