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REVIEW: Life after death in The Missing Peace, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York ****

Many Newby performing the opening monologue, Save The Last Dance, in The Missing P:eace. Picture: David Harrison

Rowntree Players in The Missing Peace, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, tonight, 7.30pm; tomorrow, 2.30pm and 7.30pm. Box office: 01904 501935 or at josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.

AMERICAN writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher and political philosopher Benjamin Franklin famously said: “In this world, nothing is certain except death and taxes.”

Yet talking about death remains a taboo subject (and who wants to discuss tax?), but Tow Law-born York all-rounder, teacher, party-band frontman, keynote conference speaker, filmmaker, charity event organiser and storyteller Big Ian Donaghy did just that in his second book, The Missing Peace.

Busker Peter Hyndman in a lonesome moment in The Missing Peace. Picture: David Harrison

“It’s not about dying,” he clarifies. “It’s about living and celebrating life.” Actually, it is about death, coming to terms with death, life after death and, yes, talking about it. Death of partners, parents and pets alike. Siblings and soul mates. Stepping in as the replacement or being the loco in parentis.

Gemma McDonald, teacher and Rowntree Players pantomime favourite, read the book and immediately thought The Missing Peace could be turned from the written to the spoken word on stage in the form of One Play…15 Endings.

Working in tandem with Donaghy, she has adapted and directed the Players’ Talking Heads-style production, set at a busy York railway station, where Mark Addy, no less, is the station announcer in the pre-recorded narrator’s role.

Platform for discussion: Dealing with death in Rowntree Players’ production of The Missing Peace. Picture: David Harrison

Donaghy has the funny bones and timing of a stand-up, the golden quill of a novelist, an all-too-uncommon common touch and the eye for a story and contacts’ book of a journalist. Hence he can deliver lines, deliver Addy and, in turn, Addy delivers the goods. “He’s like a Peter Sallis, like being by a warm hearth,” said Donaghy after last night’s premiere.

Donaghy is decisive too. Watching the dress rehearsal, the frontman in him told him the cast would need head microphones as well as overhead ones. He and Gemma also instinctively felt that the presentation of a succession of monologues – theatre’s most intense, concentration-demanding form – would benefit from the insertion of an interval.

He was right on both fronts, and in his wish for The Missing Peace to be the starting pistol for conversation, not the finishing line, those conversations could start all the sooner, at half-time.

Mother and son in union: Jackie Holmes listens to Mark McDonald in The Missing Peace. Picture: David Harrison

Gemma McDonald has done a tremendous job too, both in picking the monologues and their varying tones and experiences and her choice of community cast, whether young (Beth Hutchinson, Katelyn Banks, Hannah Woods), ever reliable (Mark McDonald, Mandy Newby, Graham Smith, Maggie Smales, Gemma herself); or assured in centre-stage (Lynne Edwards, Liam Godfrey, Jackie Holmes).

A series of monologues might sound repetitive, but there is nothing mono about their performances; instead they are rich in nuance, all performed with clarity and sensitivity, using the exposure of direct address to the maximum impact. Individuality and teamwork knitted together superbly, and how moving this counselling form of theatre is.

This is not stand-and-deliver theatre; instead Gemma has a painter’s eye in framing each scene, with others present on stage in many, but never distractingly so. All the while, busking guitarist Peter Hyndman links the monologues, looking heavenwards as he sings.

Heaven’s above: Sara Howlett mid-monologue in The Missing Peace. Picture: David Harrison

Sara Howlett excitedly talking about heaven has person after person disengaging from her on the station forecourt; Alison Taylor’s secret “other woman” at her lover’s funeral stands at the back, separate from the motionless, side-on, silhouetted mourners, as she faces the audience in a soft spotlight in a brilliant piece of choreography.

In contrast, Joseph Marucci’s devastated father is all alone in his abiding grief, conversing with his stillborn daughter, “born asleep”.

“You may cry,” wrote Donaghy in his programme notes. We did, at that moment and others too. “You may laugh,” he surmised. We did, knowingly, as Gemma McDonald and Katelyn Banks’s mum and daughter dealt with the death of the family hamster, and when Beth Hutchinson’s daughter revealed to her late dad her switch of allegiance from Manchester United to Liverpool (“Jurgen Klopp is like Fergie with better teeth,” she reasoned).

