All PLAYHOUSE tickets for shows from the 7th August 2015 now come with an additional benefit as you can now travel to the PLAYHOUSE on the Metro for free with your theatre ticket. Theatre tickets are valid up to two hours before and after the performance, just simply retain your PLAYHOUSE ticket for inspection by Metro Staff when travelling to or from the PLAYHOUSE for a show.

The PLAYHOUSE Whitley Bay is delighted to be working with Nexus to provide this extra added benefit to ticketholders on a trial basis until April 2016, and it’s hoped the partnership continues.

North Tyneside is well serviced by the Metro and is Monkseaton Metro Station the nearest to the PLAYHOUSE just a 10minute walk away from the theatre. Alternatively the Whitley Bay Station is also just over 10minutes away through the centre of Whitley Bay.

Cllr Eddie Darke, cabinet member for Leisure, Culture and Tourism, said: “This is a great initiative and one that I’m sure will be very popular with those going along to enjoy all of the fantastic events and performances at the Playhouse.”

The Metro is the hassle free choice to travel to the PLAYHOUSE Whitley Bay.

With frequent services you can arrive ready to relax with a pre-show with a drink from our well stocked bars in advance of the performance. A full range of alcoholic and soft drinks are on offer, with nibbles to enjoy throughout the show.

With a varied and busy Autumn and Winter Season coming up, from The Lindisfarne Story to Paul Potts, and of course the ever popular Christmas Pantomime we hope patrons take advantage of this opportunity to hop on the Metro free and save on the search for parking space and parking fees!

Signal Box Theatre, York – 5 August 2015.  Reviewed by Marcus Richardson

Where to start on perfection? The Railway Children, returning for the first time to the city of York since 2008 when it premièred with great critical acclaim, screeched success as I immersed myself in the land that was Yorkshire. With the York Theatre Royal being in the dark you would expect it to be dead, but it has never been more alive as the performance was held at the National Railway Museum which ties in with the play for obvious reasons.

I watched the performance like a gawping child staring at the steam engines passing by like a “dragon”. The story-telling piece of theatre ticked all the boxes. I was completely drawn in by the narration from all three of the children: Phyllis (Beth Lily), the youngest of the trio; Bobby (Rozzi Nicholson), the oldest and most responsible; and Peter (Izaak Cainer), the man of the family while his father is away. As the audience we saw through their eyes the recollection of the summer when they were the Railway Children. This offered a large amount of comedy as the children’s view was naïve which softened the very dark events that happen in the play.

The staging gave the performance everything it needed whilst also giving the unique and creative aspect I would expect from York Theatre Royal. The staging was transverse holding a real train track centre stage which had a guest appearance of one of the trains being held at the National Railway Museum, blowing the whole audience away with the impressive size of the locomotive. The stage used platforms on the rail tracks to make for effective scene changes. There were few props on stage. However, scenes were clearly shown with a table with the addition of some smaller props on the table depending on the scene.

The acting was impeccable and I couldn’t fault the trio of adult actors who played the young heroes of the railway. When I saw the play, the famous Berwick Kaler was supposed to play the Old Gentleman. However, due to him being ill, the understudy had to step up to the job and by jove he did it. The cast worked together to create the community one would expect from a Yorkshire village. The characters were altered by the children’s views. This made for a very comical scene where one character’s dialogue was made up of ‘Blah Blah Blah’.

The play has to be the best I have ever seen, beating my all time favourite by far. I would definitely encourage anyone to see anything that York Theatre Royal produce

Direct from the West End, the smash hit comedy Handbagged is set for Newcastle Theatre Royal’s stage from Mon 26 – Sat 31 Oct, when the relationship between two of the country’s strongest women is explored.

Handbagged opens the clasp on the relationship between two giants of the 20th Century. The monarch – Liz. Her most powerful subject – Maggie. Two enduring icons born in the same year. One destined to rule, the other elected to lead. But when the stiff upper lip softened and the gloves came off, which one had the upper hand? Moira Buffini’s celebrated new comedy speculates on that most provocative of questions: What did the world’s most powerful women really talk about behind closed palace doors?

