Tag: Janet Morrison

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What’s On in Ryedale, York and beyond. Hutch’s List No. 14 for Gazette & Herald

Oliver Davis, Amber Wadey, Connor Keetley and Abigail Bailey in The Very Hungry Caterpillar Show. Picture: Pamela Raith

FROM a very hungry caterpillar to a life-changing musical, a Ritchie  Blackmore tribute to Normal poetry, Charles Hutchinson  looks on the bright side for spring joy. 

Children’s show of the week: ROYO presents The Very Hungry Caterpillar Show, York Theatre Royal, tomorrow, 2pm and 4pm; Friday and Saturday, 11am and 2pm

CREATED by Jonathan Rockefeller, The Very Hungry Caterpillar Show features 75 lovable puppets in a faithful 50-minute adaptation of four stories by author/illustrator Eric Carle:Brown Bear, Brown Bear, 10 Little Rubber Ducks, The Very Busy Spider and the titular star of the show. In the cast will be Abigail Bailey, Oliver Davis, Connor Keetley and  Amber Wadey. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

Nic Cage Against The Machine: A tribute act like no other at The Crescent, York

York tribute act of the week: Nic Cage Against The Machine, The Crescent, York, Friday, 7.30pm

MOVE over Elvana, the covers- band conflation of Elvis and Nirvana. Here comes the even wilder Nic Cage Against The Machine, a tribute to Californian rock band Rage Against The Machine, fronted by an homage to Hollywood’s Nouveau Shamanic method actor supreme Nicolas Cage, with props. Leeds fun punks Moose Knuckle support. Box office: thecrescentyork.com.

Blackmore’s Blood: Celebrating the hard rock of Deep Purple and Rainbow

Ryedale tribute show of the week: Blackmore’s Blood, Milton Rooms, Malton, Friday, 8pm

BLACKMORE’S Blood exploded on to the scene in 2016 with its tribute to Ritchie Blackmore’s rock years with Deep Purple and Rainbow, combining an authentic sound with a flamboyant stage presence and thrilling theatrics.

Playing not only the classics, every performance is a time machine, transporting audiences back to the glory days of hard rock with electrifying riffs, soaring melodies and Blackmore swagger. Box office: 01653 696240 or themiltonrooms.com.

York Stage cast members in Nik Briggs’s production of Come From Away. Picture: Matthew Kitchen

Musical of the week: York Stage in Come From Away, Grand Opera House, York, Friday to April 18, 7.30pm, except Sunday and Monday; 2.30pm, Saturday matinees; 4pm, Sunday matinee

NIK Briggs directs the York premiere of Irene Sankoff and David Hein’s Olivier and Tony Award-winning musical account of the real-life story of 7,000 air passengers being grounded in Canada in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, whereupon the small Newfoundland community of Gander invites these “come from aways” into their lives with open hearts.

Performed by a cast of 19, Come From Away is “more than just a musical,” says Briggs. “It’s a celebration of humanity, resilience and the power of community. Step into a world where kindness conquers all, brought to life with invigorating, electrifying music and stories that will make you laugh, cry, and believe in the goodness of people.” Box office: atgtickets.com/york.

Cyril Raymond and Janet Morrison in the poster for Meaningful Films’ documentary Briefest Encounters at City Screen Picturehouse

Film event of the week: Brief Encounter, Briefest Encounters and Q&A, City Screen Picturehouse, York, Friday, 7pm

FRIDAY’S screening of the 80th anniversary restoration of David Lean’s Brief Encounter (PG) will be followed by North Rigton-raised journalist, researcher and filmmaker Joanna Crosse’s new documentary, uncovering the untold love story behind the 1945 film, revealing the hidden past of her grandfather, actor Cyril Raymond,  who played Laura’s cuckolded husband Fred.

In an uncanny twist of fate, Raymond had a ‘brief encounter’ with actress Janet Morrison during a transatlantic stage production in 1929 that resulted in a child being born out of wedlock. Cinema myth meets lived experience in Briefest Encounters as interviews, letters, Raymond’s rediscovered diaries and archive material show how interrupted love, inherited silence and duty shaped family lives for generations. Crosse and fellow Meaningful Films filmmaker Luke Taylor will take part in a Q&A afterwards. Box office: picturehouses.com.

