Theatre and performance in Greater Manchester & other places.
Royal Exchange, Manchester. 2 October 2017. While in the Royal Exchange's main theatre Sarah Frankcom's production of 'Our Town' cleverly plays around with place and time, in the studio next door Jackie Hagan's new play 'Cosmic Scallies' firmly sticks a pin in a map to locate us in the here and now. Welcome to 44 [...]
Presented by Word of Warning, STUN + Z-arts. 30 September 2017. 'Emergency', Word of Warning's annual "day for the curious", features various performances, installations and experiences all in the space of 11 hours. This year there were 27 shows to choose from and it was more or less non-stop from the off. What's so likeable about [...]
Royal Exchange, Manchester. 19 September 2017. The Royal Exchange's stage is crowded with people sitting around tables, chatting and waiting for something to start. Everyone is dressed as if they have just walked in off the street and it isn't obvious who are the audience and who are the cast. The setting is so mundane [...]
Contact, Manchester. 21 September 2017. After developing the concept of a 'football opera' with fans in Belgium, and then recreating it in other European cities, the directors of We're Not Really Here (Yahya terryn, Oliver Roels and Gilles De Schryver) bring the show to Manchester for its English premiere. In each city they work with [...]
HOME, Manchester. 13 September 2017. Gary McNair takes us back to a time when the Sugababes and Girls Aloud were in the charts, the second Star Wars trilogy was unfolding and he was the proud owner of a mobile phone with 60 minutes of free calls and 90 free texts. Finding himself increasingly isolated and [...]
Oldham Coliseum. 12 September 2017. A 'musical entertainment' from the 1960s casting a satirical eye over the First World War and done in the style of old music hall theatre could sound like a dusty museum piece of a show. However while the Great War is now a century ago, as tensions simmer in Korea [...]
53two, Manchester. 1 September 2017. "Who run the world? Girls!". Anna Jordan's 'Freak' is a fiercely forensic examination of the pressures women face and the price they pay. It considers these issues through the lives of 15-year-old Leah struggling with her first serious relationship and 30-year-old Georgie at a crossroads after the end of a [...]
Hope Mill Theatre, Manchester. 29 August 2017. Building on its reputation as Manchester's hotbed of musical theatre Hope Mill Theatre plays host to a revival of Stephen Schwartz's 1970s musical 'Pippin'. A sort of play within a play, acted out by a wandering troupe of performers, it tells the story of a young prince (named [...]
Royal Exchange, Manchester. 16 August 2017. It starts with a few coded knocks, a secret phrase and a charming warm Polari welcome on our entrance... The Royal Exchange Young Company's latest production begins in a louche 1950's gay bar and then takes us on a journey of lives half-lived, secret stories and modern-day oppression. 'We [...]
Contact, Manchester. 28 July 2017. Contact Young Company and Action Hero. Andy Warhol's prophetic assertion that "In the future everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes" is the starting point for Contact Young Company's new show. What can you do in 15 minutes they ask? Travel to Contact on a bus from Piccadilly or bake [...]
Circles & Stalls 