THE Americana-country scene, based in Nashville Tennessee, spawns a seemingly endless supply of singer-songwriters, many of whom tour the UK visiting everything from the stadium circuit to county and town-fringe pubs as they make their names. Some, like Gretchen Peters, made an immediate hit with British audiences who have remained faithful over the years. She’s…

THIS has been the most extraordinary few weeks, and really nothing should surprise, but when Donald Trump’s wig and Theresa May’s outfit turn up on the same stage in Yeovil, it might be a bit of a shock. However, with the versatile Swan Theatre company and a play by David Tristram, anything might happen. Tristram…

TERENCE Rattigan is best known for his dramas of difficult lives, so a comedy is something of a surprise … and a delightful one. While the Sun Shines, the second play in the Bath Theatre Royal summer season, is directed by Christopher Luscombe, and runs until 30th July. First performed in London in 1943 it…

LOSS – lost love, death or separation – is a powerful theme, expressed with explosive physicality in Tim Podesta’s Architecture of Loss, at Ballet Under The Stars, with Covent Garden Dance. Mara Galeazzi, former principal dancer and guest artist of the Royal Ballet and a favourite with Hatch regulars, was the soloist in this short,…

THERE are so many good ideas in Barry Matthews-Keel’s production of Shakespeare’s magical comedy a Midsummer Night’s Dream, on stage at the Studio Theatre in Ashley Road, Salisbury until 23rd July. It starts in total darkness, and as the light comes up a silhouette begins a slow martial dance. We discover that she is Hippolyta,…

YOU meet up with somebody you thought you might be in love with, some time after they have apparently dumped you (or at least failed to contact you, as they promised, after a night that you will never forget). But you both want to keep talking, even if it is awkward and neither of you…

PETER Shaffer’s double bill The Private Ear and The Public Eye was first performed in 1962, and starred Maggie Smith and Kenneth Williams.  Set in a time of innocence before the discovery of sexual intercourse (according to Philip Larkin that came a year later) they are both dated and timeless. David Riley chose The Private…

HER Majesty Queen Elizabeth I was apparently so taken by Shakespeare’s Sir John Falstaff, that she asked for more of him after the Henry IV plays, and the playwright obliged with a more farcical view of the fat knight in The Merry Wives of Windsor, before reporting his death in Henry V. The new play…

YOU couldn’t stage Annie Get Your Gun without a charismatic central performer – and Shaftesbury Arts Centre is fortunate to have one in Sophie Lester. The original 1946 Broadway staging had Ethel Merman as the sharpshooter Annie Oakley. It is very difficult to hear There’s No Business Like Show Business sung by any other voice…

IT was more than 20 years ago that this revival of Kander and Ebb’s musical opened on Broadway. By the time it got to London’s Adelphi Theatre in 1997 I was working in Docklands, so was able to see not only the original cast, studded with stars Lemper, Henshall, Goodman (Henry not Len) and Planer,…