York artist Jill Tattersall stands by her work Genesis, Exodus at Thursday’s launch of her Finding The Way exhibition at Bluebird Bakery, Acomb
AS Gary Oldman’s banana-chomping turn in Krapp’s Last Tape enters its last week, Charles Hutchinson finds alternatives aplenty for entertainment and enlightenment.
Exhibition opening of the week: Jill Tattersall, Finding The Way, The Human Maze, Bluebird Bakery, Acomb Road, Acomb, York, until July 3
THE Wolf At The Door artist Jill Tattersall has overcome a bout of Covid to launch her Finding The Way show at Bluebird Bakery, featuring such works as World On Fire: Such Colours In The Sky; Universal (Dis)Order, Blue Rhapsody and City Of Light And Shadows.
“My brother is an anthropologist, in New York, so I’m very interested in cave symbols, early writing, Japanese and Chinese imagery and themes of communication and language,” she says. “I just have fun with all this stuff!”
Got it taped: Gary Oldman in Krapp’s Last Tape on his return to York Theatre Royal after 45 years. Picture: Gisele Schmidt
York theatre event of the year: Gary Oldman in Krapp’s Last Tape, York Theatre Royal, until May 17
OSCAR winner Gary Oldman returns to York Theatre Royal, where he made his professional debut in 1979, to perform Samuel Beckett’s melancholic, tragicomic slice of theatre of the absurd Krapp’s Last Tape in his first stage appearance since 1989.
“York, for me, is the completion of a cycle,” says the Slow Horses leading man. “It is the place ‘where it all began’. York, in a very real sense, for me, is coming home. The combination of York and Krapp’s Last Tape is all the more poignant because it is ‘a play about a man returning to his past of 30 years earlier’.” Tickets update: check availability of returns on 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
The George Harrison Project: Playing the JoRo Theatre on Sunday night
Tribute show of the week: The George Harrison Project, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, Sunday, 7.30pm
THE George Harrison Project celebrates “the quiet Beatle’s” best-loved hits from the Fab Four, his solo career and The Traveling Wilburys.
Sunday’s show combines Taxman, While My Guitar Gently Weeps, Something, Here Comes The Sun, All Things Must Pass, My Sweet Lord, Blow Away, Handle With Care and Got My Mind Set On You with video footage and interesting facts about Harrison and his music. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.
Next Door But One cast members George Green, left, Charlie Blanshard and Becky Heslop in rehearsal for How To Be A Kid
Children’s show of the week: Next Door But One in How To Be A Kid, York Explore, May 12 and 13, 5.30pm; Friargate Theatre, York, May 17, 12 noon and 3pm
AT only 12 years old, Molly cooks, does the dishes and gets her little brother Joe ready for school. Molly misses her Grandma. Molly looks after her mum, but who looks after Molly?
Now her mum is feeling better, maybe things will return to normal. Maybe Molly can learn to be a child again in Sarah McDonald-Hughes’ touching, funny story of family, friends and fitting in, suitable for seven to 11-year-olds and their grown-ups. Warning: this show contains dancing, chocolate cake, dinosaurs, superheroes and an epic car chase, plus big topics such as care, mental health and growing up with an even bigger sense of imagination, creativity, joy and hope. Box office: York Explore, tickettailor.com; Friargate Theatre, ticketsource.co.uk.
Charlie Clarke’s Nora, left, and Chloe Pearson’s Nora’s Self rehearsing a scene from Matthew Peter Clare’s The Inner Selves, next week’s premiere by Black Sheep Theatre Productions. Picture: Matthew Peter Clare
Premiere of the week: Black Sheep Theatre Productions in The Inner Selves, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, May 13 to 17, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee
BLACK Sheep Theatre Productions present the premiere of director Matthew Peter Clare’s debut play, quick on the heels of the York company’s first Shakespeare show, The Tempest, in March.
Clare charts the declining mental health and marriage of Henry and Nora (played by Dan Poppitt and Charlie Clarke) and the cacophonic assault of their inner thoughts (Josh Woodgate’s Henry’s Self and Chloe Pearson’s Nora’s Self) on one climactic day of mediocrity and boredom. As emotions come to a boil, will this marriage survive, even if only until morning? Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
Dara Ó Briain at the double: Playing York Barbican and York Comedy Festival
Comedy gig of the week: Dara Ó Briain, Re:Creation, York Barbican, May 14, 8pm
IRISH comedian, broadcaster and writer Dara Ó Briain will be “doing his favourite thing: standing in a theatre, telling stories and creating madness with the audience” in Re:Creation, his follow-up to 2023’s So, Where Were We?
Should you miss out on Wednesday’s sold-out gig, Ó Briain will be returning to York to co-headline the inaugural York Comedy Festival with Katherine Ryan on July 6 in the finale to Futuresound Group’s second season of Live At York Museum Gardens shows. Box office: futuresound.seetickets.com/event/york-comedy-festival/york-museum-gardens/3288662.
Gizza job: Jay Johnson’s Yosser Hughes in James Graham’s stage adaptation of Alan Bleasdale’s Boys From The Black Stuff, on tour at Leeds Grand Theatre
Touring production of the week: Bill Kenwright Ltd, Royal Court, Liverpool and National Theatre present Boys From The Black Stuff, Leeds Grand Theatre, May 13 to 17, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday matinees
JAMES Graham’s stage adaptation of Alan Beasdale’s BAFTA award-winning television drama Boys From The Black Stuff heads to Leeds with its story of 1980s’ Liverpool, where Chrissie, Loggo, George, Dixie and Yosser are used to hard work and providing for their families, but there is no work and no money.
What are they supposed to do? Work harder, work longer, buy cheaper, spend less? They just need a chance. Life is tough but the lads can play the game. Find the jobs, avoid the ‘sniffers’ and see if you can have a laugh along the way. “Taking it on the road to communities around the country feels like the most important thing we could be doing next with our story,” says Graham.Box office: 0113 243 0808 or leedsheritagetheatres.com.
Mike Scott: Leading The Waterboys at York Barbican on Thursday
Gig of the week: The Waterboys, York Barbican, May 14, 7.30pm and Leeds O2 Academy, June 15, doors 7pm
THE Waterboys showcase “the most audacious album yet” of Mike Scott’s 42-year career, Life, Death And Dennis Hopper, on their latest return to York Barbican, having played their “Big Music” brand of folk, rock, soul and blues there in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2018, 2021 and 2023.
Released last month on Sun Records, their 16th studio album charts the epic path of the trailblazing American actor and rebel, as told through a song cycle that depicts not only Hopper’s story but also the saga of the last 75 years of western pop culture. Box office: York, yorkbarbican.co.uk; Leeds, academymusicgroup.com.