Displaying items by tag: Theatre

An award winning global festival of art, music & ideas taking place on 11-14 May 2011 in Manchester, England. World premieres of astonishing artworks, an explosive citywide music programme, visionary thinkers from around the world and awards for outstanding innovations.

Laugh your socks off at unitytheatre this April/May with some amazingly talented comedians such as Arthur Smith, Simon Munnery, Andi Osho and Pete Firman as Liverpool Comedy Festival 2011 comes rolling and laughing through unity! With past names such as Rhod Gilbert, Dara O'Brian, Andy Parsons, Jimmy Carr and John Bishop treading the unity boards, come and be jolly and have a laugh at 'Liverpool's most ambitious theatre'.

Today Twitter brought down the Arts Council webserver - it didn't, it was simply a power cut in Manchester.

Today the Arts Council destroyed the Arts in England - NO that didn't happen either.  The arts organisations are suffering, along with the staff, the real people who work hard and the artistic programmes but in the long term everyone just gets on with the job of work.

In Liverpool we have seen 11% cuts portrayed as a good result and they maybe when compared against the likes of Urban Strawberry Lunch who run the St. Lukes Church aka the bomby getting cut completely.

Much of Liverpool: City of Radicals is still in the planning stages so you will have to check elsewhere for up to date details - but here is a line up of what is known now to be taking place throughout the year.

Enter a wonderfully dark and dangerous world where nothing is quite as it seems and every outcome is surprising. Tales of psychopathic childhood nemeses, slyly threatening landladies and savage and sadistic gambling games.

Roald Dahl’s renowned short stories for adults are brought to the stage for the first time by The League of Gentlemen’s Jeremy Dyson, co-writer of the Everyman and Playhouse and Lyric Hammersmith smash-hit Ghost Stories and directed by Polly Findlay winner of the JMK Trust Young Theatre Director Award. Video below

WHAT WOULD YOU DO FOR THE PERFECT CHRISTMAS?

Reality and the ridiculous collide in an enchanting festive adventure, whisking you between Victorian England and the present day.

From Peepolykus, the company that brought Spyski and the West End hit The Hound of the Baskervilles to Liverpool, and under the direction of Artistic Director Gemma Bodinetz (Tartuffe and The Hypochondriac), this is the extraordinary tale of a reckless man who risks everything one Christmas Eve.

Open Now at Liverpool Playhouse.

Watch the trailer below No Wise Men

Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool

There are several good reasons to want to see Anthony and Cleopatra at the Liverpool Playhouse this month. The one the press like is Kim Cattrall of ‘Sex and the City’ fame as Cleopatra. While I’ve never watched the television show I am aware of the shoes associated with it and have more recently been impressed by Cattrall constantly reminding people that she’s from Liverpool,  and yes I am both that shallow and that parochial. However the real draws for me are director Janet Suzman and actor Jefferey Kissoon as Anthony. Jefferey Kissoon was last (as far as I know) in Liverpool in Talawa Theatre’s The Gods Are Not to Blame at the Everyman. I was working there at the time and his performance was arresting to say the least; he was a powerful yet elegant actor who was a pleasure to watch each of the several times I saw the show. And he was a handsome man; all of us box office girls (and one of us was a boy) appreciated that; just to pass his dressing room added a frisson to our day. Perhaps more importantly (but only perhaps!), he has worked with Peter Brook, Robert Lepage, and Complicité, so don’t take my word for his prowess. Putting him together with Cattrall directed by the great Janet Suzman was surely going to produce special theatre.

I wasn’t sure what to expect from Anthology when I approached the Everyman last night.

What I did know was that there were several different plays by several different authors being simultaneously performed offsite. I wasn’t sure how that would work, but was pretty keen on seeing how it turned out – plus, I really wanted to see Jeff Young’s piece. It turned out there are seven pieces in all, and choice is by random selection, either by throwing a seven-sided die (‘die’ is singular for ‘dice’, my Dad told me) or by selecting one of seven objects, among them a party popper, a feather, a letter and so on. My choice was a milk bottle with a flier in the top. This turned out to be play number 2, and I was given headphones and a receiver on a lanyard tuned to the appropriate station. All very exciting. However this was not Jeff’s piece, and I was not allowed to swap as it was already oversubscribed. I imagine not all audients are going to be open to this, at least some presumably choosing to come to the theatre because they like a particular playwright, actor or theme; and it certainly added an element of potential chaos that made me glad I was no longer a Front of House Manager. I think on the whole though that this potluck is a good thing; it adds to the sense of adventure, plus I saw a show by a writer I wasn’t aware of and probably wouldn’t have selected given a free choice, and that has to be good.

Swedish company Cirkus Cirkör, one of Europe’s top names in contemporary circus, is visiting the North West for the very first time. Featuring eight multi-skilled circus artists, this family-friendly show is jam-packed with clowning, acrobatics, juggling, trapeze aerialists and much more. Bringing together circus, music and breathtaking visuals, Inside Out celebrates the art of circus; its technical skillfulness and magic.

Phoenix Dance Theatre make bold statement with première of Declarations at Liverpool Playhouse

Phoenix Dance Theatre’s first major tour under Artistic Director Sharon Watson, Declarations, will be a programme of four contrasting and musically diverse dance works, and willpremière at the Liverpool Playhouse on Wednesday 15 and Thursday 16 September.