Mike Peters: Playing a “one-man band electro-acoustic setlist ” at The Crescent, York, on June 8
MIKE Peters took his guitar into hospital to write The Alarm’s new album, Forwards, out on June 16.
After a year of heightened health challenges, the 64-year-old Welshman is on tour, performing a one-man band electro-acoustic setlist of songs from all four decades of The Alarm discography at The Crescent, York, on Thursday.
“The album title came to me when I was in hospital, at the North Wales Cancer Treatment Centre [at Glan Clwyd Hospital, Rhyl], and things weren’t looking good,” he says.
“I was in a ward where someone had flown in from America to visit their father for the last time, and they said, ‘oh my God, it’s Mike Peters from The Alarm’. I realised I would need to write a letter to The Alarm fans and I signed off the note, ‘Forwards, Mike Peters’. That’s when I thought, ‘that would make a great album title’.”
Mike was suffering from both pneumonia and a leukaemia relapse. “I’ve been living with leukaemia since 1995. I’ve probably had more [leukaemia treatment] than any person alive and I’m still here to tell the story,” he says.
“But all the drugs that had kept me alive were now working against me, which was why I was in such a dire position. It would take three weeks to get used to the new drug, and luckily I made it through to be able to take the full dose. That’s what’s keeping me alive today.
“I asked if I could bring my guitar in, when I was lying on my side for eight days while five litres of blood were drained out of me, through the back. I was walking the corridors when I could to keep functions going – and playing the guitar to do that too.”
His fellow patients encouraged him to “keep going” with his guitar playing. “They were enjoying it, and I found myself coming up with new chords. By the time I came out of hospital, I had all these new songs and did the demos really fast in the caravan by my house, when my voice was working well before I lost it again,” says Mike.
“My manager said, ‘you’ve got to record this’ – and I was down to a whisper at the time – so I thought it might the only vocals we could use but could rebuild the music sonically around them, but later switch back to the caravan to record the vocals again.”
Mike was last on the road with The Alarm in 2019, playing a 38-date American tour and subsequently did a spoken-word show called Stream, piecing the story together from the albums Eye Of The Hurricane [1987] and Change [1989]: a story of leaving your environment, going downstream and then realising you can’t really leave your roots behind.
“So I did the show, one performance with a proper immersive theatre experience working with the Brecon Theatre company in South Wales, which was amazing, and I was about to stage it at the Edinburgh Fringe when the pandemic came.
“We hope to revisit that show with an open invite to bring it to the Fringe, but for now I have this solo tour in May and June, doing ten dates, just to get the voice into action again, then two dates in America.”
All this is against a backdrop of Mike having to take a regular “huge dose” of chemotherapy in tablet form. “I also have to go to hospital to have different drugs put in my bloodstream two weeks apart,” he says.
His solo show takes the form of a one-man band. “I play drums with my feet and my guitar is acoustic or electric, which is a lot of noise for one man – and that’s how The Alarm started without a bassist. It’s like a one-man White Stripes: I can play bass, acoustic and electric all in one on my guitar,” he says.
“I like going on without a setlist, just playing what comes into my head and whatever people shout out for, so there are endless possibilities. That’s why people come to the gigs: they want spontaneity. I want that moment of surprise too.
“One night I wrote a whole song on the spot around a setlist I found on the floor from the gig there the night before and that song’s never been repeated – I didn’t even know who the band was!”
Being in a band allows you to run away from life, says Mike. “Now music is my form of escape to forget about cancer and live in the moment, so it’s been a great release for me.”
At one point he was set to have a bone marrow transplant. “I said, ‘that’s great, but I’ve got a tour to play. Let me do that and come back in a really positive state of mind’, but when I came back my blood cell count had gone in the wrong direction,” he says.
“At first, I was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma but then I was re-diagnosed with chronic lymph Leukaemia. The disease I’ve got does ebb and flow in its intensity and it came back with a vengeance in its intensity last year, but hopefully it will stay stable for a few years.
“The music keeps me alive and gives me a reason to look forwards. Just because you’ve heard the word ‘cancer’ doesn’t mean you stop going for a run, going to work, but no-one prepares for it, thinking ‘I’ll read a book about it’.
“You only read about it when the doctor says ‘you’ve got cancer’, which could send you plummeting, but it doesn’t have to be that way. You have to stay at the highest point you can.”
Mike’s wife, Jules, has been through breast cancer, charting both her and Mike’s cancer journeys in a documentary for the BBC, and now she mentors cancer patients.
“We run our own charity, the Love Hope Strength Foundation, which takes people to Everest, helping to build a cancer treatment centre, speaking at the World Cancer Congress,” he says. “Every year we climb Snowdon, taking other survivors with us, showing that with a good attitude, you can ‘buy yourself’ days, months, years, through a positive attitude.
“Exiting from life can be just as beautiful as the entrance point, and we have to accept that sometimes we’re going to have to go through that, and maybe cancer will save you from other horrors. You have to respect cancer, as it comes from the same life as all the positive things.
“In my case, I try to be in control, and I know that some people don’t have that disposition, but if you can find some inner strength, you will be better for it.”
Mike Peters presents The Alarm (Acoustic), The Crescent, York, Thursday, 7.30pm. Box office: thecrescentyork.com.
The Way Old Friends Do writer and lead actor Ian Hallard and director Mark Gatiss. All pictures: Darren Bell
IN 1988, two school friends tentatively come out to one another: one as gay, the other – more shockingly – as an Abba fan. Nearly 30 years later, a chance meeting sets them on a new path, one where they decide to form the world’s first Abba tribute band – in drag.
So begins The Way Old Friends Do, Ian Hallard’s new comedy about devotion, desire and dancing queens, directed by his marital partner, Dr Who and Sherlock writer and producer and The League Of Gentlemen member Mark Gatiss, on tour at York Theatre Royal from June 6 to 10 in the itinerary’s closing week.
“I thought, if I’m going to write a play, there should be a bit of wish fulfilment with no-one to stop me,” says Ian.
Cue a play with an Abba drag act and questions of whether a revived friendship can survive the tribulations of a life on the road that embraces platform boots, fake beards and a distractingly attractive stranger.
Hallard himself will be joined in Gatiss’s cast by Donna Berlin,James Bradshaw, Sara Crowe, Rose Shalloo and Andrew Horton (understudied by Toby Holloway on June 6 and 7). The play also features the voice of Miriam Margolyes.
Here Gatiss and Hallard discuss The Way Old Friends Do, friendship, comedy and being Abba fans.
What appealed to you about this project, Mark?
“I knew Ian was up to something. I was away on holiday on the Isle of Wight with the rest of his family, and he was in a show in London and so couldn’t come. He told me, ‘I’ve been writing something’, and when I read it, I thought it was great.