Director Gemma McDonald in Do You Really Want To Hurt Me. Picture: David Harrison

“But YOU will think,” emphasised Donaghy in capital letters. And, yes, you will think, but more importantly you will talk. Everyone was talking afterwards, opening up about their own experiences.

Just as they will after tonight and tomorrow’s performances. Talk will then turn to what happens next to The Missing Peace, which surely has an afterlife. Watch this space.

Review by Charles Hutchinson

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Ross Noble clears his head to deliver post-lockdown thoughts on being Humournoid

“My shows are always where my head is on that day,” says surrealist comedian Ross Noble

ROSS Noble once said: “As usual, I have lots of stuff backing up in my mind and it’s time to let it out”.

Can you image how crammed the Geordie surrealist’s brain must be as he prepares to perform his Humournoid show at the Grand Opera House, York, on Saturday, given that tickets first went on sale as long ago as June 6 2019.

At that time, the gig was scheduled for April 30 2020, but then Coronavirus brought everything to a halt. “It’s been hilarious!” says Ross, managing to see the funny side of Covid’s curse on live entertainment.

“I’d been waiting two years, with dates being on, then off, then back on, then off, having to keep reorganising the tour, before I finally could start it at the end of last year.”

Ross, now 45, called an earlier tour show Brain Dump, in acknowledgement of every improvised performance being a clear-out of his in-tray of thoughts. “My shows are always where my head is on that day,” says the Newcastle-born absurdist comic and actor.

Lockdown had led others to occupy their head space in such a way too, he notes, and that has since had an impact on Humournoid. “We started doing Humournoid in Australia [where Noble lives in Melbourne], just before the country got shut down. It’s a bit unusual that people, the entire world over, whether they liked it or not, were then forced to re-evaluate themselves and be in their head, in isolation at home, which I think has been a good thing.

“Weirdly, every comic has written either a children’s book or a self-help book in lockdown,” says Ross Noble, who has done neither

“I know it’s been hard and I know we’re still in the pandemic and people are hurting, but it’s extraordinary that even though 9/11 changed the course of how society thinks, Covid has forced the whole world to take stock and think about things.”

Since resuming performances, Ross has seen at close hand how “some people are desperate to get out to see a show but others are still nervous about going out”.

Unlike the freewheeling, wild path his shows take, he is conducting himself on the road with caution. “I wear a mask all the time, and even though people think Omicron is less severe, I’ve not yet had Covid, and if I did get it, I’d have to shut down for five days, which would affect the tour,” he says.

“My strategy is to play the gig, go to the hotel, play the next gig, go to the hotel. The only interaction with the outside world is at a petrol station, or when I’m on stage, or signing in at the hotel. Otherwise, I’m always on my own. The one thing I can do is to try to make sure that each gig happens.”

How did Ross spend his lockdowns? “Weirdly, every comic has written either a children’s book or a self-help book, and they’re the last people I’d want to get self-help advice from or want to read their stories talking about bringing up their kids,” he says.

“What I’ve done is six weeks of hotel quarantine,  when moving around in Australia, if I wanted to cross into another state to do TV. Melbourne, my home, is the most locked-down city in the world, with an eight o’clock curfew, and you were only allowed to go three miles from your home. Only one person per household per day was allowed to go out to the supermarket.”

The tour poster for Ross Noble’s Humournoid show

When he travelled to Sydney, it was “proper quarantine”, he recalls. “Locking you in your hotel room, with the police and the army on the door, and you could only open the door for a bag of food and a Covid test, when they would send a nurse around twice a week, and you had to stand there with your back against the wall as they shoved the test equipment up your nose,” says Ross.

“But in the first lockdown, I seriously loved it. Normally if I’m in a hotel room, I’d be staring at the wall, thinking ‘I should be doing more’, but just being allowed to sit there and stare into the distance, I loved it.

“The fact is I already do meditation, or as my wife calls it, ‘not listening’. People are into all this mindfulness stuff, whereas if you’re told you’re not allowed to do anything or go anywhere, I naturally drift off, as opposed to doing an hour’s formal meditation.”

It turns out Ross did put lockdown to good use. “I always have lots of ideas in my head, but the great thing about the pandemic was that I found myself thinking, ‘oh, I’m going to finish these ideas off,” he says.

“I started writing screenplays and they’re now at various stages of development. Well, the thing is I can’t really say. It’s not top secret but you have to be really careful, but in two years’ time, people could be saying, oh, he’s been busy’, or it could die in the water and become something you find in the drawer long after it never happened.”

