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Corrie & Legally Blonde star Faye Brookes to join Kevin Clifton in Strictly Ballroom The Musical at Grand Opera House in April

Kevin Clifton and Faye Brookes team up for Strictly Ballroom The Musical in York this spring

DANCING On Ice finalist and Coronation Street star Faye Brookes is to join Kevin Clifton in Baz Luhrmann’s Strictly Ballroom The Musical at the Grand Opera House, York, from April 24 to 29.

The Manchester actress, 35, will play the lead female role of Fran opposite Strictly Come Dancing alumnus Clifton’s Scott Hastings in Strictly judge Craig Revel Horwood’s production, co-choreographed with Strictly creative director Jason Gilkison, on tour until July 15.

Faye will be taking over from 2020 Strictly joint runner-up Maisie Smith, who leaves the ten-month tour on March 25 after being on the road since September 26 last year.

Faye is no stranger to musical theatre, having starred as Roxie Hart in Chicago, Princess Fiona in Shrek and Elle Woods in Legally Blonde The Musical, appearing in that pink and perky role at the Grand Opera House in August 2011.

She became a household name after joining ITV soap opera Coronation Street to play Underworld packer and waitress Kate Connor, from 2015-2019. Taking on “some of the biggest storylines the show has seen”, Faye won the 2017 National Television Award for Best Newcomer. In 2021, she skated all the way to the runner-up position in the 13th series of ITV’s Dancing On Ice.

“I can’t wait to work with Craig Revel Horwood, Kevin Clifton and the hugely talented cast,” says Faye Brookes

“I’m thrilled to be joining the tour of Strictly Ballroom and can’t wait to work with Craig Revel Horwood, Kevin Clifton and the hugely talented cast,” says Faye. “I’m so excited to be playing the role of Fran and making it my own. Bring it on!“

Welcoming her to the tour, Kevin Clifton says: “It’s very exciting news that Faye is joining the cast of Strictly Ballroom and I’m looking forward to singing and dancing my way across the UK and Ireland with her.“

Director Craig Revel Horwood says: “I am delighted to be directing the sensational Faye Brookes as she joins Kevin Clifton and the super-talented cast of Strictly Ballroom The Musical. I know that she’ll be nothing short of FAB-U-LOUS!”

Based on Luhrmann’s 1992 Australian romantic comedy film, Strictly Ballroom The Musical tells the beguiling story of Scott Hastings, a talented, arrogant and rebellious young ballroom dancer (played by former Strictly professional and 2018 champion Clifton).

When he falls out with the Australian Federation over his radical dance moves, he finds himself dancing with Fran (Brookes), a beginner with no moves at all. Inspired by one another, this unlikely pairing gathers the courage to defy both convention and families – and discover that, to be winners, the steps don’t need to be strictly ballroom.

Faye Brookes in Legally Blonde The Musical, on tour at the Grand Opera House, York, in 2011

Combining a book by Luhrmann and Craig Pearce with a cast of more than 20, Strictly Ballroom The Musical brings to stage life such songs as Love Is In the Air, Perhaps Perhaps Perhaps and Time After Time with joyous verve.

The tour also features new songs by Sia, David Foster and Eddie Perfect in a show full of “scintillating singing, dazzling dancing and eye-popping costumes”, plus heart, comedy and drama, under the glitterball.

This uplifting and courageous musical originated as a stage play that Baz Luhrmann devised with a group of classmates at Sydney’s National Institute of Dramatic Art in 1984.

Eight years later, he made his silver-screen directorial debut with Strictly Ballroom, the first instalment of his Red Curtain Trilogy, winning three awards at the 1993 BAFTAs and receiving a 1994 Golden Globe nomination for Best Picture. In April 2014, Strictly Ballroom The Musical had its world premiere at the Sydney Lyric Theatre, Australia.

Tickets for the York run can be booked at atgtickets.com/york.

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Ben Folds to play Grand Opera House, York, on What Matters Most tour on Nov 16

Ben Folds: Striding into York on November 16

NORTH Carolina pianist, songwriter, author and podcast host Ben Folds will play the Grand Opera House, York, on his What Matters Most Tour this autumn.

Tickets for the 56-year-old American’s November 16 gig – his first ever York show – will go on sale tomorrow morning (22/2/2023) at atgtickets.com/york.

Making his name fronting the alt-rock trio Ben Folds Five, his genre-bending music has taken in collaborations and special projects.

Folds tours as a pop artist, while also performing with some of the world’s greatest symphony orchestras and serving since 2017 as the first ever artistic advisor to the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts, New York.

Frequently he guest-stars in film and on television, latterly appearing as himself in three episodes of the Amazon Prime series The Wilds. Last year he received an Emmy nomination for his new theme song for The Peanuts Apple TV special, It’s The Small Things, Charlie Brown.

As an advocate for the arts, he serves on the board of the Arts Action Fund, Planet Word and the Nashville Symphony Orchestra. In his home state, he has launched a music education initiative for children.

In 2019, he released his memoir, A Dream About Lightning Bugs, with a second book on its way. In 2021, he launched his podcast, Lightning Bugs.

The artwork for Ben Folds’s June 2 album, What Matters Most, his first in eight years

On June 2, Folds will release What Matters Most, his first studio album since his 2015 collaboration with the string ensemble yMusic, on New West Records.