Handbagged first premiered at the Tricycle Theatre in 2013 where it enjoyed a sell-out 7 week run, winning the Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre (2014) and nominations for Best New Comedy and Best Ensemble Performance at the WhatsOnStage Awards (2014). The production transferred to the West End on 9 April 2014 where it ran for a strictly limited 17 week season and received an Olivier Award nomination for ‘Best New Comedy’ 2015.

Susie Blake plays ‘Q’. Her many West End theatre credits include: When We Are Married (Garrick Theatre), Grumpy Old Women Live 2: Chin Up Britain (Novello Theatre and on tour), Madame Morrible in Wicked (Apollo Victoria), Noises Off (National Theatre, Piccadilly Theatre and UK tour); The Shakespeare Revue for the RSC (Barbican, Vaudeville Theatre and UK tour); The Merry Wives Of Windsor and A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum (Open Air Theatre, Regent’s Park London).Her best known television credits include: Mrs Brown’s Boys, Beverley Unwin in Coronation Street, Parents, Singles, Born and Bred, Russ Abbott’s Madhouse and The Victoria Wood Show.

Kate Fahy plays ‘T’. Her theatre credits include: After Electra (Tricycle Theatre); The Goat (Almeida/Apollo Theatres); Grace, Goucho (Hampstead Theatre); Old Flames (Arts Theatre); Othello (Young Vic); Seduced (Royal Court); and two years at the Everyman Theatre, Liverpool. Recent television credits include: The Marriage of Reason and Squalor, The Suspicions of Mr Whicher and film credits include: Archipelago, The Living and the Dead – for which she received best actress and best supporting actress awards.

Emma Handy plays ‘Liz’.  Her theatre credits include: Miss Julie (Chichester Festival), Thursday (Adelaide International Festival), The Boy Who Fell Into a Book (Soho Theatre, London Olympics 2012), Flare Path (Haymarket Theatre), Edward Gant’s Amazing Feats of Loneliness (Headlong), Vincent in Brixton (National Theatre, Wyndham’s Theatre, Playhouse West End), 50 Revolutions (Trafalgar Studios), The Merchant of Venice, Twelth Night, Bad Weather (Royal Shakespeare Company),The Wood Demon (Playhouse, West End). Television and film includes: Wire in the Blood Series 2-7 and Velvet Goldmine.

Asif Khan plays Actor 1. His theatre credits include: Love, Bombs & Apples, Kabaddi, Kabdaddi, Kabaddi (Arcola); Multitudes(Tricycle); The Nutcracker, The Snow Queen (Unicorn); Queen of the Nile (Hull Truck); Snookered (Bush); Twelfth Night(National Theatre); Mixed Up North (Out of Joint). Television credits include: The Dumping Ground; Doctors; Dark Matters; Spooks; The Liquid Bomb Plot; Casualty and Going Postal.

Sanchia McCormack plays ‘Mags’. Her theatre credits include: The Broken Heart, Comedy of Errors (Shakespeare’s Globe); Minotaur (Theatre Clwyd/Polka); One Night in November (Belgrade Theatre); Butterfly Lion (Curve/Derby Playhouse); The Caravan (Royal Court, Tour & Roundhouse). Television includes: The Tunnell; Doctors; Broadchurch; EastEnders; Big Bad World; Coronation Street; Law and Order.

Richard Teverson plays Actor 2. Theatre credits include: The Winslow Boy (Old Vic), The Doctors Dilemma (National Theatre),Cause Célèbre (Old Vic), After The Dance (National Theatre), The 39 Steps (Criterion Theatre), When Harry Met Sally (Theatre Royal Haymarket), A Woman of No Importance (Theatre Royal Haymarket), The Lion King (Lyceum Theatre). Television credits include: Downton Abbey, Coalition, Jamaica Inn, The Bletchley Circle, Spies of Warsaw, Dancing On The Edge, Upstairs Downstairs, The Roman Mysteries, Poirot-Five Little Pigs. Film credits include: Brideshead Revisited and Workhorse.

