These Theatre Thoughts

  On Saturday 9 th December Orchard West in Dartford opened its doors to the public for the very first time. Dartford Borough Council (DBC) and Trafalgar Theatres constructed a state-of-the-art temporary theatre venue in Dartford following concerns over RAAC concrete in The Orchard Theatre’s roof, which forced the venue to close in September. Construction began on 30 th October and took just 6 weeks to complete, saving pantomime for Dartford theatregoers. Orchard West is a fully-functional, temporary, enclosed performance space with 1,000 seats – complete with comfortable seating, heating and cooling systems, access provision and full backstage and front-of-house facilities including indoor toilets and bars. On the night, audience members were quoted saying, “I can’t believe they built this in just six weeks, it’s stunning” “The bathrooms are very nice, not what I expected.” “…you would never have known you were in a temporary structure once inside the main house.” “We were all a bit

Date: 9th December 2023  Seat: L3 (Stalls) Tickets: Gifted Rating: 5 Stars  You can’t get much more classic than Sleeping Beauty when it comes to the annual panto, and at The Hawth in Crawley this year, it’s this story that takes centre stage – but don’t worry if you think you’ve seen it all before; there are some fantastic surprises in store, including some rather impressive prehistoric pets, fire performers, and plenty of musical theatre references throughout.  Why musical theatre? Because two of the panto’s stars are West End performers with some notable credits to their names – that’s Carrie Hope Fletcher (who plays Carrie-Bosse) from such shows as Les Miserables and Heathers , and Scott Paige (The Good Spirit Moonbeam), who’s starred in The Great British Bake Off Musical and The Addams Family . Add to that some wholesomeness from Andy Day, a CBeebies presenter every child (and parent) in the audience is sure to know, and you’ve got the ingredients for a fantastic show.  Fletcher

  Photo credit: Manuel Harlan Date: 5th December 2023  Seat: A6 (Circle) Tickets: Gifted Rating 5 Stars  You think you know H G Wells’ classic The Time Machine ? You might well do, actually, but the characters in Original Theatre’s side-splitting production, aptly named The Time Machine – A Comedy , might not know it quite as well, and their attempt to turn the novel into a play doesn’t exactly go according to plan. The premise of The Time Machine (this version, at least) is that Dave Wells (Dave Hearn), the great great grandson of H G Wells himself, finds a box of his famous relative’s belongings, including the original draft of The Time Machine and decides that he and his theatre company should make that their next production, abandoning (almost – it does make a rather impressive reappearance) their production of The Importance of Being Earnest in the meantime. Things do not go well. That’s partly due to Dave being unable to write a play if his life depended on it, but also because

  THEATRE503 ANNOUNCES EXTRA PERFORMANCES FOR A WOMAN WALKS INTO A BANK   Photo credit: David Monteith-Hodge  Due to unprecedented demand, Theatre503 is extending the run of A Woman Walks Into a Bank by an extra week until Friday 15 December, a first in Theatre503 history.   A Woman Walks Into a Bank is written and directed by Roxy Cook . Winner of the 2023 Theatre503 International Playwriting Award , it premiered to acclaim on Tuesday 28 November with praise for the play, production and performance including:  "Absorbing, original and sophisticated"  The Guardian " Cook is a talented, evocative writer... with a refreshingly unfettered imagination and a terrific sideline in jet-black humour " WhatsOnStage " A blazing production, rammed with pathos, humour and a fabulously comedic cat " Broadway World " Surreal, trippy, and wonderfully human " Theatre Weekly Offies Award nominations for Performance Ensemble + Most Promising Ne

Photo credit: Alex Brenner Date: 30th November 2023  Seat: G16 Tickets: Gifted Rating: 3 Stars  Sherlock Holmes is a wonderful character, and Dickens’ A Christmas Carol is a fantastic story, so combining these two things should work. And it almost does in A Sherlock Carol . But not quite well enough to be completely satisfying, and the weak points that slow everything down and get rather convoluted and confused are a shame when there’s so much promise in the idea.  That’s not to say that A Sherlock Carol , written and directed by Mark Shanahan, is a bad play – it’s absolutely not. For a couple of hours, you’ll be transported to Victorian London, and you’ll follow Sherlock around as he takes on the role of Scrooge – meeting ghosts and solving crimes, all the while slowly but surely thawing out and turning from a mean spirited, somewhat broken man into a joy-filled one who finally understands what Christmas and friendship is all about. It’s pleasant and fun in parts, but it never quite r

  Photo credit: Alex Brenner Date: 1st December 2023  Seat: E7 Tickets: Gifted Rating: 4 Stars  I love many things about Christmas, but there’s one thing that stands out – predictability. It’s the same thing (with perhaps just a few small tweaks) every year, from the same food, the same rush (and panic) to buy gifts, the same twinkling lights, and the same old pantos with the same old stories being told.  And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that.  Only sometimes, it seems, it’s fun to escape that predictability and try something new, which is why, when offered the chance to see a different kind of pantomime telling a different kind of story, I decided it was time to step out of my comfort zone and give it a go. I’m so glad I did.  This different panto was Odyssey: A Heroic Pantomime by Charles Court Opera and currently playing at Jermyn Street Theatre. As the name suggests, this is not your usual Peter Pan or Snow White – this is the Odyssey (ish) in panto form, and although tha