“There’s a lifetime of craft and experience all focused into this one record,” says Folds. “Sonically, lyrically, emotionally, I don’t think it’s an album I could have made at any other point in my career.”

Recorded in East Nashville and co-produced by Folds with Joe Pisapia, this “bold, timely, cinematic” work spans the bittersweet to the tragic, despair to hopefulness, the title track being inspired by Folds’s late friend, the actor and comedian Bob Saget.

“I come from the vinyl era, and this perhaps more than any record I’ve made is a true album,” says Folds. “There’s a very specific sequence and arc to each side, all building up to this almost surreal positive finale, and that structure was really important to me.

“More than anything, I wanted to make an album that was generous, that was useful. I want you to finish this record with something you didn’t have when you started.”

The track listing is: But Wait, There’s More; Clouds With Ellipses (featuring dodie); Exhausting Lover; Fragile; Kristine From The 7th Grade; Back To Anonymous; first single Winslow Gardens; Paddleboat; What Matters Most
and Moments (feat. Tall Heights)

On the What Matters Most tour, Folds will combine his new album with songs from his 35-year career. Guitarist and singer Lau Noah, from Catalonia via New York, will open the shows.

York will be the only Yorkshire gig on the 2023 tour’s nine-date British and Irish leg in November.

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REVIEW: Martin Dreyer’s verdict on Ukrainian Opera & Ballet, Kyiv, at Grand Opera House, York, February 3 and 4

Elena Dee in Ellen Kent’s production of La Bohème for Ukrainian Opera & Ballet, Kyiv

Ukrainian Opera & Ballet Theatre, Kyiv, in La Bohème and Madama Butterfly, Grand Opera House, York, February 3 and 4

FOR nearly four decades, Ellen Kent has been bringing foreign opera and ballet companies to Britain, mainly from Eastern Europe. She has now additionally turned her hand to directing.

Under her aegis, Ukraine’s flagship company is touring the United Kingdom and Ireland between late January and early May, with Aida in repertory with the two productions here.

It would have been a marathon undertaking at the best of times. War at home makes it no easier. So it was to be expected that the company would play it safe. Still, this was a very respectable effort.

Neither of the lovers was in their best form in Act 1 of La Bohème. Korean-born Elena Dee, now resident in Italy, lacked focus as Mimì initially, but improved spectacularly until delivering some beautifully controlled tone in the final act. Her progression from naïve hesitation to love-induced dependency was nicely calculated.

The same could not be said for Vitalii Liskovetskyi’s Rodolfo. His Act 1 attacks were idle, approaching every phrase from slightly under the note and departing every high note almost before he had reached it. Nor was there much electricity in his interest in Mimì.

Ukrainian Opera & Ballet, Kyiv, in La Bohème

He must have been given a pep-talk after Act 2, because he was unrecognisable thereafter, singing with a purity of phrase that had previously eluded him. By the end he was fully engaged – but he had taken his time.

Olexandr Forkushak made a forthright Marcello, indeed he rarely sang below forte, but he cut a strong presence. The French soprano Olga Perrier was his vivacious, willowy Musetta, strutting and posing like a would-be celeb and really lighting up Act 2, although her relationship with Marcello there could have been give more emphasis. Vitalii Cebotari was a warm, confident Schaunard, with Valeriu Cojocaru a more diffident Colline.

Children from Stagecoach Theatre Arts York were brought in for Act 2, although their song was taken by the chorus ladies: a sensible use of local talent that was to be repeated around the circuit.

Kent needed to think harder about the opera’s comic moments, especially the by-play with the landlord and the Act 4 hi-jinks, which lacked sufficient spontaneity to spark real pathos when disaster struck.

Vasyl Vasylenko, the company’s permanent orchestra director, conducted with a good feel for momentum, steering well clear of sentimentality.

Ukrainian Opera & Ballet, Kyiv, in Madama Butterfly

Madama Butterfly was not quite on the same level. One understands that younger Ukrainians are largely engaged on military assignments, but when Pinkerton, rather than an ardent young lieutenant, is old enough to be Cio-Cio San’s father and looks as if he should be at least a commodore if not a rear admiral, disbelief is not willingly suspended.

Although we could not appreciate her interest in him, Alyona Kistenyova’s Cio-Cio San was appealingly innocent, only introducing steel into her tone when realising that she had been betrayed. Even more engaging was Natalia Matveeva’s sharply observed and keenly attentive Suzuki.

Sorin Lupu’s days as Pinkerton must surely be numbered, given that his tenor showed signs of fraying at the edges. Olexandr Forkushak was back as a determined Sharpless, moderating his dynamic levels as he had not done as Marcello. Ruslan Pacatovici was a busybody Goro and Anastasiia Blokha a striking Kate.

Vasylenko was back in the pit, but this time lacking some of the urgency he had shown in Bohème, but orchestral ensemble remained cohesive.

At the end of each opera, after the first few bows, a Ukrainian flag was unfurled and the national anthem sung, a moment of high poignancy that provoked even more resounding applause in each case.

