Fable Attraction

Fable Attraction

Speed Dating with a difference

Dave and Kiki Valentine run a speed-dating night – with a difference – all of their clients are mythical! Come and join them at The Red Hedgehog on Friday 15th February 2013 and enjoy a couple of drinks, some nibbles, some music and six speed ‘dates’ with famous mythical lovers, including Narcissus, Psyche, and Bluebeard!

Local Girl Productions’ latest piece of interactive theatre follows the success of Yule Pull A Cracker at the BAC.  Your £10 ticket gets you a free drink, a £1 drink voucher (as long as your journey has been green!) and free nibbles – as well as participation in a half hour theatrical event.  You’ll visit each character for a five minute ‘date’ in groups of no more than 10, so you can be as interactive as you want. Feel free chat to the characters as part of your ‘date’, or simply enjoy hearing about their romantic trials and tribulations – whatever went down for you on Valentine’s Day will pale into insignificance in comparison!

We’ve got two shows: one from 6:30pm, with the ‘dates’ commencing at 7pm (bring a gang of mates from work) and the second, 8pm for 8:30pm.  There’s a pub and curry house just across the road and the venue is a two-minute walk from Highgate station.

Contact Local Girl Productions (artisticdirector@localgirlproductions.co.uk) for tickets or further information. 

  

On Golden Pond

On Writtle's Golden Pond

Taking inspiration from the iconic centre point of the beautiful village of Writtle – the duck pond on the village green – local amateur dramatics group Writtle CARDS have chosen to perform Ernest Thompson’s On Golden Pond for their latest production.

Norman Thayer Jnr and his wife Ethel have had a summer cottage on Golden Pond since early in their long marriage. This summer their daughter Chelsea – whom they haven’t seen for years – feels she should be there for Norman’s 80th birthday. She and her boyfriend Bill are on their way to Europe, so Ethel and Norman agree to take care of Bill’s son, Billy Ray Jnr. When Chelsea returns, her stepson has the relationship with her father that she has always wanted. Will communication between father and daughter improve at last?

On Golden Pond was released as a film in 1981 starring Henry Fonda and Katherine Hepburn as Norman and Ethel, who both won Oscars for their performances. Playwright Ernest Thompson also won an Oscar for his adapted screenplay. Fonda’s daughter, Jane, played the Chelsea role, reflecting the strain of her real-life relationship with her father.

Writtle CARDS’ production is set to star both their oldest and youngest actors – Boot Banes as Norman Thayer Jnr, and Toby Harris as Billy Ray Jnr in his first role for the society. Nick Caton, recently seen as Victor Frankenstein in CARDS’ Halloween production, directs for the first time since their record breaking The Haunting of Hill House in 2010. The cast also includes long-standing member Clare Williams, and new members Jodee Goodwin, Chris Ivermee and Chris Rogerson.

A romantic tale of twilight love, Writtle CARDS perform for Valentine’s weekend from Thursday 14th February until Saturday 16th February at 8.00pm, with a Saturday Matinee at 2.30pm. Performances are at Writtle Village Hall – opposite the duck pond. Tickets are just £7.00 and can be reserved at writtlecards@hotmail.co.uk or on 07742 301367.  

A Passionate Woman

A Passionate Woman at the Queen's

Kay Mellor's  life-changing love story

The Queen’s Theatre, Hornchurch, launches its 60th anniversary year with Kay Mellor’s poignant love story A Passionate Woman from 1 – 23 February.

A shattering secret changes family life forever in this funny and moving play by Coronation Street writer Kay Mellor. It stars television actress Marji Campi, alongside the Queen’s award-winning professional resident company cut to the chase....

On the morning of her son’s wedding, doting mother Betty is hiding in the attic to escape her unappreciative husband and the reality of an empty nest. Surrounded by happy memories and mementos, Betty relives her youth and a passionate love affair with a man she might have married.

Actress, script-writer and director Mellor first wrote A Passionate Woman for the West Yorkshire Playhouse in 1992 and two years later, it opened in the West End to rave reviews before touring extensively all over the world. In 2010, Mellor co-directed a BBC1 drama series adaptation starring Billie Piper and Sue Johnston and in 2011, she starred in a production at the Oldham Coliseum.

