North West Archives - Page 143 of 173

Disney’s Beauty and the Beast – Palace Theatre

7Apr

By Hazel BumbyNo Comments

North West

Disney’s Beauty and the Beast – Palace Theatre

Not entirely sure where to start with this at all. Oh, my word, from the welcome outside the theatre, red carpet treatment (technically for all the soap stars there, but we walked it anyway) a red rose per special guest/press and a small but scrummy rose fondant cupcake, to the buzz and excitement that seemed to be in every corner… As per usual The Palace Theatre is always on top note on press night and tonight was no exception. Well done to the Palace Theatre and your super staff. The show was incredible from start to finish and what a start it was with an incredibly famous voice kicking off the show off in style. The set was just wonderful with pieces moving seamlessly from one side to another either suspended in air or on the round. Sound and lighting were on point to,...

6Apr

By Luke StephensonNo Comments

North West

Peter Pan – St Helens Theatre Royal

It was a great pleasure to see Peter Pan the pantomime in St Helens last night, by Regal Entertainments. The audience was full of families ready to boo and hiss whilst shouting he’s behind you. It’s worth noting if you see the show double check the start times as they are afternoon and teatime showings. Peter Pan (Harrison Vaughan) lives in Never-land. In Never-land it is a place full of lost boys. Where you can’t grow old. They all fight together against Captain Hook (Scott Gallagher) and his pirates. Peter had won the first fight against Hook by taking of one of his hands which was replaced by (you guessed it) a hook. However, Hook wasn’t going to lose the next time and plans to find his hideaway and poison Peter Pan whilst his cronies kidnapped the lost boys along with Wendy (Lauren ...

Jane Hair: The Brontes Restyled – Hope Mill Theatre

6Apr

By Brian MaddenNo Comments

North West

Jane Hair: The Brontes Restyled – Hope Mill Theatre

A salon in the village of Haworth, West Yorkshire is an unlikely location for a play to be set. However, we soon meet the stylists; Emily, Charlotte and Anne and finally it all becomes clear. This is a modern day look at the Bronte sisters written by Bradford lasses Kirsty Smith and Kat Rose-Martin. From the get go the characters are instantly likeable and have their own unique personalities. However, before going on with the review I must state on the night I watched the production the actor who plays Charlotte was isolating due to Covid-19. However, instead of cancelling the performance the ladies ploughed on and the stage manager stepped up to read the role of Charlotte, and she more than delivered. The action really starts when a post appears online from a ‘Lizzie G’ (any gue...

6Apr

By Mark DavorenNo Comments

North West

Sheila’s Island – Liverpool Playhouse

It’s Bonfire night and Sheila (Tracy Collier), Denise (Abigail Thaw), Julie (Rina Fatania), and Fay (Emily Jane Kerr) are Team C in Pennine Mineral Water Ltd.’s annual outward-bound team-building weekend. Somehow, Sheila has been nominated team leader, and, using her cryptic crossword solving skills, has unwittingly stranded her team on an island in the Lake District. Our intrepid heroines find themselves manufacturing weapons from cable ties and spatulas and create a rescue flag with plastic plates and a toasting fork. Questions are asked; truths are told; dirty washing is aired. Is it possible to build an adequate night shelter with a prom dress and a sleeveless jumper? What is Julie’s husband really up to in Aldi? And why are they on this bloody team building exercise when they...

5Apr

By Louise KershawNo Comments

North West

Hindle Wakes – Lyceum Theatre Oldham

There are a lot of people who would shiver significantly at the thought of a dash up to Oldham (or Owdham to us natives) on a soggy cold Monday night. As a daughter of that fair mill town, I was more than happy to abandon my South Manchester residence and head up t’ th’ills to see the Lyceum’s current production of Stanley Houghton’s Hindle Wakes. Written in the first decade of the 20th Century and just prior to the First World War, this beautifully comic play, which presented one of the first powerful working- class female protagonists, was controversial, shocking and highly contentious amongst both audiences and academics when first produced. Fanny Hawthorn, spirited mill worker and a lass who knows her own mind, spends an illicit weekend away with the boss’s son, who happens to be...