Classical pianist Julian Trevelyan: Performing at Helmsley Arts Centre

Classical concert of the week; Julian Trevelyan, Farewell Letters, Helmsley Arts Centre, April 11, 7.30pm

CONCERT pianist Julian Trevelyan performs regularly throughout Europe and in the UK. He moved to France after winning the 2015 Long-Thibaud-Crespin international competition at the age of 16, becoming the youngest prize-winner in the competition’s history. He has since won prizes at international piano competitions such as Leeds, Géza Anda & Horowitz. He will be performing works by Bach, Byrd, Oginski, Beethoven, Schönberg,  Strauss/Trevelyan and Mozart. Box office: 01439 771700 or helmsleyarts.co.uk.

Jan Brierton and Henry Norma:l: Teaming up for poetry and humour at Helmsley Arts Centre

Poetry at the double: Edge Street Live presents Henry Normal and Jan Brierton, Milton Rooms, Malton, April 16, 7.30pm

WRITER, poet, television & film producer and Manchester Poetry Festival founder Henry Normal is joined by Dubliner Jan Brierton for an evening of poetry and humour. Normal, whose credits include co-writing The Mrs Merton Show and the first series of The Royle Family, will be reading from his new book A Quiet Promise.

Brierton riffs on modern life, love and friendships, wellness and ageing, rage and domestic exasperation in her poetic reflections on being a wife, mother, daughter, sister and retired raver, plus plenty of stuff about tea, lipstick and biscuits. Box office: 01653 696240 or themiltonrooms.com.

Maureen Onwunali: Slam champion in action at Say Owt’s night of poetry at The Crescent in York

Slam champ of the week: Say Owt presents Maureen Onwunali, The Crescent, York, April 17, 7.30pm

YORK spoken-word collective Sat Owt’s guest poet for April’s gathering will be Dublin-born Nigerian poet and two-time national slam champion Maureen Onwunali.

Rich with political observations and carefully crafted verse, her work has been featured by musicians, radio shows and organisations, such as the British Film Institute, Penguin, BBC, Roundhouse, Apples and Snakes, Obsidian Foundation and the Poetry Society. Box office: seetickets.com/event/say-owt-slam-featuring-maureen-onwunali/the-crescent/3588134. 

More Things To Do in York and beyond. Hutch’s List No. 14, from The York Press

Amabile Clarinet Trio: Playing innovative programme at York Late Music concert

HAMLET on a sinking ship, family politics on a calamitous wedding day and artists’ studios opening on two weekends are the headline acts on Charles Hutchinson’s latest bill of arts delights.

Classical concert of the week: York Late Music presents Amabile Clarinet Trio, Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York, April 11, 7.30pm

THE Amabile Clarinet Trio – York clarinettist Lesley Schatzberger, cellist Nicola Tait Baxter and pianist Paul Nicholson – presents an innovative programme featuring two premieres plus Thea Musgrave’s Canta Canta!, patron Nicola LeFanu’s Lullaby and Nocturne, American composer Robert Muczynski’s rarely played Fantasy Trio and the first York performance ofAlexander von Zemlinsky’s Trio in D minor.

The UK premiere of David Lancaster’s Canzone Sospesoand a world premiere from composer David Power will be complemented by a set of Morris newly transcribed by York composer Steve Crowther. Lancaster gives a pre-concert talk at 6.45pm, to be enjoyed with a complimentary glass of wine or juice. Tickets: latemusic.org or on the door.

Lesley Jones and Steve Coates: Teaming up for the last time for Swing When You Sing

Farewell concert of the week: Steve Coates Music Productions present Swing When You Sing, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, April 12, 7.30pm

BEV Jones Music Company and The Jubilee Celebration Singers producer Lesley Jones bids farewell to the York stage after 20 years of mounting shows with Swing When You Sing, presented with Steve Coates Music Productions.