Moira Buffini’s plays include Wonder.land, a musical with Damon Albarn, for the Manchester International Festival and National Theatre, Women, Power And Politics for the Tricycle Theatre, Welcome To Thebes and Dinner for the National Theatre, Dying For It (adapted from Nicolai Erdman’s The Suicide) and Marianne Dreams (adapted from Catherine Storr’s book) for the Almeida Theatre, A Vampire Story for NT Connections, Loveplay for the RSC, Silence for Birmingham Rep (Susan Smith Blackburn Prize), Gabriel for Soho Theatre  (LWT Plays On Stage Award and the Meyer Whitworth Award), Blavatsky’s Tower for the Machine Room, and Jordan with Anna Reynolds for the Gate (Writers Guild Award for Best Fringe Play). Her screenplays includeTamara Drewe directed by Stephen Frears, Jane Eyre directed by Cary Fukanaga, and Byzantium directed by Neil Jordan. She recently directed her first short film, Father.

Indhu Rubasingham, Artistic Director of the Tricycle Theatre, directs. For the company, her work includes Multitudes, The House That Will Not Stand, Red Velvet (Tricycle/ St Ann’s Warehouse New York, Evening Standard Award and Critics’ Circle Award), Paper Dolls, Women, Power And Politics, Stones In His Pockets, Detaining Justice, The Great Game: Afghanistan, Fabulation, and Starstruck. Her other theatre work includes The Motherf**ker with the Hat at the National Theatre, Belong, Disconnect, Free Outgoing, Lift Off, Clubland, The Crutch, Sugar Mummies (Royal Court), Ruined (Almeida Theatre),Yellowman, Anna In The Tropics (Hampstead Theatre), The Waiting Room (National Theatre), The Ramayana (National Theatre/ Birmingham Rep), and Secret Rapture, The Misanthrope, Romeo and Juliet (Chichester Festival Theatre). In 2012 Rubasingham was awarded the Arts & Culture Award at the Asian Women of Achievement Awards for ‘astounding achievements in theatre’. She also received the Carlton Multi-Cultural Achievement Award for Performing Arts and in 2010 she jointly received the Liberty Human Rights Arts Award for The Great Game: Afghanistan. She was previously Associate Director of the Gate Theatre, Birmingham Rep and the Young Vic.

Designs are by Richard Kent, with lighting design by Oliver Fenwick, and sound design by Carolyn Downing. The production is presented by Eleanor Lloyd Productions, Tricycle London Productions and the Touring Partnership.

Handbagged appears at Newcastle Theatre Royal from Mon 26 – Sat 31 Oct 2015. Tickets from £12 (pay 50p less per ticket when you book online). Tickets can be purchased from the Theatre Royal Box Office on 08448 11 21 21, (calls cost 7p per minute plus your phone company’s access charge) or select your own seat and book online at www.theatreroyal.co.uk

INTERNATIONAL SMASH HIT
LET IT BE
1000th PERFORMANCE IN THE UNITED KINGDOM

LET IT BE played its 1000th UK performance in the UK last night, August 4th 2015

LET IT BE will play its final performance in the West End on September 5th

Audiences have just 4 more weeks or 38 final performances to catch this record-breaking show

Over 1 million people have seen LET IT BE worldwide

Packed with 11 number ones, 40 smash hits from the back catalogue and over 15 tracks never played live by The Beatles themselves

In the 50 years since Beatlemania ruled the airwaves, The Beatles have scored more number ones than any other UK artist with 31 Top 40 hits and sales of over 22 million singles

LET IT BE played its 1000th UK performance in the West End last night as it entered the final part of its run. The show has just four weeks left to play at the Garrick Theatre and audiences have now just 38 more performances to catch this record-breaking production before it closes on September 5th.

LET IT BE established itself as one of the West End’s most popular shows when the production originally opened at the Prince of Wales Theatre in September 2012, before transferring for a year-long run at the Savoy Theatre from January 2013 – February 2014.  The show then embarked on its inaugural UK & Ireland tour before enjoying a summer season at the Garrick Theatre last year. This final season at the Garrick will end on September 5th.