4Apr

By Karen Morley-ChesworthNo Comments

North West

Swim – Theatre by the Lake

Sitting in The Studio just a few yards from Derwentwater the urge to run down to the shore and into the icy water is extreme after Liz Richardson’s performance of her play Swim, writes Karen Morley-Chesworth. This is a new version of the production performed at HOME in Manchester and at the Edinburgh Festival before the lockdowns. Originally with a cast of other performers, sharing the experiences of a group of wild swimmers, during the following couple of years, Liz revisited her work and focused on the true-life experience of her and her friend Lisa B. This one-woman performance works beautifully, distilling their intertwined story into the one voice. The setting for this production at Theatre by the Lake in Keswick is simple and effective. A chained curtain backdrop upon which the...

2Apr

By Clare ChandlerNo Comments

North West

The Oracle – The Future Yard

A building that reimagines the role of a live music venue seems the perfect setting for an arts organisation pushing the boundaries of classical music. Tonight, the collaboration is further enhanced by the contribution of South African cellist Abel Selaocoe, an artist who is redefining the parameters of his instrument. As Selaocoe explains, in South Africa mastering ‘Western’ instruments is a form of protest as you can put your culture on top. This layering of cultures, timbres and sounds is evident throughout The Oracle as pieces by Stravinsky, Rameau and Vivaldi sit alongside Selaocoe’s own compositions. An oracle is a form of divination, providing a message for the wellbeing of the community and there are moments of this programme that are sublime as it explores Afrofutur...

2Apr

By Paul WilcoxNo Comments

North West

Les Misérables – The Lowry

Reviewing 'Les Misérables' is in some ways a useless task. The show is entering its thirty seventh (!) year in production and has been seen by well over seventy million (!!) people during that time. It was famously panned by the critics at the opening but has subsequently proved to be one of the most popular 'critic proof' musicals with sell out audiences all over the world, Now, Boublil and Schonberg's iconic show lands at The Lowry for six weeks having already sold virtually every ticket, once again those visitors will not be disappointed with this fresh staging of a spellbinding masterpiece. The titanic struggle between Javert (Nic Greenshields) and Jean Valjean (Dean Chisnall), set against the backdrop of post revolutionary France, culminating in the Paris Uprising of 1832, forms th...

Ellen Kent: Madama Butterfly – Floral Pavilion

31Mar

By Lou SteggalsNo Comments

North West

Ellen Kent: Madama Butterfly – Floral Pavilion

Puccini may have been a philanderer and scoundrel, with a Hitchcock-like tendency to put his heroines through merry hell, but my goodness, he could write an aria. Madama Butterfly, one of the most widely performed operas in the world, boasts its fair share, and is deemed to be one of the most accessible to audiences. Set in one location - a hillside house in Nagasaki, Japan - we follow Cio-Cio-San, nicknamed ‘Butterfly’, the young bride of an American naval officer, Lieutenant Pinkerton, as her romantic ideals are tested to their limits when he seemingly abandons her, yet she still waits hopefully for his return. The sense of tragedy is embedded from the get-go, as we know as an audience that Pinkerton has no intention of coming back, seeing the match as a short-lived one until he can f...

31Mar

By Anne PritchardNo Comments

North West

Mamma Mia! – Liverpool Empire

Everyone is familiar with the ‘Mamma Mia!’ films but not everyone has seen the stage show upon which they’re based; I’m lucky enough to have seen it many times, the first time being the London premier in 1999 when I was blown away by the production, the songs and the energy of the cast. Based around the songs of Swedish pop legends ABBA, ‘Mamma Mia!’ is now a box-office worldwide musical phenomenon. The feel-good musical is presently playing in both the West End and Broadway and has countless touring versions performing world-wide. The show was originally conceived by English producer, Judy Craymer and written by Catherine Johnson, with director Phyllida Lloyd, these being the collaborative creative force behind what was to become an unprecedented commercial success; it premier...