Alan Owens’s 16-piece big band will be joined on stage by singers Ruth McNeil, Annabel van Griethuysen, Hayley Bamford, Johanna Hartley, Adele Barlow, Larry Gibson, Terry Ford, Stephen Wilson, David Hartley and Geoff Walker to perform Rat Pack, Minnie The Moocher, Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy, Under The Sea, Cheek To Cheek, Sway (Latin), Fever, Mr Bojangles, Amy Winehouse’s Back To Black and Sing, Sing, Sing (with Bob Fosse-style dancing). “Varied? Yes! Upbeat? Yes! Emotional? Yes!” says Lesley. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.

The poster for the launch of Bishy Road Community Choir 

Start-up of the week: Bishy Road Community Choir, Stables Yoga Centre, Nunmill Street, York, from April 13

THE Stables Yoga Centre and Rachel Davies are setting up the Bishy Road Community Choir to run on Mondays from 5pm to 5.50pm at £5 a session from April 13. This welcoming, musically accessible group will use song to promote happiness, wellbeing and community. No experience or musical skills are needed; only enthusiasm to try feel-good singing. To book a place, visit stablesyoga.co.uk/timetable.

Wedded bliss amid wedding-day blisters: Darren Barrott’s Marek and Joy Warner’s Sylvia in York Actors Collective’s Till The Stars Come Down

Family politics of the week: York Actors Collective in Till The Stars Come Down, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, April14 to 18, 7.30pm, Tuesday to Friday; 2pm and 6pm, Saturday

PREMIERED at the National Theatre in 2024 and now receiving its York premiere, Beth Steel’s contemporary British family drama is set on the wedding day of Sylvia and Marek in a South Yorkshire mining town.

Directed by Angie Millard, Till The Stars Come Down explores the tumultuous dynamics of a working-class family in a changing world of economic  decline and political shifts as long-held secrets, passions, and tensions surrounding class, immigration, and social change spill over into chaos and tragedy. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

Ralph Davis’s Hamlet in the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Hamlet, set on a sinking ship, on tour at York Theatre Royal

Titanic anniversary event of the week: Royal Shakespeare Company in Hamlet, York Theatre Royal, April 14 to 18, 7pm plus 1.30pm, April 16 and 2pm, April 18

LET director Rupert Goold introduces the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Hamlet, starring Ralph Davis, as the tour sets sail for York on the 114th anniversary of the Titanic’s descent to the depths. “Our production is set aboard a ship but one that is soon to founder, going down with all hands,” he says.

“Its inspiration comes from the most famous sinking in history, and just as that icy tragedy came to pass in a little over two and a half hours, our play takes place in real time and for about as long, as much catastrophic thriller as poetic meditation. This production asks what it means to be human and decisive when time is running out.” Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

Jan Brierton and Henry Normal: Poetic humour at Milton Rooms, Malton 

Poetry at the double: Edge Street Live presents Henry Normal and Jan Brierton, Milton Rooms, Malton, April 16, 7.30pm

WRITER, poet, television & film producer and Manchester Poetry Festival founder Henry Normal is joined by Dubliner Jan Brierton for an evening of poetry and humour. Normal, whose credits include co-writing The Mrs Merton Show and the first series of The Royle Family, will be reading from his new book A Quiet Promise.

Brierton riffs on modern life, love and friendships, wellness and ageing, rage and domestic exasperation in her poetic reflections on being a wife, mother, daughter, sister and retired raver, plus plenty of stuff about tea, lipstick and biscuits. Box office: 01653 696240 or themiltonrooms.com.

Aggers & Tuffers: The chatter of cricket and the clatter of wickets at York Barbican

Not just cricket: Jonathan Agnew and Phil Tufnell in An Audience With Aggers & Tuffers, York Barbican, April 16, 7.30pm

TEST Match Special commentator-and-pundit duo Jonathan Agnew and Phil Tufnell take to the road for more cricket chat from beyond the boundary. Former Leicestershire and England fast bowler and three-decade BBC cricket correspondent Aggers teams up anew with record-breaking former England spin bowler and crowd favourite Tuffers, who gives his spin on his maverick playing days and second wind as a media personality on I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here, Strictly Come Dancing and A Question Of Sport. Box office update: limited availability at yorkbarbican.co.uk.