“It was fully formed. It was very touching, very funny, very true. A delight really. Write what you know, as they say – it felt very authentic.”
[Editor’s note: The script was so “fully formed” that four years after that first draft, the finished version is “virtually unchanged”.]
After your online play Adventurous, produced by Jermyn Street Theatre, was premiered in March 2021, this is your first full-scale stage play, Ian. Discuss…
“I’d always thought it seemed to require a colossal amount of confidence, if not arrogance, to say, ‘there hasn’t been a play that’s sufficiently tackled this one particular topic, and I am uniquely placed to be the person to write this play’.
“Then I just got over myself, and once I’d decided to try and write something, it was motivated by what I myself wanted to be in. I thought, ‘well, if it’s the first thing I write, I’m going to write a part for myself. What would I be most excited about if my agent rang tomorrow with a script for me to read?
“It would be an offer to play Agnetha from Abba’. Then I just had to reverse engineer things and construct a storyline in which that could happen.”
What was the inspiration behind The Way Old Friends Do, Ian?
“It’s very easy to pitch in one line: two old school friends form the world’s first drag Abba tribute band. It does exactly what it says on the tin. When I told my friends, they got excited because, at first, they thought I was actually setting up a drag Abba tribute band.
“Then, once I’d had the idea, I did extensive Googling to see if such a thing already existed, and as far as I’m aware, it doesn’t. Who knows? It might give somebody else the idea now.”
Will The Way Old Friends Do provide much-needed escapism, Mark?
“Absolutely. It’s just the sort of play that people need right now. It’s extremely celebratory, it’s about friendship, about love, about fun. It’s also about life and about time and how it changes us. But principally, it’s just a really entertaining show.”
“I thought, if I’m going to write a play, there should be a bit of wish fulfilment with no-one to stop me,” says Ian Hallard
Is the play autobiographical, Ian?
“The background setting is autobiographical. It’s about a gay, middle-aged man from Birmingham who is a massive Abba fan. So that much is very much based on real life. But the actual events of the play are entirely fictitious.
“I was a teenager in the 1980s, a time of homophobia in the media; the rise of AIDS with that image of the tombstone in the advert, and Section 28 too. That’s all there in the background in this play and makes the lead characters what they are now.”
What can you reveal about Peter, your character in the play, Ian?
“He’s lived in Birmingham all his life. He’s 39; a big Abba fan, obviously. He got into them through his mum, who died when he was only a child. So, he was brought up by his grandmother, which mirrors the real life of Frida from Abba.
“Then a chance meeting via a gay dating app means he ends up running into the kid he was great friends with at school whom he’d lost touch with, and that sets the whole crazy series of events in motion.”
What about the rest of the characters, Ian?
“Well, they’re a pretty diverse bunch. There’s Peter’s old schoolfriend, Edward, who is played by James Bradshaw, best known for his role as Max DeBryn in Endeavour. Edward’s camp and waspish, but deeply insecure underneath it all.
“Jodie – as played by Rose Shalloo – is a young actress who you could say has more enthusiasm than talent. Then there’s the gorgeous Australian photographer Christian, played by Andrew Horton – who’s just finished playing a superhero in Netflix’s Jupiter’s Legacy.”
Who else, Mark?
“The wonderful, Olivier-winning Sara Crowe is the eccentric Mrs Campbell, who among other quirks, has a deep-seated suspicion of Michael Palin. And finally, there’s their long-suffering, no-nonsense stage manager, Sally, played by Donna Berlin, who has to try and corral them all into some kind of order.”
What’s the result, Ian?
“A lot of the comedy in the show comes from flinging these six characters together and observing how they interact.
“As well as me and Mark, the producers had input into the casting and happily all our first choices said yes.”
How did Sara Crowe become involved in the production, Ian?
“Sara had done a couple of rehearsed readings with me in the past and is a friend of mine, so I was delighted when she agreed to be in the cast. The comic potential in that set-up – putting Olivier Award-winning Sara Crowe in a wig as the quirky Mrs Campbell – was not lost on me and now there’s a five-minute section that I can’t take any credit for that she improvised in the rehearsal room with Mark saying, ‘have fun with this’.”
Friendship is a major theme in the play. Why, Ian?
“I was interested in exploring friendship, as opposed to a romantic relationship between these two middle-aged, queer men. With The Way Old Friends Do, I had a ready-made title from Abba’s back catalogue, and I knew very early on that the final scene of the play would revolve around that song. So everything leads up to that.”
“Seeing each other for the five-week rehearsal period was a real luxury for us,” says Ian Hallard of working with husband Mark Gatiss
What’s it like working professionally with your husband?
Mark first: “We can compare notes at the end of the evening without having to organise a special notes session.”
Ian: “We’ve done it quite a few times before, but this has a slightly different dynamic because we haven’t worked together as director and writer, and certainly not on stage, so watch this space. But given past experiences, I have no cause for concern.”
Mark: “These things aren’t guaranteed to work, of course. A lot of couples never work together because they’d rather leave it at the door, but so far, so good!”
Ian: “Look at Abba. Romantic relationships kick-started the band, although admittedly it did all go awry subsequently.”
Mark: “Yes, we’d better not follow Abba down that line.”
Ian: “Ah well, if we do, we’ll just end up getting back together in 40 years’ time.”
Talk about your working relationship with Mark, Ian…
“We’ve collaborated on stuff before where I’ve been his sort of unofficial script editor. I’m the first person to read anything he writes.
“I trust him implicitly. We’ve acted on stage together, and everything went very happily in the rehearsal room this time. Seeing each other for the five-week rehearsal period was a real luxury for us.
“The very first draft of this play had a flashback to seeing the men as 15-year-old schoolboys and that was one of Mark’s biggest notes for script changes. He said, ‘that can be left as a back story’. We’ll leave adults playing schoolboys to Blood Brothers!”
Just checking, The Way Old Friends Do isn’t a musical, is it, Ian?
“That’s right, it’s a play rather than a musical. We’re not trying to compete with Mamma Mia! It’s a backstage play, very much in the vein of The Full Monty or Stepping Out: a bunch of plucky amateurs deciding to put on a show. It’s about those characters and their relationships.
“Although Abba is very much the setting, and it’s part of the show, it’s not a play about Abba, it’s a play about being an Abba fan.”
Did you acquire the approval of the Abba estate, Ian?
“Yes. They know about it and they’re happy for it to go ahead. I would have been devastated to be slapped down by my heroes because they didn’t want the play to happen. Happily, we do have their blessing!
“We have the rights to sing one Abba song. We’ll keep that as a bit of a secret but there may be a clue in the title of the play!”