On tour until May 8. Northern dates include Sunderland Empire (La Bohème, February 24 and Madama Butterfly, February 25), Alhambra Theatre, Bradford (La Bohème, March 16; Madama Butterfly, March 17m, and Aida,  March 18) and Sheffield City Hall (Aida, April 29). Box office: www.ticketmaster.co.uk

Review by Martin Dreyer

Alyona Kistenyova: “Appealingly innocent” in her role as Cio-Cio San in Madama Butterfly
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More Things To Do in York and beyond to lighten up nights and uplift days. Here’s Hutch’s List No. 8 for 2023, from The Press

Countering the winter blues: Doubletake Projections’ Colour and Light illumination at York Minster

DARKNESS and light, American and Scottish singers, Yorkshire brass players and a York comedian will draw the crowds in the week ahead, advises Charles Hutchinson.

Light show of the week: Doubletake Projections’ Colour and Light, York Minster, 6pm to 9pm nightly until February 23

DOUBLETAKE Projections are using projection mapping to re-imagine the facade of York Minster’s  South Transept in a free public show visible from the South Piazza.

Brought to the city by the York BID (Business Improvement District) to illuminate the cathedral during winter’s dark nights, this immersive digital experience is running on an eight-minute loop. Viewers are invited to stay for as many showings as they wish. No booking is required.

In addition to paying homage to the cathedral’s construction and incorporating nods to local history, York Minster’s medieval stained glass is in the spotlight. Collaged compositions of biblical stories told through the glass is being animated and beamed onto the towering transept walls, shining a new light on the medieval window illustrations.

Using animation techniques and styles, the after-dark projection show showcases elements of the rich historical archives in a new way while emphasising the grandeur and ornate detail of York Minster’s architecture.

Chop chop! Demon barber Sweeney Todd (Neil Wood) and resourceful pie-maker Mrs Lovett ( Julie-Anne Smith) make a fast buck from their tasty venture in a cutthroat world in York Light’s Sweeney Todd. Picture: Matthew Kitchen

Dark show of the week: York Light Opera Company in Sweeney Todd, The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street, York Theatre Royal, Wednesday to March 4, 7.30pm, except February 26; 2.30pm, February 25 and March 4

YORK Light return to York Theatre Royal for a 70th anniversary production of “one of the darkest musicals ever written”, Stephen Sondheim’s noir thriller Sweeney Todd, directed by Martyn Knight with musical direction by Paul Laidlaw.

Neil Wood plays the Georgian-era misanthropic barber who returns home to London after 15 years in exile, seeking vengeance on the corrupt judge (Craig Kirby) who ruined his life. The road to revenge leads him to open new tonsorial premises above the failing pie shop run by Mrs Lovett (Julie-Anne Smith). Cue a very tasty meaty new ingredient to boost sales in this now cutthroat business. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

Shepherd Group Brass Band: Performing with the Black Dyke Band at Grand Opera House, York

Fundraiser of the week: York Brass Against Cancer 2, Grand Opera House, York, Sunday, 2.30pm

YORK’S Shepherd Group Brass Band joins up with West Yorkshire’s world famous Black Dyke Band for a charity collaboration in aid of York Against Cancer. BBC Radio Leeds presenter David Hoyle hosts this two-hour concert. Box office: atgtickets.com/york

Belinda Carlisle: Revisiting her decades of hits at York Barbican

California calling: Belinda Carlisle, The Decades Tour, York Barbican, Monday, 7.30pm

NOW living in Bangkok and once the lead vocalist of The Go-Gos, “the most successful all-female rock band of all time”, Los Angelean Belinda Carlisle, 64, has enjoyed chart-topping solo success too with Heaven Is A Place On Earth.

At a gig rearranged from October 2021, hopefully The Decades Tour set list will be taking in Runaway Horses, I Get Weak, Circle In The Sand, Leave A Light On, Summer Rain, (We Want) The Same Thing, Live Your Life Be Free, In Too Deep and Always Breaking My Heart from her eight studio albums. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.

Suzanne Vega: Songs and stories from New York in York on Wednesday night

Storyteller of the week: Suzanne Vega, An Intimate Evening Of Songs And Stories, York Barbican, Wednesday, 7.30pm

2022 Glastonbury acoustic stage headliner Suzanne Vega, 63, plays York Barbican as the only Yorkshire show of the New York singer-songwriter’s 14-date tour.

Emerging from the Greenwich Village folk revival scene of the 1980s, Vega has brought succinct, insightful storytelling to songs of city life, ordinary people and social culture. Her support act will be Tufnell Park folk singer and traditional song archivist Sam Lee. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.

Rob Auton: Send in the crowds in York, Pocklington and Leeds

Crowd pleaser: Rob Auton, The Crowd Show, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, February 24 (Burning Duck Comedy Club) , 8pm, sold out; Pocklington Arts Centre, May 27, 8pm; Hyde Park Book Club, Leeds, June 5, 7.30pm

CHARMINGLY offbeat York poet, stand-up comedian, actor and podcaster Rob Auton returns home from London on his 2023 leg of The Crowd Show tour. Next Friday’s show is crowded out already but space is available at his Pocklington and Leeds gigs.

After his philosophical observations on the colour yellow, the sky, faces, water, sleep, hair, talking and time, now he discusses crowds, people and connection in a night of comedy and theatre “suitable for anyone who wants to be in the crowd for this show”. Box office: Pocklington, 01759 301547 or pocklingtonartscentre.co.uk; Leeds, hydeparkbookclub.co.uk.