Maureen Onwunali: Slam champ spinning words at Say Owt 

Slam champ of the week: Say Owt presents Maureen Onwunali, The Crescent, York, April 17, 7.30pm

YORK spoken-word collective Sat Owt’s guest poet for April’s gathering will be Dublin-born Nigerian poet and two-time national slam champion Maureen Onwunali.

Rich with political observations and carefully crafted verse, her work has been featured by musicians, radio shows and organisations, such as the British Film Institute, Penguin, BBC, Roundhouse, Apples and Snakes, Obsidian Foundation and the Poetry Society. Box office: seetickets.com/event/say-owt-slam-featuring-maureen-onwunali/the-crescent/3588134. 

 Jacqueline James: Demonstrating her hand-woven rug-making in Rosslyn Street, Clifton, at York Open Studios

Art event of the month: York Open Studios, York and beyond, April 18 & 19 and April 25 & 26, 10am to 5pm

ARTISTS and makers involved in York Open Studios are putting the final touches to their workplaces and studios within York and a ten-mile radius of the city, in readiness to welcome visitors across two weekends.

This annual event offers the chance to gain a sneak peek into where the artists work, their methods and inspirations, whether a regular participant or the 27 newcomers, spanning traditional and contemporary painting and print, illustration, drawing, ceramics, mixed media, glass, sculpture, jewellery, textiles and photography. For more information, visit yorkopenstudios.co.uk; access the interactive map at yorkopenstudios.co.uk/map.

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How life mirrors art in Joanna Crosse’s film documentary Briefest Encounters, showing at City Screen Picturehouse on April 10

Cyril Raymond, Nicholas Crosse and Janet Morrison. “Briefest Encounters is about more than one lost love; it’s about three intertwined lives, missed chances and the emotional cost of convention,” says documentary filmmaker Joanna Crosse

A REVELATORY documentary uncovering the hidden love story behind Brief Encounter will receive its northern premiere at City Screen Picturehouse, York, on April 10 at 7pm.

Briefest Encounters – An Untold Love Story has been waiting in the wings for decades to be told and now it will be, when shown in tandem with David Lean’s November 1945 film to mark its 80th anniversary.

North Rigton-raised journalist and filmmaker Joanna Crosse uncovers the secret past of her grandfather, actor Cyril Raymond, who played the quietly cuckolded husband, the crossword-filling Fred Jesson, in the Noel Coward-scripted film.

Through letters, interviews, archive material and diaries re-discovered in a bag at a car boot sale, Crosse’s documentary traces how a real-life ‘Brief Encounter’ between two actors, Raymond and Janet Morrison, during a transatlantic stage production [Josef Suss on Broadway] resulted in a child being born out of wedlock.

The poster for Meaningful Films’ documentary Briefest Encounters – An Untold Love Story

That child, renamed Nicholas Crosse when adopted four years later by a Bradford textile family, was not only brought up in Yorkshire but ended up playing a king alongside Dame Judi Dench’s “forgetful angel” in the 1951 revival of the York Mystery Plays in the Museum Gardens.

He was chairman of the Bradford Area of the York Minster Appeal Fund, assisting the preservation of one of the county’s most important spiritual and architectural landscapes, a contribution marked by a stained glass crest in his name.

Joanna trained as a journalist in Yorkshire and worked in newspapers, radio and television in God’s Own Country at different stages of her career. She and her colleague at Meaningful Films, Luke Taylor, premiered Briefest Encounters on the 80th anniversary of Lean’s film in Bath, where they both live,  but York is the first stop on a national tour.

Next Friday’s double bill  – the 80th anniversary restoration of Brief Encounter first, then Briefest Encounters – will be followed by a question-and-answer session with the two filmmakers, hosted by BBC Radio York breakfast show presenter Georgey Spanswick.

