Next February. A Few Man Fridays, at the Riverside.

A homeless nation. An ongoing story

The Chagos Islands

A Few Man Fridays, written and directed by Adrian Jackson, is at the Riverside Studios, Hammersmith, from 10 Feb 2012 – 10 Mar 2012.

Designed by Fred Meller, music and soundtrack by David Baird, produced by Cardboard Citizens. The production presents the story of an entire nation made homeless, starting in an age of Cold War secrets and ending in the era of global warming.

A Few Man Fridays unearths an inglorious episode of British history. Between 1967 and 1973, the population of the Chagos Islands was evicted to make way for a US military base. For forty years they have fought for justice in an epic struggle that is unlikely to end even when the European Court of Justice delivers a ruling later this year.

This is the second of Cardboard Citizens’ history plays exploring the fantasies of the powerful, set against the dreams of the powerless. A Few Man Fridays traces the displacement of these ‘unpeople’ and the successive denial of their right to nationhood.

Cardboard Citizens has worked with homeless people and the marginalised for 20 years, marrying personal stories and historical subjects into an epic theatre that challenges public perceptions of social exclusion.

http://cardboardcitizens.org.uk

Another Earth: Film Review

First year college student Rhoda Williams (Brit Marling) causes accidental devastation to the family of composer John Burroughs (William Mapother), Maya Burroughs (Meggan Lennon), and their son (AJ Diana). It’s a moment’s distraction – with lifetime consequences for them all – caused by the appearance of a new planet parked alongside Earth.

Earth 2 looks exactly the same as Earth 1. Most likely, as a character points out, so far as Earth 2 is concerned, it’s probably Earth 1.

Which of the two seemingly identical planets is the original – if either? And if Earth 2 looks the same, are there people on it? The same people? Every one of us? Another Earth is about looking at ourselves from the outside – suppose that we could suddenly see ourselves as others see us? And how can someone make up for something done wrong that shatters other people’s lives?

Full review at http://www.fringereport.com/1109filmanotherearth.php

This Thursday (1 Dec) – Keats, Kean and the Tragedy of Jane Porter’s Switzerland

John Keats

Keats’ house in Hampstead (which is managed by the City of London Corporation) is the venue for many types of events and exhibitions. This Thursday, 1 December, at 7pm there’s a lecture titled: Keats, Kean and the Tragedy of Jane Porter’s Switzerland.

Jane Porter, though her name is hardly known these days, was one of the most popular novelists of the nineteenth century. She shared with Keats a dangerous fascination with the most significant actor of their era, Edmund Kean.

Tickets are £6.00. Keats’ House, the house where he lived from 1818 to 1820 and wrote his Ode to a Nightingale, is just outside Hampstead overground station.

More at: www.keatshouse.cityoflondon.gov.uk/

Othello and Twelfth Night at the Lion and Unicorn

Othello and Twelfth Night will be in rep at the Lion and Unicorn Theatre, Kentish Town from 06 Dec – 18 Dec 2011, presented by New London Company, supported by Giant Olive Theatre Company’s New Talent Academy.

Established in early 2011the NLC is a theatre troupe based in and working all over the capital. Having started in Cambridge by undergraduates the company has recently moved to London to present its first full season of Othello, the Moor of Venice and Twelfth Night; the theme is hysteria and in both plays (they say) it ploughs its way through like a steam train with the machiavellians in both Olivia and Othello’s houses working their mischief for comedy and tragedy.

The company is, and has always been, about staging great works, whether they be classical, musical, modern or indeed brand new. Its hope is that the works not only shine through interpretations but that the actors and production team may also demonstrate great talent and quality of theatre.

For those who need reminding about the plots…

Othello is an army general and Desdemona his young wife. Having fallen in love and eloped, the happy couple relocate to Cyprus where they intend to live out the rest of their days. However, as the moor’s ensign Iago begins to corrupt Othello’s mind with evil nothings, hysteria overwhelms the court with deadly consequences.

In Twelfth Night, Duke Orsino prepares his stately home for a party at which he intends to woo the Countess Olivia. As fate would have it, a large storm that night erupts and traps them all in the house. Among those house-bound, are a set of identical twins who have been separated and shipwrecked on opposite sides of the Island. Deception and disguises, imprisonment and impersonations, proclamations of love are awash in this stormy black comedy about the peculiar and hysterical goings on in the once quiet town of Illyria.