Director Mark Gatiss and writer-actor Ian Hallard with The Way Old Friends Do cast members Donna Berlin, Rose Shalloo, Andrew Horton, Sara Crowe and James Bradshaw
Have both of you always been Abba fans?
Mark first: “Yes. They’ve had different phases of their existence which people can hop on at: Eurovision, the Abba Gold revival, Mamma Mia! and now Voyage! But they’re loved because they’re just so bl**dy good.
“Quality will out. They have just an astonishing range of hits and styles and genres. They’re both gloomy Swedes and insanely infectious disco-mongers.”
Ian: “My mother was pregnant with me when they won Eurovision in 1974. Although that makes it sound as if it was some kind of immaculate conception via the magic of Waterloo. I should add that I wasn’t actually conceived at that precise moment.
“But yes, it’s been a lifetime of devotion for me. I have an old university friend who I’ve known since I was 21. I hadn’t seen her for years, but just after the pandemic she came down to visit.
“We went for dinner and we were chatting about my play. I said, ‘I don’t know if you remember, but I’m a bit of an Abba fan’. And she just looked at me and said, ‘Ian, it’s literally the first thing that comes to my mind when I think about you’!”
So, Ian, why do you like Abba?
“I guess that’s the 64 million dollar question: why do you like a band or a football team? But there are certain things you can talk about objectively. The music has stood the test of time after 50 years, and though the songs are deceptively simple, there are flourishes you don’t notice on a cursory listen, but you would miss them if they weren’t there.
“Their ability to interpret the language of pop is almost second to none, writing in their second language, and they were quite experimental in going from glam rock to pure pop to disco and embracing digital technology in the early 1980s.”
What do you hope next week’s audiences in York will take away from the play?
Ian first: “Just a great night out. If you love Abba, there are plenty of little Easter eggs and moments for you. But if you don’t know anything about them, or don’t even like them – yes, there are such people out there! – it speaks about being a fan. We’re all a fan of something. That level of devotion and ownership is universal.
“But I also think the six characters are fun people that audiences will enjoy spending time with. I hope people will laugh and be touched – and then rebook!”
Mark: “It’s truthful, it’s moving and it’s joyous – that’s what I like to see in a play. Like Abba, it’s bittersweet, but ultimately very, very upbeat, and a joy to be around.”
Have we reached Abba saturation point yet, Ian?
“It was something I was aware of, that question, but I thought, write what you know, and it’s different. It’s a play, not a musical, and it’s not about Abba but about the characters in the play and the journey they’re going on.”
The Way Old Friends Do runs at York Theatre Royal from June 6 to 10, 7.30pm plus 2pm Thursday and 2.30pm Saturday matinees. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Claire Richards: Taking Steps to headline York Pride’s main stage
PRIDE is loud and proud this weekend in a city full of ideas, heated politics and apocalyptic music, as recommended by Charles Hutchinson.
Diverse celebration of the week: York Pride, city-centre parade at 12 noon, followed by festival until after-hours on Knavesmire
NORTH Yorkshire’s largest LGBT+ celebration sets out on a parade march from Duncombe Place, outside York Minster, processing along Bishopthorpe Road to the festival site on Knavesmire.
Hosted by Sordid Secret and Mamma Bear, the Main Stage welcomes Claire Richards, from Steps, Pussycat Doll Kimberly Wyatt, Union J’s Jaymi Hensley and RuPaul’s Drag Race UK finalist Kitty Scott-Claus. Plenty more acts take to the YOI Radio Stage and Family Area and the new Queer Arts Cabaret Tent (1.30pm to 7pm, headlined by York’s pink-attired Beth McCarthy). Full festival details at: yorkpride.org.uk.
In the pink: Beth McCarthy tops the Queer Arts Cabaret Tent bill at York Pride this evening
Festival of the week and beyond: York Festival of Ideas 2023, until June 15
THIS University of York co-ordinated festival invites you to Rediscover, Reimagine, Rebuild in a programme of more than 150 free in-person and online events designed to educate, entertain and inspire.
Meet world-class speakers, experience performances, join entertaining family activities, explore York on guided tours and more! Topics range from archaeology to art, history to health and politics to psychology. Study the festival programme at yorkfestivalofideas.com.
Ocean-loving Kentviolinist and composer Anna Phoebe performs her Sea Soul album with Klara Schumann and Jacob Kingsbury Downsat the National Centre for Early Music, York, tonight at 7pm as part of the York Festival of Ideas. Picture; Rob Blackham
Don’t myth it: The Flanagan Collective in The Gods The Gods The Gods, York Theatre Royal, tonight, 7.30pm; Slung Low at Temple, Water Lane, Holbeck, Leeds, tomorrow, 7.30pm (outdoor performance); Hull Truck Theatre, Stage One, June 29,7.30pm
WRIGHT & Grainger’s myth-making The Gods The Gods The Gods is performed as a 12-track album in an exhilarating weave of big beats, heavy basslines, soaring melodies and heart-stopping spoken word. In the absence of co-creators Alexander Flanagan-Wright and Megan Drury in New York and Australia respectively, Easingwold birthday boy Phil Grainger, 34 today, will be joined by Oliver Towse and Lucinda Turner from the West End original cast of Wright’s The Great Gatsby.
The 65-minute performance links stories of two youngsters who meet when out dancing, destined to fall hard; a woman on a beach, alone at night, looking at the stars, and a bloke on a bridge, thinking about jumping, just before dark, all at the crossroads where mythology meets real life. Box office: York, 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk; Leeds, slunglow.org; Hull, 01482 323638 or hulltruck.co.uk.
Upwards and onwards: Oliver Towse, left, Lucinda Turner and Phil Grainger survey the auditorium ahead of their Harrogate Theatre performance of The God The Gods The Gods. York, Leeds and Hull dates lie ahead
Comedy gig of the week: Patrick Monahan, Classy, Pocklington Arts Centre, tonight, 8pm
IN a world of groups, hierarchies and class systems, everyone tries so hard to fit in. What’s wrong with being a misfit? Be you, be proud!
From the caravan to the middle-class neighbourhood, Irish-Iranian comedian Patrick Monahan, 46, has taken four decades to realise this. Time for the Edinburgh Fringe regular to pass on his observations on living his contemporary life alongside stories of his upbringing. Box office: 01759 301547 or pocklingtonartscentre.co.uk.
Patrick Monahan: Classy performance at Pocklington Arts Centre
Apocalypse now: Late Music presents Late Music Ensemble, Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York, tonight, 7.30pm
YORK Late Music concludes its 2022-23 season on a spectacular – if not entirely optimistic! – note tonight when the Late Music Ensemble, conducted by Nick Williams, opens up the End Of The World Jukebox.