Let’s see what happens to these Noble deeds, but in the meantime, he will be in Humournoid form in York this weekend.

Having made his return to the Grand Opera House on his El Hablador in October 2018 after a run of shows at York Barbican, he is delighted to be going back there once more. “It’s one of the best rooms for comedy,” says Ross. “I put it in my top five favourite places to play. I love it there.”

Ross Noble: Humournoid, Grand Opera House, York, Saturday (29/1/2022), 8pm. Box office: 0844 871 7615 or at atgtickets.com/York.

Copyright of The Press, York

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‘Be pleasantly surprised by how little you really know of Frankenstein,’ say York horror company Theatre Of The Macabre

Lee Gemmell, left, and Dan Boyle in rehearsal for Theatre Of The Macabre’s Frankenstein. All pictures:  Hannah Jade Robbins

DO you reckon you know everything there is to be known of the story of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein?

“If so, come along and be pleasantly surprised about how little you really know,” say York company Theatre Of The Macabre, introducing the twisted fantasies and grotesque dreamscapes of next week’s York premiere at Theatre@41, Monkgate, on Wednesday.

“Join us as we discover Victor Frankenstein’s innermost fears and misgivings that haunt his troubled mind and how his ungodly experiments defied the Laws of Nature.”

Director Bryan Heeley’s production began life in 2019 and was set to be unfurled at Theatre@41 in April 2020, only to be derailed by the pandemic. “My original cast was halved due to circumstances too bizarre to stretch belief, so in 2020 we had to re-build, which was by no means easy,” he says. “Eventually, however, the play was re-cast and, despite the strict restrictions, began its ‘rebirth’.”

“All the original cast worked at The York Dungeon so it was relatively easy to arrange meetings. For next week’s cast, besides myself as Walton, there’ll be three of the original actors: Dan Boyle as Victor Frankenstein, Hannah Jade Robbins as Elizabeth and Naomi Lombard as Justine.

Gripping scene: Hannah Jade Robbins’ Elizabeth and Lee Gemmell’s Creature

“They’ll be joined by Jess Murray as Henry and the redoubtable Lee Gemmell as the Creature.”

When first conceived, the cast numbered 20-plus. “But it was relatively easy to divide the parts for this production, giving equal parts to everyone except Lee and Dan,” says Bryan.

“I’d worked with Jess before, in Bronzehead Theatre’s The Alchemist, which also featured multi-role parts, so I knew she was capable of this.

“Lee has been a revalation as the Creature, and as I knew the play backwards, I replaced Dan, who was the original Walton. I was determined to share the parts out equally, regardless of the sex of the character and one character Greta impressed me so much, she was given an extra scene.”

Why are we still so fascinated by Frankenstein and his Creature, Bryan? “I’m constantly amazed, when mentioning the name Frankenstein, how many diverse people quote it as their favourite book and the interesting slants they have on the characters,” he says.

Find out the answer to the question above at Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, from February 2 to 5

“Feminists love it, sc-fi enthusiasts rate it and ‘horror nuts’ like me constantly cite it among their top ten, along with Dracula and The Phantom Of The Opera.”

Then add the medical aspect that prevails throughout the book, says Bryan. “The ‘miracle’ of rebirth has slowly become a reality as science and medicine have uncovered further revelations. So, it’s even more remarkable that Mary Shelley in the 19th century could conceive such unthinkable ideas. How can we fail to not be impressed by such fantastical concepts?”

No longer does the horror genre suffer from the prejudiced perception of being an “inferior artform”. “It now has the legitimacy it rightly deserves,” says Bryan.

“As a child of the 1960s, my staple diet of entertainment gravitated to Hammer Horror films such as Dracula, The Mummy, The Wolfman and, of course, Frankenstein.

“Such influences are still there to be seen today; just pop along to HMV and listen to diverse people wax lyrical about the latest Zombie epic while ploughing through the shelves marked ‘Horror’ for undiscovered gems.

The caption above receives a tut-tut from the CharlesHutchPress spelling police

“Theatre has flourished at the same time: the likes of Stephen Mallatratt’s The Woman In Black, Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom Of The Opera, Richard Curtis’s The Rocky Horror Show and Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman’s excellent Ghost Stories are prime examples of this. Even the National Theatre ‘dipped their toes’ with Danny Boyle’s Frankenstein.”

