Our Reviews and Awards
November 2023REMEMBER REMEMBER
Number 9.... Reviewing the Arts UK Wide 9th November 2023
What is the recipe for a good thriller / whodunnit? That is the million dollar question, and if the recipe is right, the play is an instant hit. In this play, 'Remember, Remember' `{` an updating of the author's own play 'Penny For The Guy'`}` there are as many plot twists as you have had hot meals, and this keeps us very much ...........
Read MoreAct UK 9th November 2023
This is billed as a World Premiere
performance of David Soames’s play. It
is a new updated version of ‘Penny for
the Guy’ which has only been on stage
once before for a run of 2 weeks 30
years ago.
It was interesting to read the
background history of this play and how
it was brought to Knutsford, thanks to
the tenacity of the director Sean Duvall........
January 2023Beauty and the Beast
Act UK January 2023
Pantoland is reviving former titles such as “Little Red Riding Hood” and “Beauty and the Beast”, and why not? All the traditional formatting can be applied to most fairy tales. Let us not forget the evil character always enters stage left (known as the dark side). The creative team delivered a fun-filled pantomime with upbeat songs and choreography. There was a very workable set with two clever.......
Read MoreNovember 2022Lady Killers
Act UK November 2022
Almost everyone knows the film, if you don’t
shame on you, it is a classic of British cinemas,
and is much loved and a firm favourite of
mine. Action is set in the post war world in
Mrs Wilberforce’s bomb damaged house next
to King Cross station.
The set was a cross-section of two floors of
the house; creating many challenges for the
designer: the effect created as the passing trains rattle pictures, the set
dressings, and the demise of each of the villains via the window. All
worked well until the need to use the window......
September 2022Educating Rita
Act UK September 2022
The audience was presented with a box set, with
a door up stage right and window up stage left:
Set dressings of hung pictures, bookcases, books:
the furniture consisting of chairs, a filing cabinet
and desk. This is the world of the old soak of an
“Eng Lit” tutor Frank. It was maybe just a little
too tidy as it didn’t reflect the heavy drinking
and boredom of life of its inhabitant. Costumes
have to make such a strong statement......
February 2022Hobsons Choice
Act UK February 2022
Harold Brighouse’s 1916 comedy, Hobson’s
Choice, is “as well made as a pair of Hobson’s
stout boots”. It is a portrait of a middle-class,
prosperous Salford boot maker with Victorian
values. Set in 1880 there are changes ahead for
Hobson brought about by the “upishness” of his
three daughters. Brighouse was a modernist of his
time: this play, with its social subtext, is proof of that.
The scenery locates the action from the Hobson’s shop to Maggie and
Willie’s cellar cum shop, and the parlour of Hobson’s shop.....