Composers and players re-imagine the pop songs they would like to hear if Armageddon were nigh in arrangements of Imogen Heap’s Hide And Seek, David Bowie’s Warszawa, Cole Porter’s Every Time We Say Goodbye and Bob Dylan’s Cat’s In The Well. The Beatles will be represented by The End from Abbey Road, alongside new works by Christopher Fox and Anthony Adams.
Williams’s nine-strong ensemble promises a broad musical spectrum through the presence of Edwina Smith (flute, piccolo), Jonathan Sage (clarinet, bass clarinet), Iain Harrison and Lucy Havelock (saxophones), Murphy McCaleb (bass trombone), Kate Ledger (piano, toy piano, voice), Tim Brooks (keyboards, piano), Catherine Strachan (cello) and Anna Snow (voice).
Due to unforeseen circumstances, today’s lunchtime concert by Stuart O’Hara has been postponed. It will, however, be rescheduled in the 2023-24 season, whose programme will be announced in the next few months.
While the End of the World cannot be avoided, York Late Music adminstrator Steve Crowther is an optimist who believes that, for now at least, the end is no nigher. A 6.45pm, pre-concert talk by Christopher Fox includes a complimentary glass of wine or fruit juice. Box office: latemusic.org or on the door.
Kate Ledger: Pianist playing in the Late Music Ensemble’s end-is-nigh concert tonight
Folk gig of the week: Spiers & Boden, The Crescent, York, Wednesday, doors 7.30pm
THIS weekend the focus falls on the City of York Roland Walls Folk Weekend at the Black Swan Inn, Peasholme Green. Meanwhile, the organisers, the Black Swan Folk Club, have teamed up with The Crescent to present Bellowhead big band cohorts Spiers & Boden in a seated concert next week.
John Spiers and Jon Boden re-formed their instrumental duo in 2021 after a seven-year hiatus to release the album Fallow Ground. Box office: thecrescentyork.com.
Seated gig: Folk duo Spiers & Boden atThe Crescent on Wednesday
Defiant gig of the week: Mike Peters presents The Alarm (Acoustic), The Crescent, York, Thursday, 7.30pm
AFTER a year of health challenges, The Alarm leader Mike Peters returns to the stage this spring with a new album set for release in the summer.
Co-founder of the Love Hope Strength Foundation, the 64-year-old Welshman will be performing a one-man band electro-acoustic set list of songs from all four decades of The Alarm discography. Box office: thecrescentyork.com.
Mike Peters: Setting The Alarm songs acoustically at the Crescent on Thursday
Troubadour of the week: Steve Earle, The Alone Again Tour, Grand Opera House, York, Friday, 7.30pm
AS his tour title suggests, legendary Americana singer, songwriter, producer, actor, playwright, novelist, short story writer and radio presenter Steve Earle will be performing solo and acoustic in York: the only Yorkshire gig of a ten-date itinerary without his band The Dukes that will take in the other Barbican, in London, and Glastonbury.
Born in Fort Monroae National Monument, Hampton, Virginia, Earle grew up in Texas and began his songwriting career in Nashville, releasing his first EP in 1982 and debut album Guitar Town in 1986, since when he has branched out from country music into rock, bluegrass, folk music and blues. Box office: atgtickets.com/york
Steve Earle: Heading from New York to York for the opening night of his British solo tour. Picture: Danny Clinch
Brass at full blast: Shepherd Group Brass Band: Stage And Screen, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, June 10, 7pm
SHEPHERD Group Brass Band’s late-spring concert showcases music from across the repertoire of stage and screen, featuring five bands from the York organisation, ranging from beginners to championship groups, culminating with a grand finale from all the bands. Tickets update: only the last few are still available on 01904 501935 or at josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.
Thalissa Teixeira: The Royal Shakespeare Company’s first black female Brutus in Julius Caesar, directed by Atri Banerjee, on tour at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Marc Brenner
Power play: Royal Shakespeare Company in Julius Caesar, York Theatre Royal, June 13 to 17, 7.30pm plus 2pm Thursday and Saturday matinees
ATRI Banerjee directs this fast-paced political thriller on the RSC’s return to York Theatre Royal in a fresh interpretation of Julius Caesar with a female Brutus (Thalissa Teixeira) and non-binary Cassius (Annabel Baldwin) that asks: how far would we go for our principles?
Concerned that divisive leader Julius Caesar (Nigel Barrett) poses a threat to democracy, revolutionaries take the violent decision to murder him but without a plan for what happens next. As the world spins out of control, chaos, horror and superstition rush in to fill the void. Civil war erupts and a new leader must rise, but at what cost? Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Digital artist Kit Monkman, of KMA, with his latest People We Love installation at Castle Howard. Picture: Charlotte Graham
YORK digital artist and filmmaker Kit Monkman’s People We Love installation explores “the invisible transaction between a person, a piece of art and that emotion which bonds us all”. Love.
The latest edition of KMA’s community-inspired artwork has taken over the Chapel at Castle Howard, near York, where a bank of five high-definition screens is showing portraits of the estate community, residents and visitors filmed in March as they gaze at a picture of their choice. A picture you never see, but you will feel each unspoken story as the faces tell the tale of a person they love.
After gracing York Minster twice (the first run was stopped by Covid), followed by Pittsburgh, USA, Viborg, Denmark, and Selby Abbey, North Yorkshire, the latest KMA installation is once more designed by Monkman and produced by York-based Mediale.
“Each installation is a portrait of a community at that moment,” says Mediale founder and creative director Tom Higham. “What’s really exciting is doing a series of different places that collectively make a 21st century portraiture archive.
“York Minster was an awe-inspiring space for the installation, but there is something more intimate about the experience here in the Chapel. You can’t compete with the grandeur of the place, but you provide something that is complementary.”
The Castle Howard setting enables moving images of the digital age to stand alongside the grandeur, oil-painted portraiture and collections of the John Vanbrugh-designed stately home.
“Viewers of People We Love will meet the penetrating gaze of the work’s subjects, never knowing who the focus of their detailed attention is,” says Kit.
“In the most direct sense, the aesthetic subjects of the installation, the people we love, are absent, and can only be conjured into existence through an act of imagination on the viewer’s behalf. The work turns on this notion, the notion that love and empathy start as an act of imagination.”
A study of people studying faces in People We Love in the Chapel at Castle Howard. Picture: Charlotte Graham
People We Love finds its inspiration in The Life And Opinions Of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Coxwold clergyman, humorist and novelist Laurence Sterne. First published in York in 1759, the book contains a blank page for the reader to imagine, draw or write about a person they love.
