What happens when you nick a car and stick it through a hedge? Here comes Wright & Grainger’s Helios at Castle Howard

Alexander Flanagan-Wright in a scene from Helios

WHERE better for Wright & Grainger to stage their modern take on the Ancient Greek myth of Helios than underneath the dome of Castle Howard’s Great Hall.

The dome mural, painted by Venetian painter Antonio Pelligrini between 1709 and 1712, depicts the Four Elements, the Twelve Figures of the Zodiac and Apollo and the Muses.

This ethereal work climaxes with the tale of Phaeton falling from his father’s chariot. Encouraged to look higher and higher, the viewer finally meets the dizzying spectacle of Apollo’s son plunging to Earth, the chariot crashing into the river.

The Fall of Phaeton happens to be the thematic inspiration behind Easingwold storytellers Alexander Flanagan-Wright and Phil Grainger’s opus too, premiered at the Stilly Fringe at Stillington Mill, near York, in July 2023, and later that summer in the former Women’s Locker Room at Summerhall at the Edinburgh Fringe.

What happens, Alex? “A lad lives halfway up a historic hill,” he elucidates. “A teenager is on a road trip to the city in a stolen car. A boy is driving a chariot, pulling the sun across the sky.

“In a story about the son of the god of the sun, Helios transplants the Ancient Greek tale into a modern-day myth wound round the winding roads of rural England – and into the everyday living of a towering city. It’s a story about life, the invisible monuments we build to it, and the little things that leave big marks.”

In the wake of their oft-performed, internationally acclaimed myth hits Orpheus, Eurydice and The Gods The Gods The Gods – joined for the first time by Half Man Hall Bull at this summer’s Edinburgh Fringe – Alex and Phil invite audiences to “join them in a grand room with a tape player-and a delicate tale to tell” in performances of Helios at 5pm and 7.30pm.

Alex and Phil have a history of staging performances at Castle Howard, ranging from Gobbledigook Theatre’s The Tales Of Beatrix Potter in the Walled Garden to The Guild Of Misrule’s peripatetic The Great Gatsby and Gobbledigook Theatre/The Flanagan Collective’s Orpheus that turned the Grecian Hall into a disco.

Now comes Helios, performed by Alex to a cinematic score by Phil. “To be honest, it was Abbi [Alex’s sister Abbigail Ollive, director of marketing and visitors at Castle Howard] who suggested it this time. When she first saw Helios at Edinburgh, she said, ‘oh, you know there’s a painting of the Fall of Phaeton in the Great Hall?, and I had to say ‘No’, but very quickly I thought, ‘we should definitely find time to do a show under such a piece of art’. Hopefully it’ll be an historically significant night.”

What drew Alex to re-telling the fateful tale of Phaeton in modern-day rural England? “There was something about this kind of need to prove yourself. These two young lads are kind of doing that ‘My dad’s better than your dad’ thing, where there’s a need to prove ‘I’m worth what I said I’m worth’ by doing something stupid,” he says.

“It’s that thing of wanting to be greater than you are and trying to do something that’s beyond your capacity,” says Alex

“I guess, in part, it’s the way you grow up in school, claiming ‘I am this or I am that’, and then someone says, ‘Yeah? Prove it’. It’s validating that space you take up in the world.

“It felt like it was a story that had a real tenacity to it, and then, like in loads of Ancient Greek myths, it speaks about how our landscape is laid out. Reflecting on how we grow up in our landscape, and how these stories define our day-to-day existence, it was a story well worth thinking about.”

Ancient becomes modern as Phaeton trying to ride his father’s chariot through the sky becomes “Phaeton having his mate Michael nick a car and then sticking it through the hedge”. “It’s that thing of wanting to be greater than you are and trying to do something that’s beyond your capacity,” says Alex. “That thrust of going too far to try to get the respect you’re pushing to achieve.

“You think, ‘what is that need in us now in a contemporary telling’ and you find the answer in something you remember in a story your mate told you.

“This is the interesting thing: why are you’re trying to go beyond these limits or trying to respond to someone else or a lack of something, rather than celebrating the beautiful things you have achieved.”