KT Tunstall: A nut in every soundbite on her latest album, showcased at York Barbican on Friday

Doing her Nut: KT Tunstall, York Barbican, February 24, 8pm

SCOTTISH singer-songwriter KT Tunstall returns to York on Friday for the first time since she lit up the Barbican on Bonfire Night in 2016. In her line-up will be Razorlight’s Andy Burrows, on drum duty after opening the gig with his own set.

The BRIT Award winner and Grammy nominee from Edinburgh will be showcasing songs from her seventh studio album, last September’s Nut, the conclusion to her “soul, body and mind” trilogy after 2016’s Kin and 2018’s Wax. Box office: kttunstall.com and yorkbarbican.co.uk.

A tale of love: Will Parsons as Davy and Kayla Vicente as Yvonne in Central Hall Musical Society’s Sunshine On Leith at the JoRo Theatre. Picture: Joly Black (jolyblack4@gmail.com)

You should walk 500 miles for: Central Hall Musical Society in Sunshine On Leith, Joseph Rowntree Theatre,  York, February 23 to 25, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee

SUNSINE On Leith, aka “the Proclaimers’ musical”, is a tale of love; love for family, love for friends, love for romantic partners and love for our homes, as one tight-knit family, and the three couples bound to it, experience the joys and heartache that punctuate all relationships. 

Secrets will be revealed, relationships made and lost and broken hearts mended once more, all while singing the songs of Charlie and Craig Reid in this student production by the University of York’s musical theatre society, directed by Romilly Swingler. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.

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Remember that film? Now Pretty Woman: The Musical heads for Grand Opera Opera next February with ‘love story for the ages’

Danny Mac’s Edward and Aimie Atkinson’s Vivian in the West End production of Pretty Woman: The Musical. Picture: Helen Maybanks

THE debut UK tour of Pretty Woman: The Musical will play the Grand Opera House, York, from February 20 to 24 next year.

Billed as “Hollywood’s ultimate rom-com, live on stage”, the show features original music and lyrics by Canadian rock star and Grammy Award winner Bryan Adams and Jim Vallance and a book by Garry Marshall and the 1990 film’s screenwriter, J F Lawton, with direction and choreography by two-time Tony Award winner Jerry Mitchell.

Tickets for the 7.30pm evening performances and 2.30pm Wednesday and Saturday matinees in York are newly on sale at atgtickets.com/York.

The West End production continues to play at the Savoy Theatre, London, taking bookings until June 11 2023. The British and Irish tour will open on October 17 at the Birmingham Alexandra  Theatre; the tour cast is yet to be announced.

Should the Richard Gere-Julia Roberts movie have escaped your attention, here is a quick refresher course on Pretty Woman’s story: Once upon a time in the late 1980s, Vivian met Edward and her life changed forever.

Or put it another way, in a tale based somewhat loosely on George Bernard Shaw’s play Pygmalion, rich New York corporate raider Edward Lewis hires free-spirited Hollywood prostitute Vivian Ward to accompany him to a series of social events, only to fall in love with her. How will they bridge the chasm between their worlds?

Danny Mac’s Edward Lewis and Aimie Atkinson’s Vivian Ward in a scene from Pretty Woman: The Musical at the Savoy Theatre, London

Move forward to 2023-2024, when the tour publicity invites you to “be swept up in their romance in this dazzlingly theatrical take on a love story for the ages – and get to know these iconic characters in a whole new way – in a sensational show guaranteed to lift your spirits and light up your heart”.

The musical also features the Roy Orbison and Bill Dees composition Oh, Pretty Woman, the Big O’s August 1964 chart topper that inspired Garry Marshall’s film.

Atlantic Records has released Pretty Woman: The Musical (Original Broadway Cast Recording), a soundtrack album produced by Adams and Vallance.

The show has  scenic design by David Rockwell; costumes by Tom Rogers, from the original Broadway designs by Gregg Barnes; lighting design by Kenneth Posner and Philip S Rosenberg; sound design by John Shivers; hair design by Josh Marquette and music supervision, arrangements and orchestrations by Will Van Dyke. 

Pretty Woman; The Musical received its world premiere at Chicago’s Oriental Theatre in March 2018 before transferring to Broadway, where it ran at the Nederlander Theatre. A German production opened in Hamburg at the Stage Theater an der Elbe in September 2019 and a USA tour began in October 2021. 

The Ambassador Theatre Group, the Grand Opera House owners, are among the tour’s producers.

The artwork for Pretty Woman: The Musical, on tour at the Grand Opera House, York, next February
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Happy Valentine’s day, all week, as York Stage’s Sweet Charity goes in search of love

Looking for love: Katie Melia’s Charity Hope Valentine in York Stage’s Sweet Charity

WHAT better character name could there be for a show opening on St Valentine’s Day than Charity Hope Valentine?!

Company regular Katie Melia will take that sweet, optimistic, indomitable, hopeful, romantic, trusting, naïve, quirky, charming, caring, irresistible role in York Stage’s production of Sweet Charity, the musical with the subtitle The Adventures Of A Girl Who Wanted To Be Loved.

From tomorrow to Sunday, the John Cooper Studio will be transformed into a seedily seductive Fandango Ballroom for the 1966 Broadway musical with a book by Neil Simon, music by Cy Coleman and lyrics by Dorothy Fields, decorated by such songs as Big Spender, If My Friends Could See Me Now and Rhythm Of Life.