Participation in the Castle Howard project was by open invitation to attend the late-March filming. Among the faces is the Honourable Nick Howard, present occupant of the 18th century stately pile, in informal attire of black T-shirt and unbuttoned work shirt.
“It was brave of him, maybe that’s the right word, maybe the wrong word, to do it,” says Kit. “This house is full of portraits denoting power and stature and yet these portraits are about vulnerability, showing these really honest, vulnerable faces close up.
“If you sit in the Chapel for a long time with these faces, in the beautiful chapel light, you will have an inner dialogue with them. You absolutely will start to project a story on to them, or at least have an empathetic response.”
Among those meeting the gaze of the faces on screen on the opening day were Tim and Delia Madgwick, from nearby Yearsley. “The installation feels quite benign but also radical,” she says. “So much of our culture today is about attention-seeking, but this really repays quiet attention if you’re prepared to spend time with it,” says Delia.
“There was something that was all encompassing about being filmed, holding a photograph of Tim, being asked questions. All your senses were at play and it felt like you were in the womb. You had a sense of being very safe.”
Delia took part in People We Love after undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer, being filmed when she had no hair but had no qualms about facing the KMA camera for the six-and-a-half-minute recording.
“I didn’t feel self-conscious, even knowing it was going to be out there for hundreds of people to see. It was an extremely appropriate moment to do it, and that moment was all that mattered,” she says. “I found Kit’s approach very welcoming and comforting.”
“There is something more intimate about the experience here in the Chapel,” says Mediale creative director Tom Higham
After deliberation, Tim was her choice for her photo. “My daughter said, ‘Good! I’d have been worried if you hadn’t done that’!” says Delia.
Tim selected one from their time in Australia. “It was a lovely picture of us taken in Perth, Western Australia in 1982/1983 , when we decided we couldn’t stay over there. It’s that moment, looking at it, where you think, ‘where have the last 40 years gone? How things have changed’.”
Delia put herself forward to be filmed first. “Afterwards, I said to Tim, ‘you must do it too’, ” she recalls of her experience.
“It was very emotional, when you reflect on having been together for 44 years and the challenges we have been through this winter” says Tim. “I looked at the photograph for some time on the day, so it was on mind, and as you look at it, you realise the essence of the person you’re looking at hasn’t changed.
“In fact it has developed and matured, and what has changed is that life experiences have added to it. We could reflect on our good fortune when thinking things were not quite so fortunate.”
Coming next for People We Love will be a return to Viborg Cathedral for a new installation of Danish faces from September 2023 after an installation of York faces there last autumn. ArtHouse Jersey will follow. “Some discussions are under way for 2024, but nothing is locked in yet,” says Mediale’s Tom Higham.
People We Love is on show in the Chapel at Castle Howard, near York, until October 15, open 10am to 4pm, as part of the general admission ticket at castlehoward.co.uk.
David Lomond’s James, and James Lewis-Knight’s Jimmy in Next Door But One’s Operation Hummingbird
THEATRE has the power to move you to not move, but to stay rooted to your seat at the close, not wanting to break the moment.
Contemplation. Reflection. Solemnity in solitude yet a collective grief too. Such was the experience at Pocklington Arts Centre, in response to York community arts collective Next Door But One’s requiem to loss but one buoyed by hope for those left to pick up the pieces in the stillness, in the need to balance looking back with looking forward.
On a Yorkshire Thursday night, NDB1 played to an audience left in bits by writer-director Matt Harper-Hardcastle’s 56-minute, one-act two-hander. In the first two rows sat schoolchildren, hushed, attentive, and come the finale, needing the comfort of hugs.
Children are often introduced to death by the passing of a pet, but a hamster spinning off its mortal wheel will inevitably lead to greater collisions with life’s end. Harper-Hardcastle lost his mum all too young in 2016, prompting him post-counselling to write Operation Hummingbird, a play first presented in York libraries in 2021 and now revived for more Explore York sites, as well as the TakeOver Festival at York Theatre Royal, Pocklington and lastly Helmsley Arts Centre.
“Have you ever wished you could fast forward and ask the future you: ‘has everything turned out OK?’,” Harper-Hardcastle ponders.
Teenager Jimmy (cast returnee James Lewis-Knight) deals with his mum’s terminal cancer diagnosis by diving into the virtual world of computer games, head forever in his headset, fingers twitching on the console or reaching for the crisp packet.
Through his haven of virtual reality – a form of magic realism, if you prefer – he encounters James (NDB1 debutant David Lomond, from Scarborough): the man Jimmy will become 35 years later.
Lomond will play Jimmy’s dad too, and his mum, a change of character denoted by a scarf, typical of the no-frills staging by Harper-Hardcastle, who restricts his set to three boxes that accommodate props or can be used as a seat. Less is more here, from running time to cast size and set design, and the impact is consequently all the bigger both emotionally and visually too.
Boldness applies equally to subject matter and sparse performance style, but there is beauty, imagination and grace, even occasional humour, to Harper-Hardcastle’s rich, enveloping language, with its contrasts for young and adult voices, that lifts his poetic, profound drama to elegiac heights, aided by Abi Turner’s lighting.
The weight of grief, preceded by the anticipation of loss, is counterbalanced by Harper-Hardcastle’s passion for “the power of noticing just how far you’ve come”.
All is expressed in the performances of Lewis-Knight’s bewildered, distraught Jimmy, so full of questions not easy to answer, and Lomond’s bereft, tender, ever-supportive Dad and James, who provides words of advice and assurance as much for the audience as young Jimmy.
Next Door But One in Operation Hummingbird, Helmsley Arts Centre, tonight (2/6/2023) at 7.30pm. Box office: 01439 771700 or helmsleyarts.co.uk.
Suitable for age 11 plus. “This performance is for you if you’re a Jimmy, a James, or anywhere in between,” advises writer-director Matt Harper-Hardcastle.
Opera North in The Pearl Fishers (Les Pȇcheurs de Perles). Picture: James Glossop
IT has been well over 30 years since Opera North looked at Bizet’s youthful stab at orientalism, The Pearl Fishers. But in that time orientalism has acquired some of the negative taints of colonialism, with claims made in the programme that Bizet’s attempts at exoticism sound dissonant to modern ears because he was not properly acquainted with Asian music.
It is doubtful if that thought would have even flitted into the minds of the Leeds – or any other –audience. Nowhere is credence given to the idea that the composer was not trying to be authentic, merely conjuring atmosphere as understood in his own day and still largely so now.
The mere fact that there is felt to be a need for such an apologia is an instant red flag that there might be a ‘concept’ lurking. Productions should be able to speak for themselves.