Bryan continues: “The York Dungeon, a fine exponent of the genre, has hosted popular zombie events, which could be classed as live theatre. The pandemic has brought its own particular terrors, yet it was a no-budget short called The Host that generated worldwide acclaim, not least due to participation of York’s own James Swanton as the malevolent spirit. Among the carnage, people still preferred to be shocked.”

Theatre@41’s black-box John Cooper Studio is the perfect theatrical setting for Frankenstein. “We wanted to create a claustrophobic atmosphere to coincide with Victor’s ‘madness’ and Theatre@41 is the ideal space to create such an environment,” says Bryan.

“A thrust-style setting should put our audience close to the action and a few ‘shocks’ on the way will hopefully add an added element to their experience. If we can achieve this then we can go away with a satisfactory feeling and, as the Creature says, ‘rest in peace’.”               

Frankenstein wholly suits a theatrical presentation. “There is nothing so satisfying as taking one’s seat in the theatre, whether it be for a comedy, musical or simply to be shocked,” says Bryan.

“A skilful artist can take you by the hand and lead you a merry dance,” says Theatre Of The Macabre director Bryan Heeley

“A darkened stage invokes our primal fear of the unknown. You have no control of your emotions. A skilful artist can take you by the hand and lead you a merry dance and, somewhere at the back of your mind, you want to go there, no matter what the consequence.

“Frankenstein is such a creature (forgive the pun). You share the emotions of the characters as they pass through their journey and question their motives. You feel invested in the action and leave thinking, ‘would I have done the same thing?’. I have to admit, even though I’ve lived with this project for so long, I still ponder these questions myself.”

One final question demands to be asked: why will next week’s audiences be “pleasantly surprised about how little you really know” about Frankenstein?

“As the old saying goes, ‘there are no original ideas left’, so this question is the trickiest to answer,” concedes Bryan.

Theatre Of The Macabre’s poster for Frankensetin

“I would like to think that by emphasising Victor Frankenstein’s state of mind and his extreme behaviour, I have brought some originality to this production. His actions are for the most part despicable, rash and questionable, despite the events unfolding.

“One could say they are the classic symptoms of a sociopath. His musings are comparable to Hamlet and it’s no coincidence that Shakespeare’s play is quoted in this production – and we all know how that ended.

“But we must also remember they are actions sanctioned by Mary Shelley herself and I’m trying to be faithful to her while adding my own spin. I leave it to the audience to judge and ultimately decide.”  

Theatre Of The Macabre in Frankenstein, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, February 2 to 5, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

Looking ahead

AN offshoot of the Theatre Of The Macabre company regularly presents a Halloween Spectacular in Budapest, Hungary. “It is hoped, in the future, to organise a possible production there,” says Bryan Heeley.

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What’s up for debate by Two Big Egos In A Small Car podcasters Chalmers & Hutch?

Who’s listening? Hutch cocks an ear beside Maggi Hambling’s seaside sculpture, The Scallop, on the beach at Aldeburgh, Suffolk

DOES Paul Thomas Anderson’s Licorice Pizza top Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon A Time In Hollywood?

Arts podcasters Graham Chalmers and Charles Hutchinson mull over two Tinsel Town fables.

Plus re-discovering Bruce Springsteen on scorching form at No Nukes in 1979, on its belated CD and DVD release, and welcoming news of new music venues for York and Edinburgh.

To listen, head to: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1187561/9927881

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Guilds of York to roll out York Mystery Plays wagons on city streets on June 19 and 26

2022 York Mystery Plays artistic director Tom Straszewski

HERE come the wagons, rolling through York’s streets on June 19 and 26 for the 2022 York Mystery Plays.

Once more, the driving force behind the community production will be the Guilds of York, maintaining the four-yearly wagon-play cycle they set in motion in 1998 and last implemented in 2018.

Under the artistic direction of Tom Straszewski, the Mystery Plays will be presented on decorated pageant wagons, in keeping with the medieval custom. Pushed by York residents, these will move through the streets to the accompaniment of musicians.

Straszewski’s production will involve nearly 600 people in all, who will create hours of drama, performed for free. Eight wagons will process through the city centre to stage their chosen plays at four locations, including St Sampson’s Square, St Helen’s Square and King’s Manor.

Roger Lee, chairman of York Festival Trust, says: “With arts and culture being amongst the last areas of our lives allowed to return post-Covid, we are delighted to bring York Mystery Plays back to the city this summer and support the rebirth of live performing arts.