“I’ve wanted to do Sweet Charity for over a decade in York,” says director-producer Nik Briggs. “When I started York Stage, we had an Independent Woman season, with Hairspray, Sister Act and Legally Blonde, and Sweet Charity was in on the wish list.

Fandango Ballroom dancers: Emily Ramsden’s Nickie, back, Carly Morton’s Helene and Katie Melia’s Charity Hope Valentine

“I’ve always loved Neil Simon’s work, and considering it’s a dance-heavy musical, you can still really get into the story. What made him so special at that time is the realism in his work, where everyone recognises those situations, and to see those scenes so intimately at Theate@41 will be really rewarding.”

In the American musical comedy, Melia’s heart-of-gold New York City taxi dancer Charity Hope Valentine fantasises about three things in life: romance, luxury and escaping the questionable ballroom clientele. Lovable, gullible and spirited, she longs to find a lover to sweep her off her feet but Charity keeps handing over her heart and earnings to the wrong man, whether Charlie, his name tattooed on her arm, movie star Vittorio Vidal or Oscar.

“Charity is billed as ‘the girl who wanted to be loved’. All she wants is true love,” says Nik. “But as [fellow dancer] Nickie tells her, ‘your big problem is you run your heart like a hotel – you got guys checkin’ in and out all the time’. She’s the kind of girl who falls in love too easily and just goes from guy to guy.

“Sweet Charity follows hostess Charity through the various men in her life, as she lives in hope through all of them, but deep down, we all know that we’ve seen it all before and heard it all before, and one of the reasons I love the piece is that it doesn’t give audiences the ending they expect.”

Nik Briggs: York Stage director-producer for Sweet Charity

Briggs has picked a cast of 15, led by Melia’s Charity, who is joined by Emily Ramsden and Carly Morton as dancers Nickie and Helene; Stuart Piper as Oscar; Jack Hooper as Vittorio Vidal; James Robert Ball as Daddy; Briggs himself as Fandango ballroom owner/pimp Herman and York Stage newcomer Mary Clare as Ursula and Rosie.

Amy Barrett, who played the female lead, assembly line worker Lauren, in York Stage’s Kinky Boots last September, will be Carmen, while supporting roles go to Verity Carr, Ilana Weets, Kelly Stocker, Sam Roberts, Stuart Hutchinson and debut-making Katherine Farr.

Rather than an orchestra of 30 for big Broadway productions of Sweet Charity, Briggs and musical director Jess Viner have “totally rearranged” the songs for a small band, stationed above the stage on the mezzanine level. “It’s almost like a jazz quartet,” says Nik. “We’ve created a production for the Theatre@41 space [a black box design] and that space is very much a 16th member of the cast.”

A further key factor is the choreography for a musical first choreographed by Bob Fosse for both the stage premiere and the 1969 film, his screen directorial debut. “You can’t move away from the Sixties, that very stylised choreography that is sensual and sexual,” says Nik.

Emily Ramsden’s Nickie and Carly Morton’s Helene in York Stage’s Sweet Charity

“Danielle Mullan-Hill has created really dynamic routines for us that’ll be very exciting to see in that space – and she knows that space and how to work it from doing our pandemic pantomime, [Jack And The Beanstalk, in December 2020]. It will feel really immersive.”

To mark St Valentine’s Day, York Stage are advertising the first night as “Galentine’s Night”. “Traditionally, it’s a night for all the gals without a Valentine date, when they get all the girls round,” says Nik. “There’s a glass of fizz included in the ticket for Valentine’s night for gals…and guys.”

Coming next from York Stage will be Ian Fleming’s fantasmagorical musical Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, flying car et al, at the Grand Opera House, York, from April 6 to 15. Principal roles will go to Carly Morton as Truly Scrumptious; Ned Sprouston as inventor Caractacus Potts; Finn East as Baron Bomburst; Richard Barker as the evil Childcatcher and Mick Liversidge as Grandpa Potts. Adam Tomlinson will be the musical director.

York Stage in Sweet Charity, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, tomorrow (14/2/2023) until Sunday, 7.30pm, except Sunday; , 2.30pm Saturday and Sunday matinees. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

York Stage in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Grand Opera House, York, April 6 to 15, 7.30pm; 2.30pm, April 7, 8, 12 and 15; no shows on April 9. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.

The poster for York Stage’s spring production, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, at the Grand Opera House, York
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Is Michael McIntyre playing York? Yes, but both Grand Opera House gigs have sold out

Michael McIntyre: New material next week in York

COMEDIAN Michael McIntyre has sold out next week’s two Work In Progress shows at the Grand Opera House, York, in only eight minutes.

The 46-year-old Londoner will be “trying out brand new material” on February 16 and 17 at 8pm on his return to the Cumberland Street venue, where he last road-tested new gags on February 28 last year.

McIntyre’s big break came on the televised 2006 Royal Variety Performance, since when his tours have sold four million tickets. He holds the record for the highest-selling artist at London’s O2, Britain’s biggest arena, where he sold out 28 shows.

McIntyre hosted Michael McIntyre’s Comedy Roadshow from 2009 on BBC One, winning the National Television Award for Best Entertainment Programme in 2012.