At this time of year, the company has customarily offered a concert staging in Leeds Town Hall. With that venue undergoing major refurbishment, a full staging at home base was the obvious fall-back, but all the touring dates are due to be only concert performances.
This is relevant since what we get is a very static production from Matthew Eberhardt, with little hint of context in Joanna Parker’s costumes.
Principals apart, it is hard to tell whether the chorus are supposed to be fisher-folk or Brahmins, since they are clad in black suits and dresses, very much like westerners. They are even to be found seated in chairs along the edges of the stage. So it is very close to a concert performance.
The only costume to make any impact is Nourabad’s rather jumbled salt-caked coat-tails, more like the Old Man of the Sea than a high priest.
Parker’s set is dominated by a central totem of tangled fishing ropes stretching up the ceiling. This appears to serve for an altar and is twice partially climbed by Leïla. Otherwise, the stage is littered with enlarged pearls of various sizes up to two metres in diameter. These mainly vanish in Act 3, allowing the chorus easier passage, though some larger ones are to be seen hanging in nets overhead.
Peter Mumford’s lighting is predominantly gloomy, most of the light coming from slender on-stage spots, which enliven the action but regularly leave faces in partial shadow. There is a continual video backdrop of waves in moonlight co-designed by him and Parker; it does not change even when the chorus sing of blue skies and calm sea. But we could have been anywhere, Mexico (as originally intended), Ceylon – or even Lowestoft.
There are compensations in the music. Quirijn de Lang, a welcome and regular visitor here, has rarely sounded as resonant as he does as Zurga, right from the start. He commands the stage. But he reins back for the big duet with Nico Darmanin’s Nadir, who had not quite reached full throttle at that point on this opening night. Nadir’s later anger is convincing enough and he partners Leïla sensitively.
Sophia Theodorides, making her house debut, is a confident Leïla, her ornamentation clear and her emotions tangible. Joseph Creswell makes a stentorian Nourabad, a powerful presence.
The chorus is certainly forceful, if not quite up to its usual blend. Matthew Kofi Waldren keeps them and his orchestra attentive, and alive to the nuances of Bizet’s orchestration. But this production would have been better billed as a concert staging. What we get is a half-way house that will have pleased few.
Review by Martin Dreyer
Further Leeds performances on May 25, 27, 31 & June 2, then touring (concert performances) toManchester, Gateshead, Hull City Hall (June 24, 7pm)and Nottingham until July 1. www.operanorth.co.uk. Leeds box office: leedsheritagetheatres.com; Hull, hulltheatres.co.uk
REVIEW: Martin Dreyer’s verdict on Opera North in Requiem: Journeys Of The Soul, Leeds Grand Theatre, May 30
Emile Petersen, Aaron Chaplin and Rian Jansen with tenor soloist Mongezi Mosoaka in Mozart’s Requiem. Picture: Richard H Smith
IT’S an ill wind…some good may have come out of Covid. Music of mourning requires an outcome for the living: a vision of the hereafter, perhaps, but certainly closure or catharsis. Mozart’s Requiem and Neo Muyanga’s After Tears: After A Requiem combines the talents of Opera North and fellow Leeds company Phoenix Dance Theatre with South Africa’s Jazzart Dance Theatre and Cape Town Opera.
The vital link between the two is Dane Hurst, who has links with both dance companies; he choreographs and directs this double bill, inspired by personal loss during the pandemic.
Dance was always a feature of early Christian worship and remains so in less inhibited cultures than our own, so the idea of a balletic requiem is perhaps not as radical as it may at first seem.
The ‘After Tears’ is a relatively new tradition espoused by younger generations in South African townships and equates somewhat to a wake, whereby the blues of mourning are submerged in loud, dance music.
Simplistically, South African composer Muyanga’s new response piece picks up where Mozart leaves off. Hurst’s choreography keeps closely to the music. In the Mozart, it is immediately engrossing, not least because the soloists and chorus are constantly in physical touch with the dancers, offering sympathy and consolation.
The Dies Irae sees a frenetic outpouring from both chorus and dancers, the latter writhing in agonies of what appears to be self-recrimination. In contrast, for example, the Benedictus offers cool balm to the troubled.
Dancers from Phoenix Dance Theatre and Jazzart Dance Theatre with the Chorus of Opera North in Opera North’s production of Neo Muyanga’sAfter Tears: After A Requiem. Picture: Tristram Kenton
The sheer energy of the dancing is a marvel, quite stunning. It is invigorated by a chorus that is equally on fire; the two forces clearly inspire one another.
Underpinning them is Garry Walker’s orchestra, ablaze with rhythmic fervour that can only be an inspiration to the dancers. The solo quartet – Ellie Laugharne, Ann Taylor, Mongezi Mosoaka and Simon Shibambu – blend superbly but are individually distinctive when need be. Shibambu’s stentorian bass is ideal in the Tuba Mirum.
Joanna Parker’s thin black wooden shards remain dangling overhead for After Tears, where Muyanga’s score initially lays emphasis on percussive effects. His melodic instincts are relatively subdued and tend towards minimalism as the piece progresses.
Between two main sections is a moment of ritual reflection involving a priestly figure who chants in African dialect and invokes the spirit of Fire. This is a welcome oasis of calm amid otherwise frantic activity, in which the 16 dancers now shriek with joy.
There is a sense in which the ritual aspect of this dancing evokes the atmosphere of Stravinsky’s Rite Of Spring, even though the music is less challenging. But the evening also offers an electrifying opportunity to re-evaluate our attitudes to death and mourning and discover the silver lining they canoffer. As an example of cross-cultural fertilisation, it tops the charts.
Review by Martin Dreyer
The final performance of Requiem: Journeys Of The Soul at Leeds Grand Theatre are on Saturday (3/6/2023) at 7pm and Sunday (4/6/2023) at 2.30pm. The production was co-commissioned by Leeds 2023 Year of Culture. Box office: 0113 243 0808 or leedsheritagetheatres.com
On the dark side: James Mackenzie, alias CBeebies’ Raven, is to play the villain in York Theatre Royal’s pantomime, Jack And The Beanstalk
JAMES Mackenzie follows in the CBeebies’ footsteps of Maddie Moate last winter and Andy Day in 2021 in being signed up for the York Theatre Royal pantomime.
The Scottish actor and game show host, 44, will play the villainous Luke Backinanger in the “Fe-Fi-Fo-Fun family pantomime” Jack And The Beanstalkfrom December 8 2023 to January 7 2024.
Moate appeared as Tinkerbell in All New Adventures Of Peter Pan, preceded by Day’s Dandini in Cinderella.
