ONLY connect, said E M Forster, quoted by Frank in Willy Russell’s Educating Rita: only connect, the motto written on Forster’s monument in Stevenage, and the two words which sum up not only much of Forster’s output, and Rita’s attempt at education, but also every tiny piece of the magical, mystical, deep, yet seemingly simple,…
ONCE we have been born, the one certainty remaining in this confused and confusing world is that we will die. We can no longer depend on real estate maintaining its value, jobs for life for lawyers, bankers and doctors or the sunshine in summer, but we ARE going to die. Not many of us wait…
ARTHUR Miller’s All My Sons is regarded as one of the greatest plays of the 20th century, yet it is performed rarely, requiring a level of emotional and intellectual concentration from its audience that is unusual in these 90-minutes-and-off-to-the-bar days. Set in the back yard of a house in a well-to-do neighbourhood of an American…
THIS production by Warminster’s Masqueraders was back by popular demand after a successful sell-out production on the Athenaeum stage earlier this year. That demand was certainly evident as this vibrant show, which really delivers what the title promises, once again played to full houses. It is set in a women’s prison, and the stark set…
DVORÁK: Symphonic Variations DVORÁK: Violin Concerto SIBELIUS: Scene with Cranes SIBELIUS: Symphony No. 5 THE 34-old-year Scottish conductor Rory Macdonald and the 29-year-old Dutch violinist Simone Lamsma are well past the stage when they could be called ‘promising’: both are in the thick of highly-successful careers. But the youthful zest that both bring to their…
TOP Hat has only been a stage show for three years, and after a successful run at the Aldwych Theatre in London’s West End, the show began a year-long National tour in August, and is at Bristol for the next two weeks. It started life as one of the famous Fred and Ginger musicals, made by…
YEOVIL Youth Theatre has been one of the great successes of the past decade, from the astonishingly confident Les Miserables at the Gateway in 2005 to the barnstorming CATS at the Octagon two years ago, and subsequent shows. So it was disappointing, both for the company and their fans, on the opening night of The…
THE audience at Salisbury Playhouse is not given to spontaneous displays of emotion, but at the end of the Nottingham Playhouse production of Matthew Spangler’s adaptation of The Kite Runner, almost everyone sprang to their feet to applaud. This after an unpromising start, as the touring company battled with the technology to raise and lower…
FOR many of us, the name William Tell takes us straight back to childhood. I have vivid memories both of Conrad Phillips (complete with crossbow and apple of course) on TV in the late fifties as well as of the American western series The Lone Ranger where Rossini’s familiar and exuberant music was used as…
MARK Bruce, the dancer and choreographer who has developed much of his work in Somerset, was born in London born 45 years ago, and trained at the Rambert. He founded his company in 1991 and since then has been astounding, delighting and disturbing audiences around the country and beyond. His latest work, Dracula, started life…