Documentary filmmaker Joanna Crosse on location in Whitstable, where actress Janet Morrison lived in her last years

Introducing her film, Joanna says: “Two actors meet on a Broadway stage in 1929 and have a passionate affair and the result is a child born out of wedlock. But that boy is never to know or meet his biological father and his mother gives him up for adoption when he is just four years old. This documentary tells the true life love story, which revolves around a series of brief encounters and missed opportunities that in the end take their toll on the lead players.

“Brief Encounter is an iconic film that explores the quiet heartbreak of forbidden love. It captures the emotional turmoil of two strangers who fall for each other but cannot be together. Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard brought that heartbreak to life on screen as Laura Jesson and Dr Alec Harvey. But off-screen, a quieter, even more tragic love story was unfolding – one that’s never been told. Until now.”

Joanna continues: “Briefest Encounters is about more than one lost love; it’s about three intertwined lives, missed chances and the emotional cost of convention. It is a testament to a hidden history and a reflection of the very themes that make Brief Encounter timeless: longing, restraint and the heartbreak of what might have been. It shows how interrupted love, inherited silence and duty shaped family lives for generations.”

Joanna has worked for ITV, BBC, IRN, GMTV, C4 and C5 as an on-screen journalist, presenter and Crime Stoppers reporter, has five books to her name, is a voice coach and runs theatrical digs too. Busy, busy! “To be honest, I’ve held on to this story for more than 30 years after my mother gave me the box of my father’s details, to be its custodian,” she says.

Filmmaker Joanna Crosse and actor daughter Sedona Rose during filming for Briefest Encounters. Picture: Meaningful Films

“I’ve always been interested in genealogy. Then last year, I said to Luke, ‘it’s the 80th anniversary of Brief Encounter, we’re just going to have to make this film now’, and we started by going up to Carnforth, where the refreshment room scenes were shot, to make a promo.

“I’ve been researching the story for decades and now all that work over 30 years has been gathered into a one-hour film.”

Joanna recalls how her father knew little of his roots. “My dim memory is of him telling me that he had been told he came from a theatrical family,” she says. “Rumours abounded across Yorkshire that he was a lost Royal love child.” Not so.

Nicholas never met his father, but the documentary reveals how he did “encounter” him when he chose to see a play at Leeds Grand Theatre as his treat on a holiday break from prep school. Who should be in the cast for the premiere of the musical comedy Under The Counter but Cyril Raymond.

Nicholas Crosse and his daughter Joanna on Denton Moor

Nicholas commented “what a wonderful man” he was watching on stage, but such were the laws surrounding adoption, his adoptive family could not tell him of his connection.

Nicholas would go on to work for his family textile business James Hill & Sons, serve on multiple committees and be appointed the Deputy Lord Lieutenant of the West Riding, as well becoming involved with Norwood Film Productions. .

He died in 1981 at the age of 50. Unlike the actor parents he never knew, Cyril Raymond and Janet Morrison, whose ashes were thrown to the wind,  Nicholas Crosse has a commemorative headstone at St Helen’s Church, Denton, on the Yorkshire moorland near Ilkley, where his adoptive family had owned Denton Hall.

“He was always such a wonderful natural actor, always so humorous, always good with people,” says Joanna.

Brief Encounter, Briefest Encounters and Q&A with Meaningful Films’ Joanna Crosse & Luke Taylor, City Screen Picturehouse, York, April 10, 7pm. Box office: picturehouses.com/cinema/city-screen-picturehouse.

The London premiere will be held at Picturehouse Central on May 5 at 7.30pm with a Q&A. Follow Meaningful Films on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/meaningfulfilm/?hl=en

Nicholas Crosse’s head stone at St Helen’s Church, Denton

Briefest Encounters: the back story

CYRIL Raymond was a household theatrical name whose credits filled a page of Theatrical Who’s Who. During the Second World War he served as an RAF fighter controller during the Battle of Britain and reached the rank of Wing Commander. He was awarded the MBE in the 1945 Birthday Honours List.

He was married to actress Iris Hoey and then Gillian Lind. Her uncle was William Henry Pratt, better known as Boris Karloff.

Cyril had a brief affair with actress Janet Morrison, who came from a theatrical dynasty. Her grandfather gave Henry Irving his first break and her mother, aunts and brother were all well-known actors and dancers in their day. She spent some years in BBC Rep and was cast in various productions and films.