Mackenzie will turn to the dark side in the fourth panto collaboration between the Theatre Royal and Evolution Productions, having played the immortal, leather-clad warrior in CBBC’s fantasy adventure game show Raven.
James Mackenzie: “Strutting his stuff as the bad boy of panto” at York Theatre Royal this winter
He was the original lead character in the multi-Bafta award-winning show Raven from 2002 to 2010. This mysterious warlord led young warriors on a quest to test their skills and win their heart’s desire in a show that garnered cult status, spanning 15 series filmed in far-flung exotic locations such as India. Its popularity saw it air from Canada to Australia and places aplenty in between.
Mackenzie has worked for many theatre companies, such as the National Theatre of Scotland, and has performed all over Britain in everything from Macbeth to the Proclaimers’ musical Sunshine On Leith. He has been a regular in BBC Scotland’s soap opera River City and made guest appearances in Still Game and Outlander.
Over the past few years, he has been introduced to a new CBeebies’ generation as James in Molly And Mack. He has been part of the CBeebies Christmas shows and performed on stage at Shakespeare’s Globe for CBeebies Shakespeare. Like most Scottish actors, he has appeared in Taggart more than once.
Theatre Royal creative director Juliet Forster, who will be directing Jack And The Beanstalk, says: “We are delighted to welcome James Mackenzie to the cast for this year’s panto. James is such a well-loved children’s TV personality and we can’t wait to see him strut his stuff as the bad boy of panto.”
Robin Simpson: Returning to the dame’s role in Jack And The Beanstalk
Mackenzie will perform alongside the already announced Robin Simpson in his fourth Theatre Royal panto. Simpson played the dame in The Travelling Pantomime in 2020, the British Pantomime Award-nominated Ugly Sister Manky in Cinderella in 2021 and Mrs Smee in All New Adventures of Peter Pan last winter.
He will be on dame duty in Jack And The Beanstalk, with further casting to be announced for a show that promises “stunning sets, lavish costumes, breath-taking special effects and lots of pantomime magic”.
Evolution’s co-founder Paul Hendy is writing the script once more, as he did for the past three pantos.
Tickets are “proving popular”, with a special family ticket offer available for all performances: £75 for bookings with three tickets, including at least one adult and one child, saving up to £52, or £100 for bookings with four tickets, including at least one adult and one child, saving up to £68. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
New face in town: Ryan Addyman in his York Stage debut as Jamie New in Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, Teen Edition. All pictures: Matthew Kitchen
MADE in Yorkshire, “the hit musical for today” began life at Sheffield Crucible Theatre in 2017. Now comes its York premiere in the Teen Version with a cast of 13 to 19-year-olds led by Ryan Addyman, 17, from Knaresborough, in his York Stage debut.
Inspired by the Firecracker documentary Jamie: Drag Queen At 16, composer Dan Gillespie Sells (from Horsham’s finest pop practitioners The Feeling) and writer/lyricist Tom MacRae worked their magic from an original idea by director and co-writer Jonathan Butterell.
What emerged was the completion of a populist trilogy of Sheffield comedy dramas: the defiant spirit and sheer balls of The Full Monty, the classroom politics and fledgling frustrations of Alan Bennett’s The History Boys, and now Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, the unapologetic story of the boy who sometimes to be wants to be a girl, wear a dress to the school prom and be a drag queen.
Since Jamie’s blossoming, two on-topic television shows have had a stellar impact: the couture and coiffeur catwalk and cat-talk contests of RuPaul’s Drag Race on the Beeb and the sass, too-cool-for-school dress sense and multi-cultural diversity of Sex Education, the Netflix binge-watch through lockdowns.
Sex Education shares Everybody’s Talking About Jamie’s bold humour, jagged wit and spot-on social awareness as a barometer of our changing times and attitudes towards gender, bigotry, bullying, homophobia, absentee fathers and the right to self-expression.
Jaia Howland’s teacher Miss Hedge
Meet the Year 11 pupils of Mayfield School, a typical comprehensive classroom of 16-year-olds full of hopes and aspirations, filtered through the realities of life in a northern town.
Among them is Addyman’s Jamie New, from a Sheffield council estate, but feeling out of place, so restless at sweet 16 to be “something and someone fabulous”. After Billy Liar’s Billy Fisher and Kes’s Billy Casper, here is another young Yorkshire dreamer in need of escape from the grey grime, this time in a classic teen rebel story, told from the teen perspective, but rooted in kitchen-sink northern drama rather than the white-toothed gleam of an American high-school musical.
It does nevertheless share one characteristic with the all-American Hairspray, for example, by giving the adult viewpoint in spades. Step forward Jamie’s world-weary, self-sacrificial, ever supportive mum Margaret (Maggie Wakeling, in terrific voice in her heartfelt ballads, If I Met Myself Again and especially He’s My Boy, the show’s most powerful vocal performance).
Always on the lookout for a bargain and ready with a comforting word or a putdown for authority is Margaret’s no-nonsense, cheery best friend Ray (an amusing Eve Clark), and further support comes from dress-shop boss Hugo/veteran drag act Loco Chanelle (resolute Sam Roberts).
Giving Jamie grief are his stay-away, mullet-haired Dad (Tyler Costello) and narrow-minded teacher Miss Hedge (Jaia Rowland).
Maggie Wakeling’s Margaret, Jamie’s mum
The Teen Edition necessitates giving these adult roles to young actors but all respond with performances that convey the age gap, not least in their singing performances.
As for the teens playing teens, not only Addyman’s Jamie scores high marks among the classroom performers, so too do Jack Hambleton, outstanding yet again on a York stage as the everybody-hating, self-loathing bully Dean Paxton, the big fish soon to lose his small pond, and Erin Childs’ quietly impressive, self-assured doctor-in-waiting Pritti Pasha, whose solo number It Means Beautiful is an Act II highlight.
Above all else, everyone will be talking about Addyman’s Jamie. A new face to York audiences, he is Jamie to the manner born: high of voice and heels, a shaker and a heartbreaker, a lippy kid in lip gloss, confident on the swan surface but naïve and vulnerable, wanting to strut before he can walk. Ugly In This Ugly World is his best number, almost matched by his kitchen duet with Wakeling’s Margaret, My Man, Your Boy.
Serious points are made in MacRae’s book, where the multiple confrontations carry both poignancy and punch, and you will love the Yorkshireness of it all: the blunt, knowing humour and the rough-rouge glamour of drag queens Sandra Bollock (George Hopwood), Tray Sophistacay (George Connell) and Laika Virgin (Harvey Jardine), Sheffield’s answer to the travelling trio in The Adventures Of Priscilla, Queen Of The Desert.
