Latest Articles - Page 252 of 645

Full cast announced for The Addams Family, A Musical Comedy Live in Concert at London Palladium

19Jan

By NewsdeskNo Comments

NEWS

Full cast announced for The Addams Family, A Musical Comedy Live in Concert at London Palladium

Katy Lipson for Aria Entertainment and John Stalker Productions are delighted to announce the full cast of THE ADDAMS FAMILY, A Musical Comedy at the London Palladium on 12th & 13th February. Joining the previously announced Michelle Visage as Morticia Addams, Ramin Karimloo as Gomez Addams and Lesley Joseph as Grandma in the THE ADDAMS FAMILY are Sam Buttery (Jesus Christ Superstar, Barbican/Regent’s Park Open Air) as Uncle Fester, Nicholas Mclean (Annie Get Your Gun, London Palladium) as Pugsley Addams, Dickon Gough (As You Like It, Soho Place) as Lurch, Sean Kingsley (Patriots, Noel Coward Theatre) as Mal, Ryan Kopel (Disney’s Newsies, Troubadour Wembley Park) as Lucas and Kara Lane (Rebecca, Charing Cross Theatre) as Alice. In the ensemble are Leeroy Boone (The Phantom of the Op...

19Jan

By Mark DavorenNo Comments

North West

Snow White – Rainhill Village Hall

Director Karen Woods has kept the spirit of the season alive – oh yes she has! – as Rainhill Musical Theatre company sing us into the New Year with their take on this famous fairy tale to a live musical accompaniment led by Musical Director Wayne Oakes. The kind and beautiful Snow White (Michelle Williams) lives happily in the village of Applebury with Muddles (David Stevens) and his mother, the Dame (Dru Fitzgerald), and other villagers (Fiona O’Gorman; Ryan Greenall; Emily Boycott). Her wicked stepmother, the evil Queen (Sarsh Johnson) is jealous of her beauty and with the assistance of Helga the Hag (Claire Heaton) decides to do away with her. Can fairy Riff (Megan Charlton) and Mirror (Dianne Glover) stop her in her tracks? Will the miners (Ruth Gibb; Annie Topping; Liam Fitzgerald;...

Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake will return for its 30th anniversary with a 2024-25 UK tour

18Jan

By NewsdeskNo Comments

NEWS

Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake will return for its 30th anniversary with a 2024-25 UK tour

New Adventures is delighted to announce that Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake will return for its 30th anniversary with a 2024-25 UK tour, playing The Lowry, Salford in November 2024. This reinvention of Tchaikovsky's masterpiece caused a sensation when it premiered almost 30 years ago and has since become the most successful dance theatre production of all time. In celebration of that ongoing impact, Swan Lake will take flight once more in this major revival. Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake begins at Theatre Royal Plymouth from 11th November until 16th November before visiting The Lowry, Salford from 19th November until 30th November, ahead of the 8-week annual Christmas season at Sadler’s Wells from 3rd December 2024 to 26th January 2025. Further tour dates and casting to be announced soon. ...

Red Ladder reprise all-female musical We’re Not Going Back

18Jan

By NewsdeskNo Comments

NEWS

Red Ladder reprise all-female musical We’re Not Going Back

Radical theatre company Red Ladder are reprising their all-female musical We’re Not Going Back that tells the story of women who played pivotal roles in the 1984/85 miners’ strike. The musical is being brought back after it was first staged a decade ago to mark the 40th anniversary of the great strike through the eyes of three very different sisters who are ultimately united by a common cause. Victoria Brazier, Claire-Marie O’Connor, Stacey Sampson and Beccy Owen are back in their original roles as sisters driven to take a pivotal role in the struggle to survive. Photo: Tim Smith Red Ladder aims to remind the audience of the resilience of working-class communities, and the power of sticking two fingers up to a government hell-bent on their destruction. It was originally crea...

Julie Hesmondhalgh brings her one-woman show to Bolton’s Octagon Theatre in February

18Jan

By NewsdeskNo Comments

NEWS

Julie Hesmondhalgh brings her one-woman show to Bolton’s Octagon Theatre in February

Corrie legend Julie Hesmondhalgh is performing her auto-biographical one-woman show These I Love at Bolton’s Octagon Theatre for a limited run in February. In this show Julie who found fame playing the big hearted Hayley on the Weatherfield cobbles returns to her Lancashire roots. It’s a journey of discovery and a hymn to Julie’s own working-class childhood in Accrington, to her beloved dad and to the healing power of daftness. Julie is a long time and passionate supporter of regional theatres so is generously contributing her show to support the Octagon, which is a registered charity. She is currently on TV screens starring in the smash hit ITV drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office, which has done so much to finally bring justice to hundreds of postmasters and postmistresses wron...