Seen by over 1,000,000 people worldwide, LET IT BE has delighted audiences across the globe, having recently entertained fans in Germany, Austria, Italy, Russia, Monaco, Tokyo, Singapore and America.

Jamie Hendry (Producer) – “Let It Be has been a joyous and brilliant ride. The success of the show demonstrates the enduring love the UK and the world has for the music of the Beatles. It has been a blast and we are delighted that our association with The Beatles will continue next year with our completely new production Love Is All You Need”

LET IT BE showcases the music of the world’s most successful rock’n’roll band, in a spectacular theatrical concert charting the band’s meteoric rise from their humble beginnings in Liverpool’s Cavern Club, through the height of Beatlemania, to their later studio masterpieces.

The show is packed with over forty of The Beatles’ greatest hits including: I Wanna Hold Your Hand, Hard Day’s Night, Day Tripper, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, Strawberry Fields, When I’m 64, Twist and Shout, Get Back and many more.

LET IT BE is produced by Jamie Hendry Productions, Rubin Fogel and Gavin Kalin Productions

Tickets and more information available from the LET IT BE website – www.LetItBeLive.com

LISTINGS:

LET IT BE – WEST END

Saturday 28th February – Saturday 5th September 2015
Garrick Theatre
Charing Cross Road
London WC2H 0HH
www.LetItBeLive.com

Tickets: £15 – £65

Booking: 0844 412 4662 or online at www.LetItBeLive.com

The full cast and creative team has been announced for the world premiere of a brand new stage adaptation of Aldous Huxley’s seminal novel BRAVE NEW WORLD, presented by Touring Consortium Theatre Company and Royal & Derngate Northampton which comes to Darlington Civic Theatre from Tuesday 10 to Saturday 14 November.

Brave New World, widely considered to be one of the finest and most prophetic dystopian novels of the twentieth century, bursts into life on stage in an adaptation by award-winning playwright Dawn King, directed by James Dacre and designed by Naomi Dawson, with original new music by the ground breaking British band These New Puritans.

Sophie Ward, whose extensive screen credits include TV series Land Girls, Heartbeat and Holby City, and films including Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights and Young Sherlock, will play ‘Margaret Mond’, the Regional World Controller for Western Europe (a character that was the male ‘Mustapha Mond’ in the original novel),. Her theatre work includes One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Go Back For Murder and Private Lives. Olivier Award-winning Abigail McKern, last seen in Northampton in A Tale of Two Cities and fresh from Shakespeare in Love in the West End, takes the role of ‘Linda’. The ensemble cast also includes Olivia Morgan (Macbeth, West End, The Taming of the Shrew, Shakespeare’s Globe), William Postlethwaite (King Lear, Bath Theatre Royal, Collaborators, National Theatre) as John the Savage, Scott Karim (The Merchant of Venice, Shakespeare’s Globe, Great Britain, National Theatre) as Helmholtz Watson, and Gruffudd Glyn (Three Sisters, Young Vic, Hamlet, RSC) as Bernard. The cast also includes Theo Ogundipe as Benito, Samantha Pearl as Polly, James Howard as the Director and David Burnett as Henry.

The play is directed by Royal & Derngate’s Artistic Director James Dacre (The Body of an American, King John, Arthur Miller’s The Hook) with original music by These New Puritans, whose last album was described by Record Collector as “arguably the musical achievement of the 2010s so far.” It has been adapted for the stage by Dawn King, whose credits include the plays Ciphers and Foxfinder, and the BAFTA-nominated short film The Karman Line. The production is designed by Naomi Dawson, whose recent credits include The Roaring Girl, King John and As You Like It for the RSC, with Frantic Assembly’s Eddie Kay (The Pass, Royal Court, Othello, Frantic Assembly) as movement director. Lighting design is by Colin Grenfell (Black Watch, National Theatre of Scotland, The Mother, Theatre Royal Bath) with sound design by George Dennis (Regeneration, Royal & Derngate/Touring Consortium Theatre Company, Liberian Girl, Royal Court). Video designer Keith Skretch also joins the creative team, with fight direction by RC Annie.