In 2016, he began hosting Michael McIntyre’s Big Show, again on BBC One. Now in its sixth series, the show has won several awards, such as a BAFTA for Best Entertainment Performance.

In 2020, McIntyre devised and hosted the BBC One gameshow Michael McIntyre’s The Wheel. Nominated for BAFTA and NTA Awards, the show has returned this year for a third series. Soon McIntyre will host the American version on NBC.

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REVIEW: An Inspector Calls, PW Productions/National Theatre, Grand Opera House, York, until Saturday. SOLD OUT *****

Seat of power on shaky ground: Christine Kavanagh’s Sybil Birling, Jeffrey Harmer’s Arthur Birling and Chloe Orrock’s Sheila Birling in An Inspector Calls. Picture: Tristram Kenton

IT began at York Theatre Royal in 1989, last played there in 2018 and sold out this week’s run at the Grand Opera House well before the opening night.

Welcome back Stephen Daldry’s award-encrusted reinvention of Bradford socialist playwright JB Priestley’s time play, a set text on the school curriculum. Hence teenagers aplenty at Wednesday’s matinee, initially tucking into noisy packet contents, but gradually being drawn into Inspector Goole’s forensic, if unconventional inquisition of the wealthy Birling family on the 1912 night that daughter Sheila has become engaged to Gerald Croft.

More noise came from an audience member striding across the creaking dress-circle floorboards to complain of not being able to see inside the Birlings’ Edwardian home. But that is the point. Theirs is an enclosed, blinkered, self-serving world, one that the arrival of Liam Brennan’s Scotsman Goole will open to exposure and cause a stink, like the peeling back of a sardine can.

After sirens and rain and an orchestral swell at the start, as children seek to find a way through the stage curtain to remind us this is the world of theatre at play, the house is revealed, perched, like an oversized doll’s house, on a bombed London street, in Daldry’s nod to Priestley’s play being written in 1945.

Liam Brennan’s Inspector Goole: The voice of conscience in An Inspector Calls. Picture: Tristram Kenton

Nearby stands a red telephone box, stripped of its door,  in Ian MacNeil’s still breathtaking design, no matter how many times you may have seen Daldry’s production over the past 30-plus years.

Smug conversation emerges through the windows, dominated by knighthood-seeking, cigar-smoking businessman Arthur Birling (Jeffrey Harmer) and Sheila’s fiancé Gerald (Simon Cotton), an Arthur in the making. Wastrel son Eric (George Rowlands, understudied by Maceo Cortezz on Wednesday), forever disappointing his father, says little.

Outside, urchin children are playing on the shattered street, later joined by “supernumeraries”, haunting figures to match fellow outsider Edna (Frances Campbell), the family servant ignored by all but Sheila (Chloe Orrock), the only one to express regret at what subsequently unfolds. Edna will dutifully, silently, attend to her duties, providing cups of tea and food for Goole too.

Investigating the death of a young woman in poverty, he is the ultimate outsider, exposing something rotten in the state of the Birlings/England. Goole by name, ghoul by nature, the Marley to bilious Arthur Birling’s Ebenezer Scrooge, he is also Priestley’s still prescient prophet on stage (JB foreseeing the need for change in GB that will sweep Labour to power in 1945). The voice of moral conscience, the harbinger in the moonlight, demanding a turning of the tide.

Christine Kavanagh’s self-righteous Sybil Birling. Picture: Tristram Kenton

Like on a doll’s house, the whole of the front of the house suddenly opens, mini-front door et al. In turn, Goole will remove hat, coat and pinstriped suit jacket, even rolling up his sleeves, the more he exposes the arrogant, entitled behaviour of the Birlings and Croft, especially when the monstrous matriarch, Christine Kavanagh’s do-gooding, but does-no-gooding Sybil Birling, makes her grand entry.

Goole delivers one of theatre’s most resonant final speeches: “And I tell you that the time will soon come when, if men will not learn that lesson, then they will be taught it in fire and blood and anguish. Good night.”

It becomes all the more resonant in our strike-ridden, blame-game, divided, dyspeptic disunited kingdom, as Priestley calls for the need to care for each other, for compassion and collective responsibility, but definitely not applied with the insincerity of George Osborne’s “We’re all in this together” mantra of the austerity years.

In her interview, Christine Kavanagh talked of Daldry’s demeanour in the rehearsal room, his sense of humour, mischief and playfulness undimmed after so many years of directing this remarkable piece of theatre. That spirit pours through his cast in this latest tour, and you can be sure the inspector will keep on calling. We need to listen to him, that warning of fire and blood and anguish.

Review by Charles Hutchinson 

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Monster role, monster tour as Christine Kavanagh takes the long road in JB Priestley’s time play An Inspector Calls

“She’s a tyrant, she’s a monster, but I play her as a mother who believes she was right,” says Christine Kavanagh of Mrs Birling, her role in An Inspector Calls. Picture: Tristram Kenton

AN Inspector Calls keeps on calling, returning to York next week on the 30th anniversary tour to mark Stephen Daldry’s radical take on J B Priestley’s thriller opening at the National Theatre.

“We’ve been touring so long already, it feels like the longest tour in history,” says Christine Kavanagh, who is in her 30th week of playing Mrs Birling in Priestley’s 1945 time play after starting rehearsals last August.