Actor Cyril Raymond

Cyril and Janet’s son was adopted at the age of four by a Yorkshire textile family and was known as Nicholas Crosse. He became a well-known West Riding business figure and was made Deputy Lord Lieutenant.

He ended his days becoming involved with a film company before dying of a heart attack at 50. He never knew who his biological parents were but loved the theatre all his life, appearing in the 1951 York Mystery Plays, playing a king, alongside Dame Judi Dench (then credited as Judith Dench) as an angel.

He was married with two daughters. Joanna, the eldest, went on a quest to discover her father’s birth family and realised this was a story that had to be told. Her research led her to discover various theatrical documents including Cyril Raymond’s diaries.

Nicholas Crosse in his role as a king in the 1951 York Mystery Plays, pictured at the ruins of St Mary’s Abbey in York Museum Gardens

She was reunited with them when she was interviewed on BBC Radio 4 alongside
actor Lucy Fleming, whose mother Celia Johnson played Laura, the wife of Cyril Raymond’s
Fred Jesson in Brief Encounter.

Joanna has three children. Her youngest daughter, Sedona Rose, has been an actor
since the age of 11 and helped in the search for the truth about her theatrical
grandparents.

Nicholas Crosse: A Yorkshire life

Born: November 21 1930.
Education: Wellington College, Crowthorne, Berkshire, 1944-1948.
Family: Married in 1955; two daughters. Lived at: High Folly, North Rigton, near Leeds.  
Stage school: New Era Academy of Drama and Music, London.
Joined Sir James Hill & Sons Ltd, Bradford wool importers and topmakers as an apprentice, studying all aspects of wool trade.
National Service: Commissioned in 10th Royal Hussars (PWO) in Germany.
Territorial Army: Yorkshire Hussars.
Re-joined Sir James Hill & Sons as an apprentice. Visited all wool-buying centres in Australia and New Zealand. Sales representative for home trade. Appointed export sales manager. Countries visited included North America, Europe, Middle East and North Africa.
Elected council member of Wool Industries Research Association.
Appointed to main board of Sir James Hill & Sons and sales director for home and overseas markets.
Bradford Chamber of Commerce representative on International Wool Textile Organisation and member of British National Committee.
Council member and hon. treasurer, Wool Exchange Council, Bradford.
Member of the Worsted Committee.
Chairman of Sir James Hill & Sons (Export) Ltd.

Nicholas Crosse

Other activities
Elected to Council of Bradford Chamber of Commerce.
Founder member and senior vice-president of Bradford Junior Chamber of Commerce.
President of Bradford Junior Chamber of Commerce.
Public relations and press liaison officer, Bradford Junior Chamber of Commerce.
Member of Livery of the Company of Merchants of The Staple of England.
Committee member of the Institute of Directors, West Riding of Yorkshire Branch.
Freeman of the City of London and member of Livery of the Worshipful Company of Woolmen.
Member of High Stewards committee of York Minster and chairman of Bradford Area York Minster Appeal Fund.
Life member and senator of Junior Chamber International.
Founder president of Bradford Division of British Red Cross Society.
Treasurer of Bradford City Conservative Association after three years as deputy treasurer.
President of Bradford Chamber of Commerce.
Mayor of Company of Merchants of the Staple of England.
Member of Leeds Regional Hospital Board.
Chairman of West Riding Branch of the Institute of Directors and ex-officio member of the council.
Council member of West Riding Industrialists’ Council.
Chairman of Bradford Area Health Authority.
Appointed Her Majesty’s Deputy Lieutenant of West Riding of Yorkshire and City of York.
Director of Aire Radio, which applied for I.B.A. franchise.
Nominated for High Sheriff for West Yorkshire.
Joined Norwood Studios Ltd.
Appointed to Board of Norwood Motion Pictures (U.K.) Ltd.
Appointed chairman of Wool, Jute and Flax Industry Training Board.
Appointed trustee of Industrial Training Foundation.

Nicholas Crosse’s stained glass stained glass crest at York Minster