Brave New World is at Darlington Civic Theatre from Tuesday 10 to Saturday 14 November.

Tickets* are priced from £17.40 *All ticket prices include a £1 restoration levy.

To book contact the Box Office on 01325 486 555 or visit www.darlingtoncivic.co.uk

Against Captain’s Orders: A Journey into the Uncharted
Developed by Punchdrunk Enrichment
in association with the National Maritime Museum

LAST CHANCE TO SEE PUNCHDRUNK ENRICHMENT AND THE NATIONAL MARITIME MUSEUM’S AGAINST CAPTAIN’S ORDERS: A JOURNEY INTO THE UNCHARTED

THE SHOW MUST CLOSE ON 31 AUGUST 2015

SPECIAL SUMMER PRICES ANNOUNCED

Don’t miss your chance to embark on an adventure on the high seas of maritime history with Punchdrunk Enrichment and the National Maritime Museum, in Against Captain’s Orders: A Journey into the Uncharted.To mark the summer season the National Maritime Museum are offering visitors tickets for £15 for the last month of the experience to see it off with a bang.

An exclusive first for the museum industry, the National Maritime Museum and Punchdrunk Enrichment collaboration takes six to twelve year olds and their families on the adventure of a lifetime.

Life jackets are donned as visitors become part of the motley crew of HMS Adventure.  Taking on seafaring roles of Ship’s Watch, Navigation, Midshipmen and Salvage, the teams will be called upon to navigate through this extraordinary exhibition.

With so much history secured in one museum, so many doorways to other times and other worlds, Against Captain’s Orders is exciting, enlightening, and perhaps just a tiny bit dangerous.

Against Captain’s Orders is supported using public funding by Arts Council England.

Against Captain’s Orders: A Journey into the Uncharted
Venue: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich
Dates: until 31 August 2015
Show times: From 10.00 daily
Visitor Enquiries: 020 8858 4422 / www.rmg.co.uk/againstcaptainsorders
Admission:  £15.00

New trailer can be viewed here.

A tribute to the legend BETTE MIDLER

SUE KELVIN stars in a show covering the life and songs of the divine Miss M from the perspective of a life-long fan.

The show features over a dozen songs including:

BOOGIE WOOGIE BUGLE BOY 

I’M A WOMAN

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society and Edinburgh Airport are set to open the Fringe Ticket Collection Point at Domestic Arrivals, Edinburgh Airport following its success last year.

On Wednesday 05 August 2015 at 09.30am Chief Executive of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society, Kath M Mainland and Gordon Robertson, Director of Communications at Edinburgh Airport and Chair of Marketing Edinburgh officially opened the 2015 Fringe Ticket Collection Point, ahead of the 2015 Edinburgh Festival Fringe starting on Friday 07 August.

The Edinburgh Airport ticket collection point opened for the first time in 2014. During the 2014 Fringe over 14,000 tickets were picked up. Chief Executive of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society, Kath M Mainlandsaid:

“We’re absolutely delighted to be working with Edinburgh Airport once again to offer domestic and international customers the chance to collect their Fringe tickets as soon as they arrive in Edinburgh, our wonderful festival city. We were thrilled that last year over 14,000 tickets were picked up at the airport collection point, and we’re delighted to be offering visitors this service again in 2015.” 

Gordon Roberston Director of Communications at Edinburgh Airport and Chair of Marketing Edinburgh added:

“It’s incredibly exciting to see artists and audiences begin to arrive at Edinburgh Airport from all around the world for the 2015 Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Edinburgh truly is the world’s leading festival city and I’ve no doubt that from the moment the customers collect their Fringe tickets from the Edinburgh Airport ticket collection point, right through to when they depart, many unforgettable and special memories will have been created.”

There are over 20 ticket collection points throughout the city open during the Fringe. For a list and for more information please visit edfringe.com