18Jan

By Alice RoseNo Comments

London

Cowbois – Royal Court

This is my desert island show. It’s only January and I’ve discovered the best play of 2024. Charlie Josephine (writer and co-director) finds a very welcoming new home in the Royal Court after their run before Christmas in Stratford-upon-Avon. We explore the Wild West, a struggling town after the ‘husbands’ of the town go off in search for gold and more supplies. The ‘Wives’ are left waiting but in hearing news of a nearby explosion, hold no hope in their return. Miss Lillian (Sophie Melville) holds the bar while her husband is away- praying every morning for his return when news of the famous criminal ‘Jack’ (Vinnie Heaven) is on route to town. What unfolds is a beautiful release between two people finding their joy, passion and reason to feeling happy and being alive. This town is t...

The Full Monty – Liverpool Empire Theatre

17Jan

By Jan MellorNo Comments

North West

The Full Monty – Liverpool Empire Theatre

Well, we have all probably seen the film – a bunch of middle -aged men – ex steel workers – who when the steel mills and factories close, are left broke, desperate and powerless. A story with its iconic scenes, music and humour that everyone – especially females – remembered - The Full Monty - when a bunch of men, for one night only, become cabaret strippers. So, how was this going to translate from screen to stage? I was intrigued to find out. The Liverpool Empire theatre was packed to the rafters – mostly women I have to say, and there was a deep breath of anticipation across the auditorium as the show started. A large steel construction, a scaffold frame that was a formidable centre piece, drew us into Sheffield’s former glory of theses skyline -consuming steel factories ...

17Jan

By Oliver GigginsNo Comments

Scotland

Jekyll and Hyde – Royal Lyceum Theatre

This adaptation by Gary McNair of Robert Louis Stevenson's novel, is keen to point to its source's Edinburgh roots, though mostly through the programme and the lead (and only) actor's Scottish accent. Unlike some recent productions of Great Expectations or Dracula however, it stops short of relocating the story to Scotland. But even the medium of a play represents a coming home of sorts: this story began with the true tale of furniture-maker and lock-breaker Deacon Brodie, about whom Louis Stevenson first co-wrote a play entitled Deacon Brodie, or The Double Life, though it was his later retooling of the idea of duality into the novella Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde which would find lasting success. The story is well-known (spoilers) for its crucial dual role, which lead at...

Peter Pan Goes Wrong – Leeds Grand Theatre

17Jan

By Paul ClarkeNo Comments

Yorkshire & Humber

Peter Pan Goes Wrong – Leeds Grand Theatre

The Mischief comedy juggernaut just keeps on rolling with another version of Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society’s chaotic take on Peter Pan where everything that can go wrong does. It is at heart a knowing tribute to all those am dram groups who gamely put on productions every week across the country, and the gag is that none are as likely to be so badly written or performed as Cornley’s unique take on JM Barrie’s tale of a boy who never grows up. Mischief founders Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayers and Henry Shields know what works for their brand, so have cunningly crafting dialogue so wooden you could make a table out of it, and ironically most critics have sat though productions almost as risible, but also as blissfully unself-aware as this bunch of talentless chumps. Noises Off will...

17Jan

By Tracey BellNo Comments

Yorkshire & Humber

I Should Be So Lucky – Sheffield Lyceum

The Hit Factory of the 1980/1990’s punches into the Sheffield Lyceum this week with Stock, Aitken & Waterman’s - I Should Be So Lucky. With over 25 of their top 40 hits packed into this farcical frolic of romance and crazy characters, I was left in a confused state - torn between irresistibility and irritation. The music has the potential to be a great addition to the tradition of jukebox musicals but unfortunately the storyline is just too manic to invest in its characters. With flashes of brilliance and moments that overstep the camp cheesiness into complete cringe – this show is definitely the marmite of musical theatre but just maybe it is meant to be so? With an audience demographic donned with rose coloured spectacles of a bygone era of dancing in their bedrooms to Rick Astle...