Alex continues: “Bragging is a want of broader satisfaction. It’s a loss of something, a lack of something, in everyone when growing up; you’re trying to compensate for something that otherwise means you don’t feel like you’re living life to the fullest.

“In our story of Helios we talk a lot about how it’s a show about facts in our world, how you live in relation to them, if you define them or they define you. There’s a bit in the show where they’re discussing their relationship with the sun. The sun being there means we can exist, but we like to define the sun: we are what defines us; that thing of saying ‘without us, the sun would be nothing’.

“We measure everything by the sun, but when you grow up there are so many other factors you are measured by and you understood what you’re in control of, rather than being controlled by. You brag less because you understand more.”

Why are we drawn to reckless speed in our youth? “I wonder why that is. I don’t know the answer, I don’t have an answer to posit. It starts with that joy of the bike, or roller skates, that joy of going really fast. I don’t know if it ever changes, though maybe we temper it.” says Alex.

Wright & Grainger present Helios in the Great Hall, Castle Howard, near York, October 17, 5pm and 7.30pm. Box office: castlehoward.co.uk.

The Great Hall and the Fall of Phaeton: the back story

THE Great Hall is the crowning masterpiece of dramatist-turned-architect John Vanbrugh’s design for Castle Howard, commissioned by the 3rd Earl of Carlisle.

From outside, the dome presents Castle Howard with a unique silhouette; on the inside, rising 70 feet into the air, it is a triumph of theatre and space. Massive columns, filled with carved decoration, rise in the four corners of the hallway; two large arches open to reveal the walls and staircases beyond; a balcony traverses the upper level, and above is the lantern and gallery with light flooding in from the eight windows.

The painted decoration, executed by the Venetian artist Antonio Pellegrini between 1709 and 1712, depicts the Four Elements, the Twelve Figures of the Zodiac and Apollo and the Muses.

This ethereal work climaxes with the tale of Phaeton falling from his father’s chariot. Encouraged to look higher and higher, the viewer finally meets the dizzying spectacle of Apollo’s son plunging to earth.

The 3rd Earl and Vanbrugh revelled in the playful ironies of this dramatic tale of ambition and fall, which gently mocked their own aspirations.

The dome was destroyed by a fire in 1940, and Pelligrini’s Fall of Phaeton was lost too. Following the reconstruction of the dome in 1960-61, a Canadian artist, Scott Medd, was commissioned to re-create the scene.

Who’s performing in York St John University’s TakeOver – In The Limelight festival at York Theatre Royal, May 13 to 18?

Verve: Presenting a dance triple bill at TakeOver – In The Limelight

THE 12th TakeOver festival at York Theatre Royal is in the hands of York St John University for the fourth year, taking the theme of In The Limelight from May 13 to 18.

In this annual town-and-gown collaboration, third-year drama students are put in charge of the theatre and programming its events for a week, with support and mentoring from professionals. 

“TakeOver is a fantastic opportunity for students to experience running and taking part in a theatre festival that is entirely unique,” says Ruby, a student on the producing team. “We’re able to learn so many new skills and create something that we can really be proud of.” said Ruby, a student on the producing team. 

Among the highlights will be the May 16 performance of Scottish author and poet Hollie McNish, reading from her latest book Lobster And Other Things I’m Learning To Love, wherein she addresses questions of friendships, flags and newborns as she shines her poetic lens on “all those things we have been taught to hate, and which we might learn to love again”. Joining her on the 7.30pm bill will be fellow poet Micheal Pedersen, reading from his books The Cat Prince and Boy Friends.  

To “see where dance is right now, and where it might go next”, the Verve: Triple Billat 7.30pm on May 18 presents a bold programme featuring new commissions by artistic directorMatteo Marfoglia and choreographer Joy Alpuerto Ritter,alongside a reworking of People Used To Die by the international collective(LA)HORDE. 

Verve is the postgraduate company of Northern School of Contemporary Dance in Leeds. Each year, the company commissions choreographers from all over the world to create an artistically distinct, physically daring and engaging programme of dance work. 

Hollie McNish: Reading from her book Lobster And Other Things I’m Learning To Love on May 16

Festival Programme

May 13

Opening ceremony; free snacks and drinks available for all guests.