Mellor is hailed one of the UK’s leading TV writers, with hits including Coronation Street,Brookside, Playing the Field, Band of Gold and most recently, The Syndicate. She was awarded an OBE in 2009 for “writing some of the most powerful and successful TV services in recent years” and the BAFTA Dennis Potter Award in 1997 for Outstanding Writing for Television.

Remarkably, Mellor based A Passionate Woman on a revelation about her own mother’s colourful past. She recalls: “One day I was round at my mother’s and she was washing up… she started to talk about a man she used to know… I suddenly saw her crying. She was telling me about an affair she’d had before I was born… she looked me straight in the eye and said ‘I really loved him Kay.’ To hear my Mum say that was unheard of… that’s how the idea for the play came about.”

Playing Betty, Marji Campi has appeared in Coronation Street, EastEnders, Brookside and most notably ITV’s Surgical Spirit.

A Passionate Woman also stars the Queen’s Theatre’s cut to the chase… company members James Earl Adair, Mark Newnham and Sam Pay. This production is directed byQueen’s Artistic Director Bob Carlton with design by Rodney Ford, lighting design byChristopher Howcroft and assistant director is Simon Jessop.

A Passionate Woman runs at the Queen’s Theatre, Billet Lane, Hornchurch, from 1 - 23 February. This production contains some adult language. Tickets cost £16 - £24.50.

Audiences can save money by joining the Queen’s jump the Q scheme and watch all threecut to the chase… shows this season – A Passionate Woman, They’re Playing our Song and Run for your Wife – for just £15 each. This offer ends on 16 February 2013.

Call the Box Office on 01708 443333 or book online at www.queens-theatre.co.uk

Colchester Mercury 2013

New Director Announces Entire Year of Theatre 

Made At The Mercury

New Artistic Director Daniel Buckroyd has announced his inaugural year at the Mercury Theatre with an exciting new Season Ticket. The Made In Colchester 2013 Season promises audiences can enjoy A Year of Theatre from Only £12 A Show with a Gold Season Ticket, saving up to £145.50, more than 50% off regular ticket prices, when booking all 11 shows at once.

“If you’ve been coming to the Mercury for years you will already know the exceptional quality of the theatre’s ‘home-grown’ work, and in announcing my first season as Artistic Director, I wanted to take this opportunity to celebrate the talented team of theatre-makers we’ve got working behind the scenes here in Colchester, marking the Mercury out as one of the leading producing theatres in the country. And what a season we’ve got for you!”

The season starts in the Main House with Intimate Exchanges, Alan Ayckbourn’s uproariously funny sequence of comedies, in which just two actors play eight characters across four separate but linked plays that’ll be popping up throughout Spring and Summer.

Musicals will return to the Mercury, with full-scale productions of both Melvyn Bragg & Howard Goodall’s achingly beautiful The Hired Man and the hilarious, new, 1960s-set musical comedy The Opinion Makers; as well as a Mercury Young Company production of The Who’s Quadrophenia and a Studio production of the laugh-out-loud Garage Band featuring live Punk!

There’s a great mix of drama with Alan Bennett’s multi award-winning The History Boys; a new adaptation of the incredibly moving The Butterfly Lion by War Horse author Michael Morpurgo; and a compelling and highly-topical pairing of The Good Person Of Sichuan by Bertolt Brecht in the Main House and Man To Man by Manfred Karge in the Studio.

And then it’s Pantomime time again, with Sleeping Beauty promising adventure, romance and LOTS of laughs.

Plus, alongside our Made In Colchester season, we’ll still be playing host to a wide range of visiting drama, music, comedy and more, and continuing to welcome many community groups into our theatre, so watch out for our twice-yearly What’s On Guide, packed with information about the full range of things you can see and do at the theatre.

Gold and Silver Season Tickets are on sale from Thursday 22 November to Mercury Supporters - Priority Plus, Friends, Champions, Patrons and Corporates. To find out more about joining (from as little as £26 per year / 50p per week) please call 01206 573948 or visit www.mercurytheatre.co.uk 

Gold and Silver Season Tickets are on general sale from 10am on Monday 3 December from the Box Office on 01206 573948 and online at www.mercurytheatre.co.uk - just in time to make a year of theatre the perfect Christmas present for your loved ones!

Individual tickets for the Made In Colchester 2013 Season along with the visiting programme of drama, music, comedy and more are on sale from 10am Thursday 3 January.