James Swanton as Lucifer with cast members of The Last Judgement when plays from the 2018 York Mystery Plays were staged in the Shambles Market. Picture: Lewis Outing

“Our past productions have met with great popular, academic and critical acclaim, and we hope to build on this success with our 2022 production. In their medieval heyday, the Mystery Plays and the Guilds were inextricably linked, and it is this heritage we are reclaiming with these regular four-yearly productions.

Artistic director Tom Straszewski will work with various partners across York to make the Mystery Plays, their story, themes and message accessible to as many people as possible. “After two years of uncertainty for the arts, this is an opportunity for York’s communities to come together to celebrate our city’s heritage through drama, spectacle and pageantry,” he says.

“This will be a huge boost for people’s well-being and a festival to attract York residents and visitors alike to the city on these two Sundays.”

In the era of pandemic lockdowns and climate change, the theme for 2022’s selection of eight plays will be sustainability and transformation. “The plays will cover the creation of the world, floods, last meals together and resurrections. We are still seeking directors, performance groups and actors to take on these plays, including the iconic Crucifixion with the Butchers’ Gild,” says Tom, who was the artistic director and pageant master for the 2018 Mystery Plays too.

“There are still opportunities to be involved and anyone interested should email director@yorkmysteryplays.co.uk.”

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REVIEW: The HandleBards’ biker-groovy Macbeth, York Theatre Royal ***

Something wickedly funny this way comes: Jenny Smith, left, Natalie Simone and Kathryn Perkins as the ‘Weird Sisters’ in The HandleBards’ Macbeth

The HandleBards in Macbeth, York Theatre Royal, tonight (26/1/2022) at 7.30pm. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk

THE Scottish Play becomes The Skittish Play when recycled by eco-conscious pedalling enthusiasts The HandleBards in pursuit of daft laughs on their return to York Theatre Royal.

Tragedy takes a hike up the Scottish Highlands, soliloquys lose out to a rising cacophony of noise, and The Porter’s knock-knock interlude vanishes like the secret midnight hags into the dreek mists.

Often cut for being Shakespeare’s one (not-very-funny) comic interlude, as unwelcome as a drunken heckler, presumably this time Macbeth’s bouncer has been axed for being the one character that did not require conversion to comedy.

The HandleBards like to break down barriers, as Emma Sampson’s cast demolishes theatre’s fourth wall from the off when perky Kathryn Perkins, towering Natalie Simone and professional debutante Jenny Smith introduce themselves and who they will be playing. These days, it is called meta-theatre, a form of heightened awareness that a play is indeed all about playing.

Crowning gory? Kathryn Perkins’ hell-for-leathers Macbeth

Or it could just be that The HandleBards just want to “shake a spear” at all that seriousness that emanates from so many Shakespeare productions.

Macbeth has broad shoulders and can pretty much take anything you throw at it, on stage or screen, although there was one time on a Leeds stage where the lead actor was so hapless that he not only murdered all around him, he murdered Macbeth.

That does not happen here, but Perkins’ Cockernee Artful Dodger Macbeth does tend to play second fiddle to the weird sisters, the Witches pulling Macbeth every witch way, every which way in this all-female production.

If you want punk irreverence, you will find it here, not least in the biker costume designs of Lucy Green that echo the Seventies’ clobber of Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren, tartan trim and all.

Jenny Smith’s Donalbain in The HandleBards’ Macbeth

Cycling paraphernalia is omnipresent too, from the bell to signify scene changes to the tyres on the Macbeth’s biker jacket; from the bicycle pedalling that provides the power for scenery to turn around to the honking of a horn to add to the anarchic silliness. Macbeth and co are bikers, not cyclists, as indicated by the HandleBards’ use of handlebars to signify motorbikes and a child’s toy for the sound of a revving engine.

There is abundant comic energy here, indeed an excess of it, that leaves Macbeth’s text struggling for air by comparison with last May’s visit of Romeo & Juliet that had a better balance between HandleBards’ comic mayhem and teen tragedy.

Imagine Eric Morecambe undermining Ernie Wise’s attempts to present one of those “plays what I wrote”, but then overplaying it as clarinet and shruti box drown out Perkins’s “Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow” soliloquy. In such a moment, something of the play is lost in choosing to tell it by behaving like Shakespeare’s idiot, full of sound but not fury, signifying what?  