7.30pm, Upper Foyer, This is York Pecha Kucha, Volume 30: Bearing Fruit, in collaboration with York Creatives. Rapid-fire talks from more than seven speakers on a range of topics created to leave you feeling entertained, educated and inspired. 

May 14

Full day of shows and activities, starting with two York St John companies.

11am, Studio: Bounce Back: Interactive children’s theatre experience introducing the audience to the world of fairytale.

12 noon, Studio: Final Girls: Multi-media performance set in a forest where a group of unlikely people try to survive, the best they can, against an unknown entity.

Followed by dance trail that will take the audience around the city of York before returning to the theatre.  

6pm, Studio: Peachy & Me:  Performer Beverly Bishop invites family audiences into a world of storytelling, music, magic and comedy, as she appears as both herself and her clown alter-ego to overcome the complexities of the modern world.

7.30pm, main house: Out Of Character Theatre Company in Afterlife.In this York-made piece, strangers find themselves in a waiting room between life and death where they must go through their past lives to choose their forever.  

The TakeOver – In The Limelight logo for the 2024 festival

May 15

11am, main house: Misery Loves will be sharing their production of The Women Of Whitechapel, a newly devised musical that re-tells the stories of Jack the Ripper’s victims with the focus on finding out who these women really were.

12 noon, main house: Blushed’s show Our Fault, Never Their Fault follows two characters as they experience the journey of becoming a woman, highlighting the good, bad and little embarrassing parts that go alongside growing up.  

7.30pm, main house: Pinch Punch Improvisation use audience suggestions to help their four characters unmask the murderer before they are all killed in the improv whodunit Locomotive For Murder

May 16

11am, Studio: York St John company Glass Broom perform their post-apocalyptic show End,where five people are trapped in a house together. Tensions runs high as the characters are forced to find a way to survive with each other.

12 noon, main house: Fellow York St John company Tradesman present Life Of The Party,where agroup of collaborators explores essential themes through the lens of absurdist theatre, aiming to question the themes of the human condition. 

6pm, Studio: York company Pop Yer Clogs Theatre perform Alice In Wonderland Abridged, Lewis Carroll’s timeless tale ofAlice encountering many weird and wonderful characters in subterranean land where every time is tea time and nothing is ever as it seems.

7.30pm, main house: Hollie McNish reads from her book Lobster And Other Things I’m Learning To Love. 

May 17

11am and 1pm, main house: Two dance routines created by York St John student Izzy Cryer. The first, Unholy,tells a story of cheating and betrayal, performed ina commercial style; the second, the lyrical Survivor, focuses on survival and standing together as one.

12 noon, Studio: York St John company M.A.D. say “fate, you can’t escape it”, asking how will it leave us? Alone or somehow forced together? Let’s find out what fate will throw at us this time in The Red Thread (a show suitable for age 18 plus

Alexander Flanagan Wright, left, and Phil Grainger: Performing Helios in the closing show on May 18

7.30pm, main house: A talk by Colin Sutton, a police officer for 30 years, who served as the head of a Metropolitan Police murder squad for the last nine of them. His show, The Real Manhunter, gives a guide to his career, how policing has changed, what it feels like to chase a serial killer and how he made the step from policing to storytelling. 

May 18Alexander

At 7.30pm, on the main house stage, Verve: Triple Bill of modern dance routines.

At 7.45pm, in the Studio, Alexander Flangan Wright and Phil Grainger present the third in their trilogy of Greek dramas in words and music, Helios.

Opportunities to be involved throughout the week:  

May 13, 2pm: Heels workshop, focusing on a style of dance that inspires confidence and is aimed at any level of experience. 5pm: Year 10 students from Joseph Rowntree School present a show based on social media and lockdown.

Throughout the week, tours include an afternoon tea experience. An open mic event takes place on May 14 at 4pm; a fashion show will be held on May 16 at 1pm; adult cocktail classes on May 17 at 2pm; a dance workshop for five to ten-year-olds, based on The Lion King, on May 18 at 2pm.