Dick Whittington - Civic Panto

Join Dick and his faithful feline friend on their magical adventure from the heart of Chelmsford, to the nation's capital where the streets are paved with gold and the evil King Rat dwells.

If Dick wants to be Lord Mayor he is going to need all the help he can get from Sarah the Cook, the magical fairy and a whole host of hilarious colourful characters.

Dick Whittington is staged by One From The Heart, who also produced the Civic Theatre's last five sell-out pantomimes, Sleeping Beauty, Aladdin, Peter Pan, Cinderella and Jack and the Beanstalk.

In association with the Civic Theatre, One From The Heart brings another action-packed family show to Chelmsford, featuring all the traditional pantomime ingredients; sparkling storybook sets, energetic song and dance routines, beautiful costumes, plenty of audience participation and the most important ingredient of all - a generous helping of pantomime magic!

Dick Whittington, the most adventurous pantomime of all, will be at the Civic Theatre fromWednesday 5 December 2012 to Sunday 6 January 2013.

And there's exciting news for Chelmsford panto fans, our favourite dame is back for the 3rd year running! So look forward to seeing Richard Earl in action as Sarah the Cook. 

White Rabbit Red Rabbit

White Rabbit Red Rabbit

5 performances, 5 actors, 1 totally unique show

It is often said of theatre that each performance is a unique event. Never will that have been more true than in the Mercury Studio Theatre from Tuesday 23 to Saturday 27 October at 7.45pm, where members of the Mercury Theatre Company will performWhite Rabbit Red Rabbit by Iranian playwright Nassim Soleimanpour.

Each performance will see a different Company actor do the bravest thing of their professional lives and step on to the stage to perform a script they have never seen before!

Tomos James, Emily Woodward, Tim Treslove, Tony Casement and Kelly Williams are the Company actors in question, each of whom knows nothing more about the play they are about to perform than the audience themselves.

Imagine being 29 and forbidden to leave your country. Nassim Soleimanpour dissects the experience of a whole generation in a wild, utterly original play from Iran . Forbidden to travel, he turns his isolation to his own advantage with a play that requires no director, no set and a different actor for every performance.

This is theatre at its most live, exciting and urgent and writer, Soleimanpour becomes a very real presence in the room, yet he’s miles away in Tehran …

In a change to usual Mercury Theatre policy audiences, will be invited to Facebook and Tweet about the show at designated points.

Tickets, priced £11 / £6.50 concessions, are available from the Mercury Theatre Box Office by calling 01206 573948 or online at www.mercurytheatre.co.uk

The Hound of the Baskervilles

The Hound of the Baskervilles

A howling comedy take on Holmes classic

Seasonal scares and silliness abound in Steven Canny and John Nicholson's hilarious version of The Hound of the Baskervilles, at the Queen's Theatre,Hornchurch from 26 October – 17 November - just in time for Halloween!

Featuring the Queen's permanent company of actors cut to the chase..., this most famous of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's mysteries is revamped into a hysterical fast-paced romp!

On his lonely Dartmoor estate, Sir Charles is found dead with a look of terror on his face and gigantic paw prints next to his body. It looks like the legendary curse of Baskerville Hall has struck again! Can Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson solve the mystery of the demon hound before another Baskerville comes to a gruesome end?

Just three actors juggle an astounding 16 roles between them in this pacy celebration of slapstick and quickfire wit, a version of which was recorded by the BBC in March for the More than Words Festival. 

Steven Canny, who is a director, writer and radio producer, won the Sony Gold Drama Award in 2009 and 2010 for two comedy plays on Radio 3 and 4 - Mr Larkin's Awkward Day by Chris Harrald and People Snogging in Public Places by Jack Thorne. John Nicholson is one of the founding members of Peepolykus, one of the UK's most exciting touring theatre companies.

This production of The Hound of the Baskervilles stars members of the cut to the chase… company Jonathan Markwood, Simon Jessop and Greg Last withSteven Markwick on pianoforte. Direction is by the Queen's Artistic Director Bob Carlton, with design by Norman Coates and lighting design by Christopher Howcroft.

The Hound of the Baskervilles is performed at the Queen’s Theatre, Billet Lane, Hornchurch from 26 October – 17 November. Tickets are £16 - £24.50. To book, call the Box Office on 01708 443333 or book online at www.queens-theatre.co.uk