Elsewhere, the comic tone works better, as does the editing out of the dull political stuff down in England. Natalie Simone’s Strictly Come Dancing-loving Lady Macbeth is a scream, blessed with the best comic timing; Jenny Smith has bags of clowning physicality; Perkins’s Macbeth is sacrificed to the constant playfulness.

Dancing queen: Natalie Simone’s Strictly-loving Lady Macbeth

You will enjoy women sending up Macbeth and MacDuff comparing their manliness; the Witches’ percussive musicianship, singing and later rapping; the impatience at MacDuff taking forever to comprehend the news that his wife and bairns are all dead (spoiler alert); the use of red confetti to signify blood; the dagger attached to Macbeth’s head to “see before me”.

Look out too for two Coronavirus references, two well-placed insertions of topical comedy where, elsewhere, Sampson’s cast sometimes pushes too hard for lightweight laughs at the cost of storytelling.

Sampson had decided to not replicate the use of baked beans and tomato soup for blood from the original HandleBards’ Macbeth, preferring the less messy confetti, but there are moments where the production could be cleaner, less prone to over-excitement, less busy.

This Macbeth is neither ‘bloody’ funny, nor dead funny, in a hammy Hammer horror style; more of a Five Go Camp Acting jaunty jape instead.

Coming next will be a tour of Twelfth Night; dates are yet to be announced.

Review by Charles Hutchinson

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How cabbage soup, David Walliams and a Crown Jewels-thieving Gangsta Granny became a recipe for stage show success

Oh, no, cabbage soup again: Granny (Isabel Ford) serves up another spoonful to 11-year-old grandson Ben (Justin Davies) in Birmingham Stage Company’s Gangsta Grammy. Picture: Mark Douet
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WHEN actor, humorist, author, talent-show judge, Channel swimmer and activist David Walliams was a child he spent time aplenty with his grandmas.

So began his odyssey to writing Gangsta Granny, his book for children that has since transferred to the stage in Birmingham Stage Company’s touring production, whose latest itinerary takes in the Grand Opera House from February 3 to 6, having first played the York theatre in September 2016.

“Sometimes I would selfishly think spending time with my grannies could be boring,” he says. “But when I got them on a subject like living in London during World War II, when bombs were raining down, they would become very animated and I would be enthralled. I realised everyone has a story to tell.”

In Walliams’s tale, Friday night means only one thing for Ben: staying with Granny, where he must put up with cabbage soup, cabbage pie and cabbage cake. Ben knows one thing for sure – it will be so, so boring – but what Ben doesn’t know is that Granny has a secret.

Soon Friday nights will be more exciting than he could ever imagine, as he embarks on the adventure of a lifetime with his very own Gangsta Granny.

“I realised everyone has a story to tell,” says David Walliams, who drew on childhood memories of his grandmothers for Gangsta Granny

“There was definitely a smell of cabbages in one of my grandmas’ houses,” recalls Walliams, giving an insight into his inspiration for Gangsta Granny. “The other did break wind like a duck quacking when she walked across the room.”

Walliams acknowledges the special bond between children and their grandparents. “I think grandparents love being grandparents because they get to give the children back to the parents!” says the 50-year-old Little Britain and Partners In Crime television star.

“Children love spending time with their grandparents because they love hearing their stories and being allowed to stay up past their bedtime.”

He is delighted that Gangsta Granny has become a stage show. “It’s a huge thrill seeing Gangsta Granny have this whole new life on the stage. It’s already been a TV film. People seem to really like the story,” says Walliams. “In fact Gangsta Granny is my best-selling book by far, and the stage show is brilliant – better than the book.”

Assessing the potential challenges or difficulties in staging Gangsta Granny, he says: “There is lots of action, especially when they try to steal the Crown Jewels. It’s quite a challenge for Birmingham Stage Company to bring those scenes to life but they do it so well,” he says. “Shows for children need to be fun and fast paced, which Gangsta Granny certainly is.”

Birmingham Stage Company cast members in Gangsta Granny. Picture: Mark Douet

“The great thing about seeing Gangsta Granny on stage is you will get to share it with an audience. So hopefully you will laugh and cry along with everyone else. That’s what makes theatre so special.”

What does Walliams hope children will take away from watching Gangsta Granny in York next month? “The moral of the story is, ‘don’t assume old people are boring just because they are old’,” he advises. “In fact, they are likely to have had a much more interesting life than yours. Talk to old folk, listen to their stories. They are bound to be full of magic and wonder.”