For the full programme, head to: yorktheatreroyal.co.uk/be-part-of-it/children-and-young-people/takeover/. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

More Things To Do in York & beyond. Whether 7 Days or SIX, it all adds up to Hutch’s List No. 31 for ’23, from The Press

Alex Cardall’s Eeyore, left, Robbie Noonan’s Tigger, Benjamin Durham’s Winnie the Pooh and Lottie Gregan’s Tigger in Disney’s musical adventure Winnie The Pooh. Picture: Pamela Raith

GEORGIAN glories, Forties’ swing bombshells, the joy of SIX, storytelling with pizza and Pooh and Tigger adventures bring a bounce to Charles Hutchinson’s step.

Children’s show of the week: Disney’s Winnie The Pooh, Grand Opera House, York, Tuesday, 5pm; Wednesday, 11am and 2pm

DEEP in the Hundred Acre Wood, a new musical adventure unfolds for A A Milne’s beloved characters Winnie the Pooh, Christopher Robin and their best friends Piglet, Eeyore, Kanga, Roo, Rabbit, Owl and Tigger.

Accompanying the modern narrative and life-size puppetry in Jonathan Rockefeller’s show will be Nate Edmondson’s score, featuring Grammy Award-winning songs by the Sherman Brothers, such as The Blustery Day, The Wonderful Thing About Tiggers and Whoop-De-Dooper Bounce, plus Milne’s The More It Snows (with music by Carly Simon) and Sing Ho in a new arrangement. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.

7 Days at the races: Craig David at York Racecourse Music Showcase weekend, today

SOUTHAMPTON soul singer Craig David, of 7 Days romancing fame, performs hits galore after today’s racing on Knavesmire. Fill Me In, Walkaway, Rise & Fall, All The Way and I Know You are likely to feature in his early evening set with a finishing time of 7.30pm.

Gates open at 11.15am for the 2.05pm start to the seven-race card. Best bet for a ticket, as the County Stand and Grandstand & Paddock are full already, will be the more informal Clocktower Enclosure. Buy on the gate.

Alexander Flanagan Wright, left, and Phil Grainger: Premiering Helios at the Stilly Fringe tomorrow night

Stilly Fringe storytelling: James Rowland in Piece Of Work, tomorrow, 7.15pm; Wright & Grainger in Helios, tomorrow, 8.45pm, At The Mill, Stillington, near York

AHEAD of his Edinburgh Fringe run, James Rowland opens the Stilly Fringe 2023 storytelling double bill with Piece Of Work, his follow-up to Learning To Fly. Combining story, comedy and music, Piece Of Work takes the form of a road trip searching for the writer of a letter that exploded Rowland’s life. Will he find a sense of home and maybe save a life too?

Edinburgh-bound Alexander Flanagan Wright and Phil Grainger introduce Helios, their latest instalment of stories and songs rooted in Greek myths, in the wake of Orpheus, Eurydice and The Gods The Gods The Gods. Any Stilly Fringe benefits? 1. Pizzas are on the menu from 6.30pm. 2. One ticket covers both shows at tickettailor.com/events/atthemill/957195.  

The poster for Spark Comedy Fringe

Funday Sunday: Burning Duck Comedy Club presents Spark Comedy Fringe, Events Space @ Spark:York, York, tomorrow, 4pm

FOUR acts in one day are on the Burning Duck bill of Edinburgh Fringe previews, kicking off at 4pm with comedian, animator and computer programmer Neil Harris’s Codebreaker show about the Enigma machine, Alan Turing and Bletchley Park, followed by Stanley Brooks’s I Can Make Me Rich, an inspirational, interactive seminar to change your life and bring you cash at 5.30pm.

In Eryn Tett Finds Her Audience at 7pm, this absurdist stand-up misfit combines surreal storytelling with odd observations and wordplay; Tom Lawrinson concludes the cornucopia of comedy with weird, wonderful and completely unexpected punchlines in Hubba Hubba at 8.30pm. Each show costs £5 in advance for guaranteed entry or you can Pay What You Want post-show. A £15 ticket gives entry to all four performances. Box office: wegottickets.com/spark-comedy-fringe.