On the road from September 9 2022 to April 28 2023, Christine applies the philosophy of “It’s a marathon, not a sprint” to handling such a demanding itinerary.

“We all support each other in the ensemble. People think it’s all about the play, but each week it’s also about ‘where do you get the best poached eggs?’. Only on Fridays are there no matinees, so that day’s known as ‘Hot Friday’. Otherwise, it’s full on, from the Tuesday tech onwards.”

Last playing York in September 2018 at a sold-out Theatre Royal, PW Productions’ tour collaboration with the National Theatre switches to the Grand Opera House this time for a February 7 to 11 run that is fully booked already.

“Can you believe it, post-Covid, we’ve sold out every theatre we’ve been to on this tour,” says Christine, who defines the sustained appeal of Daldry’s award-garlanded account of Priestley’s story of the prosperous Birling family’s peaceful dinner party in 1912 being shattered by the inspector’s unexpected call and subsequent investigations into the death of a young woman.

“Stephen basically broke the play out of the box of being seen as a fusty old political melodrama, even though Priestley viewed it as an experimental piece, playing with time, that he first performed in Russia.

“Stephen brough it alive as a play for a contemporary audience, with bombs going off around an Edwardian house that emerges from a crater, in 1945 [the year it was written], but still with that sense that we’re all about to sink, from Priestley setting the play on the night the Titanic went down.”

Applying the format of a thriller, Priestley was using his play as a warning, suggests Christine, to highlight the dangers of casual capitalism’s cruelty, complacency, and hypocrisy. 

“Priestley was in the trenches in the First World War and had suffered badly, and he was worried what was coming down the pipe. He was a fierce advocate of Socialism and the redistribution of power,” she says.

Seat of power: Christine Kavanagh’s Mrs Birling in An Inspector Calls

“In this play, a young woman who was exploited dies in poverty, and in asking who’s responsible, Priestley’s saying we are all responsible. That theme has never gone away, and in our present society, it’s a simple message of how we must care for each other.”

Daldry premiered his startling reinvigoration of An Inspector Calls at York Theatre Royal in the autumn of 1989, three years before its National Theatre debut. He remains at the helm for the latest tour, directing a cast of Kavanagh’s Mrs Birling;  Liam Brennan, reprising his role of Inspector Goole for a fifth tour; Jeffrey Harmer as Mr Birling; Simon Cotton as Gerald Croft; Chloe Orrock as Sheila Birling; George Rowlands as Eric Birling and Frances Campbell as Edna. 

“Coming back into the rehearsal room, it was like Stephen was 22 again, loving being with us in our scruffs, with his sense of humour and mischief and his playfulness. He still loves all that,” says Christine.

“Not many productions can stand the test of time, and you could get cynical after a while, but then you see the effect this play has on schoolchildren, how hooked they are.”

What does she make of Mrs Birling, with all her shouting and foot stamping? “She represents power; she’s a tyrant, she’s a monster, but I play her as a mother who believes she was right. She’s rather intransigent and thinks, ‘I was just doing my duty’,” she says.

“I’m a mother too and I’m known for my sense of humour, whereas Mrs Birling has had a sense of humour bypass. I don’t know if I empathise with her, but it might be fun being filthy rich…but only for a while, though they always say ‘ the devil has the best lines’.”

As for the costumes, Christine’s heaviest dress wears six kilos off the waist. “That’s just the weight of all that silk. It’s like wearing a rucksack!” she says. “Each costume is handmade for each tour. The designs are fabulous.”

Christine, who studied at Bretton Halll College of Education in West Yorkshire, draws on all her experience of stage travels at 65. “Living out of a suitcase goes with the territory of going on tour, but you have to find ways to cope psychologically by bringing your creature comforts with you and not staying in Mrs Goggins’ digs 30 minutes from the theatre. I like my frothy coffee maker!” she says. “You have to look after yourself really well. Take your multi-vitamins and go to bed as early as you can.”

The long tour has afforded Christine a different opportunity too. “There’s not a city we don’t play, so going around the country lets you reflect on whether levelling up is happening or not,” she says. “I think every politician should do that.”

PW Productions and the National Theatre present An Inspector Calls at Grand Opera House, York, from February 7 to 11, 7.30pm plus Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday matinees at 2.30pm. SOLD OUT. Box office for returns only: atgtickets.com/York.

Copyright of The Press, York

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More Things To Do in York when a Yorkshireman’s favourite price is on offer. Hutch List No. 5 for 2023, from The Press

Hannah Davies: Poetic monologues at York Explore Library in Pilot Theatre’s Monoliths for York Residents’ Festival

THE best things in life are not always free, but plenty are this weekend for York residents. Charles Hutchinson also highlights the best value in theatre, music, art and comedy.  

Event of the week: York Residents’ Festival 2023, today and tomorrow

ORGANISED by Make It York, York Residents’ Festival 2023 combines more than 100 attractions, events and offers this weekend. Historical attractions such as York Minster, Jorvik Viking Centre, Fairfax House, York Castle Museum, Barley Hall and The Guildhall will be opening their doors for free to residents.   

Further highlights include wizard golf at The Hole In Wand; free river cruises with City Cruises; chocolate tours at York’s Chocolate Story; behind-the-scenes tours of York Theatre Royal and a virtual reality experience with Pilot Theatre’s Monoliths, featuring poetic monologues on city, country and coastal northern landscapes by Hannah Davies, Carmen Marcus and Asma Elbadawi  at York Explore Library. Restaurants, cafés and shops are taking part too. For full details, go to: visityork.org/resfest.