More at www.giantolive.com

A Little Night Music at the Bridewell, opens tonight (23 Nov)

Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler, 23 November-3 December 2011

From the team who produced Sedos’s Sweeney Todd and Kiss of the Spider Woman: the Musical comes this production of Stephen Sondheim’s beautiful musical about love, memory and midsummer magic, that runs only till 3 December.

In turn of the century Sweden, lawyer Fredrik Egerman is married to 18-year-old Anne, who, although they have been married almost a year, is still a virgin. As a treat for her, he buys tickets to see the actress Desirée Armfeldt (an old flame) in a play. Later that night, in Desirée’s digs, the romance is rekindled.

But Desirée has been having an affair with a jealous, military man, Count Carl-Magnus Malcolm, husband to the long-suffering Charlotte. And Fredrik’s son, Henrik, is in love with his stepmother Anne. What happens when they all converge at the grand estate of Desirée’s mother, Madame Armfeldt, for a weekend in the country?

Humorous and heart breaking, A Little Night Music is a glorious waltz through the tangled web of romance as everybody searches for their perfect match.

www.sedos.co.uk

RIP Shelagh Delaney. Working class woman

Shelagh Delaney

Says it all here.

Just click on the link.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/stage/2011/nov/21/shelagh-delaney-working-class-women

‘ReMix’ by If You Dare Productions, 30 November

Remix is a collaboration between some of London’s new writers, musicians and DJ’s. Challenged to create a performance that fuses theatre and live music, Remix is a live, unique experiment to explore the heart of inspiration and the creative process. This is part of Branching Out at the Rosemary Branch theatre (www.rosemarybranch.co.uk).

Produced by Hannah Rodger.

Rattigan’s While the Sun Shines at the Pentameters

Terence Rattigan

Hampstead’s Pentameters Theatre is celebrating the centenary of Terence Rattigan’s birth with a production of While the Sun Shines, which runs from 29th November – 18th December.

This is one of Rattigan’s early light comedies, set in London in the early 1940’s. Cast includes Naomi Day, Gabrielle Gadsby, Matthew Jordan and Michael Loughnan.

The Pentameters is above the Horseshoe Pub in Heath Street, Hampstead. Tickets are £12.00 (£10 concessions).

More at www.pentameters.co.uk

Linck. New play by Danny West, at the Central School

“Note the deviousness of the woman, that feminine trait…The Linck woman is a serpent”

Who was Catherina Linck? | Who was Anastasius Rosentengel?

Based on the true story of the only woman ever to be executed for sodomy; Linck explores sex, sexuality, gender and government in a new piece by Danny West.

Featuring an all female cast: Fanni Compton | Hellen Kirby | Adele Keating

To reserve your FREE tickets & for info contact: daniel.west@cssd.ac.uk

7:15pm | 23rd – 25th November
1hr 15mins approx. running time

Performance Space One
Central School of Speech & Drama
Eton Avenue, NW3 3HY

Judgement Day at the Print Room, by Mike Poulton

New version of Ibsen’s “When We Dead Awaken” runs 16 November to 17 December 2011

Henrik Ibsen

When We Dead Awaken is the last play Ibsen wrote before his death in 1906.  Rarely performed, and yet a haunting piece, the play is a celebration of life and love.

Written and first performed in 1899, When We Dead Awaken is set within a mythical Nordic landscape. In this version, Judgement Day offers an explicit self-portrait of Ibsen as an aging artist: restless with his art, his homeland and his married life.

The central character, the sculptor Rubek, exhibits all the extraordinary passion and drive that was an essential part of Ibsen’s own creative character.  Whilst holidaying with his young wife, Rubek encounters his muse: a woman that he loved and left a lifetime ago. What follows is a heartfelt examination of how Rubek has used these two. Over a series of heated encounters, the entire scroll of Rubek’s life is unrolled in Ibsen’s final – and most autobiographical – exploration of what it means to love and to be loved.

Mike Poulton is one of Britain’s foremost translators and adaptors of classic plays.  Most recently, he won praise for his adaptation of Schiller’s Luise Miller at the Donmar Warehouse.

More information at: www.the-print-room.org For tickets, call 08444 77 1000 / 020 7221 6036

The Print Room is at 34 Hereford Road, London, W2 5AJ