LEAP – Liverpool’s only annual festival of contemporary dance – shines a light on the city’s ‘invisible art form’ as part of its 25th anniversary celebrations this year.
JULIE ATHERTON – Ormskirk
It was another musical theatre coup at Edge Hill this week, as Preston-born West End star Julie Atherton took to the Arts Centre stage, for a fun and enjoyable one-night event.
RAMIN KARIMLOO & the Broadgrass Band – Touring
Karimloo, a Phantom and Les Mis heavyweight, happily shrugged off the ostentation of the musical theatre world to present his stripped-down take on the songs he loves, re-arranging them with an acoustic, countrified, bluegrass tinge.
THE STAR – Liverpool
Michael Wynne’s The Star is a celebratory theatrical knees-up, drawing on the old-style variety show format with a behind-the-scenes drama and broad social commentary that makes for a fun, lively mix.
Year in Review: Vicky Anderson’s top 5 Liverpool shows of 2016
Two fantastic things to happen this year included making it on to Radio 4’s Front Row programme to review the Everyman’s The Massive Tragedy of Madame Bovary! (which was so deliciously complex I nearly made this a top six); the other was becoming part of the fantastic My Theatre Mates, the online network set up by leading theatre critics Terri Paddock and Mark Shenton.
NEWS: Liverpool Everyman’s new rep company revealed
It’s the big reveal Liverpool theatreland has been waiting for this morning, as the Everyman announced the actors who will form its new, rejuvenated rep company concept in the new year.
LIVERPOOL: Poet Lemn Sissay joins 20 Stories High as patron
Liverpool-based young people’s theatre company 20 Stories High announced their first patron this week – the poet, author and theatre maker Lemn Sissay. The company say they have been talking for a few years about their work and shared connections; political, artistic and social.
LITTLE RED & THE BIG BAD WOLF – Liverpool
Away from the glitz and the camp and the general hyperactivity of panto, the Unity offers an alternative, gentle style of festive storytelling that has really carved its own niche. In recent years, that could be down to the sensibilities and stylings of Ellesmere Port-based Action Transport Theatre, the team behind Little Red and the Big Bad Wolf,
The post REVIEW: Little Red and the Big Bad Wolf, Unity Theatre appeared first on MADE UP.
Scouse: A Comedy of Terrors… – Liverpool
“The people of Liverpool, and the Liverpool People’s Party, invite the Prime Minister to mind his own business. Here in Liverpool, we’re nearer to space than we are to London. London is 200 miles away; space is only 100 miles away. People here pay as much heed to the Prime Minister as we do to the man in the moon.”
The post Scouse: A Comedy of Terrors… appeared first on MADE UP.
LIVERPOOL: Dance lecturer takes on TV talent shows in Strictly Sickly
Ever wondered what really happens behind the sequins and smiles on TV dance spectaculars? Strictly Sickly, which comes to Liverpool’s Capstone Theatre this week, brings to life the rumbas and the rivalries of a TV dance contest – and, just like in real life, the audience has the power to decide.
THE RUBY SLIPPERS – Liverpool
Owing as much to RuPaul’s Drag Race as it does to Coronation Street, The Ruby Slippers is a new show about love, identity and following your dreams, with a true northern warmth and a big gay heart.
AT THE END OF EVERYTHING ELSE – Touring
At the End of Everything Else is the company’s second show, a follow on from its debut Something Very Far Away. It’s ‘carbon friendly’, which means most of the electricity required is produced by on-stage pedal power.
INTERVIEW: Divina de Campo & LGBT play The Ruby Slippers
“The play explores issues of identity and prejudice in the LGBT community – with outrageous drag queens, of course,” explains one of The Ruby Slippers’ writers and stars, Emma Culshaw.
INTERVIEW: Natalie Casey touring with Frantic Assembly
Natalie Casey made her name on TV shows including teen soap Hollyoaks and sitcom Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps, but on stage is where you’re more likely to find her these days. No stranger to the Playhouse, she returns this week as part of the formidable ensemble cast of Things I […]
The post INTERVIEW: Natalie Casey appeared first on MADE UP.
Homotopia Festival: Hamburger Queen rises again in Liverpool
From rags to riches, from Liverpool to London, from Nabzys to Nandos… The Rise and Fall of The Hamburger Queen is a one-woman comedy show on at The Unity Theatre as part of Homotopia Festival this week (3 to 5 November 2016).
INTERVIEW: Josette Bushell-Mingo on Nina Simone
Actress, singer and theatre maker Josette Bushell-Mingo has reached another high point with the success of her latest work, the excellent Nina – A Story About Me and Nina Simone, which ends its sold-out premiere run in Liverpool this week.
NINA: A STORY ABOUT ME & NINA SIMONE – Liverpool
Nina – A Story About Me and Nina Simone, running at Liverpool’s Unity Theatre until 29 October 2016, is without doubt a tale that needs to be told and deserves to be heard. Performer Josette Bushell-Mingo OBE is one of the patrons of the Unity, having been based in Liverpool in her early 20s.
HAPPY HOUR – Liverpool
Happy Hour is the seventh show from Liverpool-based physical theatre company Tmesis, and continues in the vein of 2015’s That’s Amore – four performers on a wry, sideways rollercoaster ride through modern life, brimming with as much fun as poignancy.
There’s Three Sides to What We Did Next in Liverpool…
Liverpool theatre group What We Did Next return next week with the North West premiere of the off-Broadway musical Three Sides. Written by Grant Olding – the composer of smash hit One Man, Two Guvnors – it is described as “a rom com for the modern age”.
SPINE – Touring
In an era of political disillusionment and generational divides, has politics forgotten the people it represents? And, what price do we put on knowledge?