Gillespie Sells’ tunes and MacRae’s lyrics are a delight too, led off by the immediately infectious And You Don’t Even Know It, through the irresistible title number to the show-closing defining statement of Out Of The Darkness (A Place Where We Belong).
Sam Roberts’s dress-shop owner Hugo recalling Loco Chanelle’s days as a drag diva
Musical director Jessica Viner works with a recorded score, but never sits back, always in view of the hugely energetic cast from the mezzanine level. Emily Taylor’s choreography is as vigorous and fun as ever, relished by leads, supports and ensemble alike.
Jo Street’s wardrobe and Phoebe Kilvington’s make-up and hair add to the spectacle, while the design combines glamour with grit: the John Cooper Studio is bedecked in shiny tinfoil and gold leaf with room for Margaret’s kitchen, the classroom and Hugo’s shop to glide on and off.
Nik Briggs’s direction goes to the top of the class, capturing the spirit of a show that “celebrates being yourself and finding a place where you belong”. Individuality and teamwork in tandem, the place where everyone here belongs is on stage, once more emphasising why the arts should never be undervalued in young lives, why there should always be a place for the Jamies of this world to express themselves.
How apt that this thrilling, uplifting production’s weekend climax should coincide with York Pride.
York Stage in Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, Teen Edition, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, tonight and tomorrow, 7.30pm, sold out; Saturday, 2.30pm (last few tickets) and 7.30pm, sold out. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
Dr Wendy Mitchell takes to the skies in a photograph in the People With Dementia Can…Be Inspired exhibition at Pocklington Arts Centre
DR Wendy Mitchell and Bob Long, who both live with dementia, are presenting an inspiring exhibition of photography and poetry at Pocklington Arts Centre until June 16.
Their People With Dementia Can…Be Inspired display combines photographs taken by Sunday Times best-selling author Wendy with poems composed by retired head teacher, pantomime provider, tennis lover and ping-pong player Bob.
The exhibition began its tour at Market Weighton Town Hall, where it was attended by dignitaries, people living with dementia, researchers and other sector experts. Post-Pocklington, further venues will follow.
Wendy says: “My message is always to see the person, not the disease. Dementia is so misunderstood by society. I hope our work helps more people appreciate that people living with dementia are all different and can still achieve remarkable things.”
Beneath a photograph of Wendy taking to the air, her exhibition statement reads: “On the 31st July 2014 I was diagnosed with Young Onset Dementia. My brain was overwhelmed with images of the last stages of the disease – those familiar tropes, shortcuts and cliches that we are fed by the media, or even our own health professionals.
“But my diagnosis far from represented the end of my life. Instead, it was the start of a very different one. I may not have much of a short term, but in this exhibition I’m hoping to convey that, although we’ve been diagnosed, people like me still have a substantial contribution to make; we still have a sense of humour; we still have feelings.
Bob Long, who wrote the poems on display at the exhibition, with his wife Sue, centre, and exhibition coordinator Sandra Burley, from Dementia Friendly Market Weighton
“I’m hoping to show the reality of trying to cope on a day-to-day basis with the ever-changing environmnt that dementia throws at those diagnosed with the condition. What I want is not sympathy. What I want is simply to raise awareness.”
Alongside a photograph of Bob on the tennis court is his message: Parting Shot. Adventure. Achievement. Ambition.
He had moved to Market Weighton from Cambridge with his young family in 1980 to take up a school headship at North Cave. “We never thought we’d still be here 43 years later but we are and we love it!” his exhibition statement reads.
“After I retired there were some signs that I was getting forgetful, so I was referred to the Memory Clinic in 2015.” Later he would be diagnosed with dementia.
“There was then a period of time that caused us to be anxious about our future. However, it wasn’t long before we recognised that we could deal with this change and that we could and would enjoy our togetherness positively.
The People With Dementia Can…Be Inspired exhibition on show at Pocklington Arts Centre
“We are keen that, having found our ‘road’, we would like to assure others that dementia is not our ‘story end’ and that together we are able to enjoy life.”
Damian Murphy, from York dementia support group Minds and Voices says: “First and foremost, this is a joyful exhibition of outstanding photography and talented poetry. Projects like this are helping us to improve our understanding of how best to support people living with dementia. Celebrating and showcasing the talent and stories of Wendy and Bob will serve as an inspiration to others.”
PAC director Angela Stone says: “We’re delighted to be welcoming this exhibition to Pocklington Arts Centre. The essence of breaking the old views of dementia, bringing rights, hope, creativity and potential into light underpins our commitment to create safe and inclusive opportunities for everyone in our community to express themselves in our supportive and welcoming space.
“We are grateful to our friends at Dementia Forward for delivering dementia awareness training to our staff and volunteers to help us better understand how to create engaging, inclusive activities, including our weekly Singing For Fun sessions, held every Thursday morning.
“We also have the forthcoming Smashing Mirrors production of Mike & Millie Go To The Seaside, an interactive workshop for those living with dementia on Thursday, June 8. We are inspired and honoured to share such an important body of work.”
People With Dementia Can…Be Inspired can be viewed during Pocklington Arts Centre’s opening hours: Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday, 10am to 4pm; Thursday, 10am to 5pm; Saturday, 10am to 1pm.
Long shot: The photograph of Bob Long playing tennis and his accompanying message entitled Parting Shot
Shakespeare Sonnets director Tony Froud in the secret garden at the Bar Convent Living Heritage Centre
YORK Shakespeare Project is to hold auditions for its new season of Shakespeare Sonnets on June 11 from 1pm and June 13 from 6.30pm at the Bar Convent Living Heritage Centre, Blossom Street, York.
“It’s an opportunity for people to dip their toe into Shakespeare in a really enjoyable and proven format,” says director Tony Froud. “Each actor develops a character guided by Helen Wilson’s script and my direction.
“It’s not too big a commitment and there are only 14 lines of Shakespeare to navigate with lots of support on offer. We’ll be delighted to welcome both new faces and past sonneteers.”
York Shakespeare Project sonneteer Judith Ireland performing in the grounds of Holy Trinity Church, Goodramgate, York
YSP’s Sonnet productions have been staged variously in Dean’s Park, behind York Minster; the grounds of Holy Trinity Church, Goodramgate; in Sonnet Walks on York’s streets and in the Bar Convent’s secret garden.
“This year we will again be bringing our audience into the Bar Convent garden, this time to witness the comings and goings of the visitors and staff of a York hotel. It will be surprisingly similar to and yet curiously unlike the Bar Convent,” says Tony.
Rehearsals will run from June 25, leading to performances from Friday, August 11 to Saturday, August 19 at 6pm and 7.30pm nightly plus 4.30pm on Saturdays.
To apply to audition, send an email to Tony via yorkshakespeareproject@gmail.com.