Fat chance…to see Sofie Hagen in her Fat Jokes show at Theatre@41

Comedy gig of the week: Sofie Hagen: Fat Jokes, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, Tuesday, 8pm

EDINBURGH Fringe comedy award winner Sofie Hagen presents Fat Jokes, a storytelling show bursting with big jokes, fat punchlines and unforgettable moments. “Come as you are and enjoy an actual fat person at the top of her game,” says the Danish-born, London-based comedian’s publicity blurb. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

Travelogue of the week: Around The World In 80 Days, York Theatre Royal, Thursday, 2pm and 7.30pm; Friday, 7.30pm; Saturday, 2.30pm and 7.30pm

PRODUCERS Tilted Wig are teaming up with York Theatre Royal for a nationwide tour of Around The World In 80 Days in creative director Juliet Forster’s circus-themed version of Jules Verne’s story, first staged on York playing fields in 2021.

Original cast member Eddie Mann will be joined by Alex Phelps, Katriona Brown, Wilson Benedito and Genevieve Sabherwal, who each multi-role as the rag-tag band of travelling big-top performers embarks on a daring mission to recreate Phileas Fogg’s fictitious journey, interwoven with the true story of Nellie Bly’s globe-travelling deeds. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

Anna Meredith: Genre-crossing composer and musician heading for The Crescent in Independent Venue Week. Picture: Gem Harris

Innovators of the week: Please Please You presents Rozi Plain and Mayshe-Mayshe, The Crescent, York, Tuesday, 7.30pm; Anna Meredith and Elsa Hewitt, The Crescent, York, Friday, 7.30pm

WINCHESTER singer-songwriter Rozi Plain showcases her fifth album, Prize, released on Memphis Industries on January 13. Highlights among its ten tracks include the blissful single Agreeing For Two, the synth explorations of Painted The Room and the woozy jazz inflections of Spot Thirteen.

Later in the week, in a special show for Independent Venue Week, The Crescent welcomes Anna Meredith MBE, the genre-crossing composer and producer whose work straddles contemporary classical, art pop, electronica and experimental rock. Guitar, drums, cello and tuba feature in her band. Box office:  thecrescentyork.com.

Liam Brennan’s Inspector Goole in An Inspector Calls, on tour at the Grand Opera House, York. Picture: Tristram Kenton

Political thriller returns: An Inspector Calls, Grand Opera House, York, February 7 to 11, 7.30pm nightly plus 2.30pm Wednesday and Thursday matinees

PREMIERED at the Theatre Royal in 1989, Stephen Daldry’s radical take on Yorkshireman J B Priestley’s thriller An Inspector Calls returns to York next month with tour regular Liam Brennan once more in the role of Inspector Goole.

Written at the end of the Second World War and set before the First, Priestley’s time play opens with the Birling family’s peaceful dinner party being shattered by the inspector’s call and subsequent investigations into the death of a young woman as the dangers of casual capitalism’s cruelty, complacency and hypocrisy are highlighted. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.

Leroy Virgil: Teaming up with York band The Black Skies at The Crescent

Country gig of the week: Hellbound Glory & The Black Skies, The Crescent, York, February 7, 7.30pm

RENO resident and Hellbound Glory main man Leroy Virgil has single-handedly invented an outlaw country music sub-genre he affectionately calls “Scumbag Country”.

His stories from the seedy underbelly of the place he calls home in sunny Nevada are full of character observations and introspection, set to a soundtrack of folk and blues-laced Americana. His York gig will be one of only three on his debut British tour to promote latest long player The Immortal Hellbound Glory: Nobody Knows You.

Young York alt/rock band The Black Skies will be his backing band as well as playing their own set at this double bill of whisky-drenched, low-slung country and rock’n’roll from the American mid-west and Yorkshire. Box office: thecrescentyork.com.

The poster for York Ceramics Fair 2023

Going potty for pottery: York Ceramics Fair, York Racecourse, March 4, 10am to 5pm, and March 5, 10am to 4pm

AFTER a short break to find a new venue, York Ceramics Fair makes a March return indoors at York Racecourse for a fourth instalment with an “impressive line-up of ceramicists”, complemented by activities, events, talks and more besides.

A free shuttle bus will be running between York Racecourse, on Kavesmire Road, and the Memorial Gardens Coach Park, in Station Road, York. Tickets: via Eventbrite at yorkceramicsfair.com/ticket-info.

Nik Briggs: Directing York Stage in Everybody’s Talking About Jamie: Teen Edition

Looking ahead: Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, Teen Edition, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, May 29 to June 3

YORK Stage will be holding the first round of auditions for the Teen Edition of Everybody’s Talking About Jamie today, seeking black, Asian and mixed-race performers aged 13-19 to fulfil Nik Briggs’s company’s commitment to represent the diverse community of Sheffield, the show’s setting, through his casting. A second audition day follows on February 4.

Dan Gillespie Sells and Tom MacRae’s coming-of-age musical follows the true-life story of 16-year-old Sheffield schoolboy Jamie Campbell as he overcomes prejudice and bullying to step out of the darkness to become a drag queen. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.