Wise words indeed from Walliams, who took up writing children’s fiction 15 years ago. “I had an idea for a story: what if a boy went to school dressed as a girl? I thought it would be a thought-provoking children’s book. That became The Boy In The Dress, my first of many children’s novels,” he says.

“The only limitation in a children’s book is your imagination. You can take children on magical journeys in books that many adults would be reluctant to go on.”

Walliams highlights the challenges presented by writing for children? “Children love to be scared but it can’t be too horrifying. Children love to laugh but it can’t be too rude. You always have to be the right side of the line,” he says.

He admires the work of Roald Dahl, arguably the 20th century doyen of children’s authors. “I think Dahl’s books always feel a little bit forbidden. He manages to balance the humour and scary elements in his stories perfectly,” says Walliams, who picks The Twits as his favourite Dahl story. “It’s utterly hilarious and I love that it’s a children’s book with no child characters.”

Birmingham Stage Company actor-manager Neal Foster, who has adapted and directed Gangsta Granny

He recalls enjoying other writers, such as Dr Seuss, in his childhood days. “I loved Dr Seuss books as a child, especially Green Eggs And Ham. His books are like nightmares come to life. They are rich and strange and utterly unlike anybody else’s work,” says Walliams.

David Walliams has become popular in his own right as a children’s author and ticket sales for Gangsta Granny testify to that popularity. “I imagine children like the humour and that I don’t patronise them,” he says, summing up his appeal as a storyteller. “I deal with quite big topics, cross-dressing, homelessness, grief. I know children are a lot smarter than most grown-ups think.”

Premiered in 2015, Gangsta Granny has become a West End hit twice over, prompting stage adaptations of Walliams’s books Awful Auntie and Billionaire Boy too. Now Birmingham Stage Company actor-manager Neal Foster’s adaptation returns to York for a second Grand Opera House run, full of Walliams’s humorous home truths wrapped inside family relationships. 

Birmingham Stage Company in Gangsta Granny, Grand Opera House, York, February 3 to 6; Thursday to Saturday, 2.30pm and 7pm, Sunday, 11am and 3pm. Box office: 0844 871 7615 or at atgtickets.com/york. Suitable for age 5+.

Did you know?

SINCE the 2008 publication of his first novel, The Boy In The Dress, David Walliams’s  books have sold  44 million copies worldwide and been translated into 55 languages.

Isabel Ford’s Granny and Justin Davies’s Ben in the Crown Jewels scene in Gangsta Granny. Picture: Mark Douet
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Sunday Lunch video star and Posh Pop queen Toyah to play Pocklington in March

Toyah in Posh Pop mode

EIGHTIES’ pop star Toyah will play Pocklington Arts Centre on March 3 on her up-close-and-personal Posh Pop Tour.

Her “lively cinematic sound” will combine Toyah’s vocals with keyboards and stand-up bass in her arrangements of such hits as It’s A Mystery, Thunder In The Mountains and I Want To Be Free, modern-day works Sensational and Dance In The Hurricane and selections from last autumn’s Posh Pop album.

These will be complemented by stories from her colourful 40-year career that has gained YouTube momentum latterly with Toyah’s Sunday Lunch videos with husband Robert Fripp, drawing ten million views since being started in lockdown. A new season was launched last weekend with their quickfire take on The Undertones’ Teenage Kicks.

Toyah: Posh Pop Tour, Pocklington Arts Centre, Thursday, March 3, 8pm. Box office: 01759 301547 or at pocklkingtonartscentre.co.uk.

Toyah Willcox: Journey from punk princess to Posh Pop queen

AHEAD of her Pocklington show, Martin Hutchinson profiles Birmingham-born singer, actor, television presenter and writer Toyah Willcox.

ONCE known as the “Punk Princess”, Toyah has proved that she is no one-trick-pony. She is an actor of note, featuring in films such as Jubilee, Quadrophenia and Ghosts Of Borley Rectory and the TV shows Shoestring, Minder, Kavanagh QC and Maigret.

She supplied her voice to the animated Mr Bean series and Teletubbies and has ‘done’ Shakespeare, playing Miranda in Derek Jarman’s 1979 film version of The Tempest.

To most of us, however, Toyah is a singer, who took the charts by storm when she first erupted on the scene in 1980. After five releases that failed to interest the mainstream Top 40, despite going top ten in the independent charts, Toyah broke through with the Four From Toyah EP, featuring the fantastic It’s A Mystery that propelled it to number four.

It was to be the first of four consecutive Toyah number ones in the UK independent charts. I Want To Be Free and Thunder In The Mountainswere top ten mainstream hits too and another EP, Four More From Toyah, came next.

The artwork for Toyah’s 2021 album, Posh Pop

Toyah has notched up ten chart albums, including Anthem, which peaked at number two in 1981. The Court Of The Crimson Queen – a reference to her husband Robert Fripp, whose band King Crimson’s breakthrough album was 1969’s In The Court Of The Crimson King – returned her to the album charts after a 33-year gap in 2008.

Last August, she released Posh Pop, an album recorded during lockdown, whose ten tracks each have an accompanying video, filmed mainly in Toyah’s Worcestershire home as well as Pershore Abbey.

Posh Pop went to the very top of the independent charts and reached number 22 in the mainstream charts, making it her highest-charting album since 1982.

All the songs were written by Toyah and her long-standing collaborator Simon Darlow and Bobby Willcox contributed guitar. Who’s he? He just happens to be husband Fripp under a pseudonym.

The album’s lyrics deal with such subjects as letting go of the past (Levitate), teleconferencing (Zoom Zoom) and the need for leadership (Monkeys).

Posh Pop has given Toyah her highest album chart placing since 1982

Levitate, Zoom Zoom and the anti-war protest song Summer Of Love have been released as singles, while Take Me Home is a sequel to Danced from Toyah’s 1979 album, Sheep Farming In Barnet

Writer Darlow’s childhood dream of being an astronaut was the ignition for Space Dance and The Bride Will Return was inspired by Israa al Seblani, a bride whose wedding was disrupted by the 2020 Beirut explosion that killed more than 200 people. She was having her wedding portraits taken at the time.

“[The] song is very much to celebrate the beauty of the brides around the world, who’ve not been able to have their weddings during lockdown,” says Toyah, who married Fripp in 1986.

Now, Toyah is heading around the country in February and March with her Posh Pop band, presenting intimate versions of her classic singles, interspersed with tracks from her new album, and audiences could be in for a few eye-openers as some songs will be performed acoustically.

Already, several songs on Posh Pop have become fan favourites, sitting comfortably alongside her greatest hits.

Now 63 but looking decades younger, Toyah Willcox is still a pocket powerhouse and never fails to put on a magnificent show. Posh Pop in Pock is not to be missed.

Toyah in concert, where she will combine songs and stories on her 2022 tour
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Rick Witter and Paul Banks to play Easter weekend gigs in Barnsley and Scarborough. Expect Shed Seven faves and surprises

RICK Witter and Paul Banks are “going where no Shed has gone before” to play Easter weekend gigs in Barnsley and Scarborough.

Mr H Presents promoter Tim Hornsby has booked the Shed Seven singer and lead guitarist for Birdwell Venue, Barnsley, on April 16 at 7pm and Scarborough Spa Theatre for April 17 at 7.30pm. “Special nights of classic Shed Seven material and a few surprises” are promised.

“Fresh from yet another Shedcember of sold-out shows, and long after the NME darlings have faded away, the mighty Shed Seven are still packing huge venues, and why ever not,” says Mr H. “Since when did b****y great big tunes, consummate musicianship and fabulous shows ever go out of fashion?

“And so we welcome the thinnest man in pop with the biggest voice and the warmest personality, Mr Rick Witter; the witty and urbane frontman of a band that, lest we forget, once rivalled Oasis for Top 20 hits.

“Joined here for the first time in Barnsley and Scarborough by partner-in-crime, the brilliant guitarist and eloquent songwriter Paul Banks, an electrifying showman in his own right and a player with an instantly recognisable style and sound.”

Pre-sales open on Wednesday at https://bit.ly/3GVsTGWand https://bit.ly/RickWitterPaulBanksAcoustic; general tickets go on sale on Friday. “You already know these whites-of-their-eyes shows are going to sell out, so don’t get bothered with the regular unholy last-minute scramble for tickets and purchase early for a holler-along to some of the best anthems ever,” advises Mr H.

Barnsley box office: ents24.com/barnsley-events/birdwell-venue/rick-witter/6412282; Scarborough: ents24.com/scarborough-events/scarborough-spa/rick-witter-paul-banks-shed-seven/6399236.

The poster for Rick Witter and Paul Banks’s duo gigs in Barnsley and Scarborough