SIX of the best: Henry VIII’s Queens hit back in song at Leeds Grand Theatre. Picture: Pamela Raith

Musical of the week: SIX The Musical, Leeds Grand Theatre, Tuesday to Sunday

TOBY Marlow and Lucy Moss’s Spouse Girls musical/pop concert wowed York in late-June. Now Leeds awaits the dancing queens with attitude who tell their story in song to decide who suffered most at Henry VIII’s hands once he put a ring on that wedding finger.

Look out for Knaresborough actress Lou Henry in the role of the apparently not-so-squeaky-clean Catherine Howard, short-lived wife number five. Box office (probably for frustration only): 0113 243 0808 or leedsheritagetheatres.com.

In the swing of things: Alice McKenna, left, and Gleanne Purcell-Brown in Alan Plater’s Blonde Bombshells Of 1943 at the SJT. Picture: Pamela Raith

Forties’ flavour of the week: Blonde Bombshells Of 1943, Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, Wednesday to August 26

ZOE Waterman directs a cast of eight actor-musicians in the SJT, Bolton Octagon and Keswick Theatre by the Lake’s lavish, lively co-production of Hull playwright Alan Plater’s warm and witty musical play.

Meet The Blonde Bombshells, the most glamorous all-girl swing band in the north, whose membership goes down every time they play a GI camp. Now an important BBC job is in the offing and Betty needs to find new musicians fast. Expect Glenn Miller, George Formby, Fats Waller and Andrews Sisters classics aplenty. Box office: 01723 370541 or sjt.uk.com. 

Castle Howard, egg tempera on gesso on canvas, by Amy Dennis, on show in the Northern Prospects exhibition at Janette Ray Rare Books

Exhibition of the week: Northern Prospects, Janette Ray Rare Books, Bootham, York, Wednesday to Friday, 10am to 5pm, until August 19

LOTTE Inch Gallery’s pop-up show of York and northern paintings, prints and ceramics at Janette Ray’s bookshop is being expanded with ceramics by York artists Ben Arnup, Mark Hearld and Ruth King among the new additions.

As Lotte turns her hand once more to creating artistic showcases in non-traditional exhibition spaces, after her hiatus from curating, she presents works by Tom Wood, Marie Walker Last, David Lloyd Jones, Amy Dennis, Nicky Hirst, Kelly Jayne, Robert H Lee, Isabella Maclure, Geoff Morten and Malcolm Whittaker in “unusual corners” amid the shop’s treasure trove of books on the visual arts.

Who will be in Mad Alice’s Georgian Rogues Gallery? Find out each day at the York Georgian Festival

Festival of the week: York Georgian Festival, Thursday to Sunday

DUST off your petticoat and powder your best wig for a plethora of engagements at York Mansion House, Fairfax House, Bar Convent Living Heritage Centre and elsewhere at the inaugural York Georgian Festival.

Learn to dance the minuet; discover Georgian family life with Horrible Histories writer Terry Deary; revel in Mad Alice’s Georgian Rogues Gallery; solve the mystery of tricky Dick Turpin’s missing corpse in an immersive murder mystery night and take a peep behind-the-scenes with York’s curators. For full festival details and tickets, head to: mansionhouseyork.com/yorkgeorgianfestival.

Katie Melia: From starring in Sweet Charity to hosting the Life Is A Cabaret fundraiser at Theatre@41, Monkgate

Fundraiser of the week: Life Is A Cabaret, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, Friday, 7.30pm

KATIE Melia returns to Theatre@41 after her February lead role in York Stage’s Sweet Charity to present a concert in aid of Reflect: Pregnancy Loss Support, looking to surpass the £3,000 raised at her first fundraiser for this North Yorkshire charity.

Alexa Chaplin, Jack Hooper and Dale Vaughan sing stage and screen hits from Wicked, Spamalot, Dreamgirls and Grease; West End star and director Damien Poole goes Eurovision with Rise Like A Phoenix; Emily Ramsden and Elf The Musical leading lady Sophie Hammond perform too. Tickets update: sold out. For returns only, tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

Chesney Hawkes: Meadowfest headliner. Picture: Axel Muench

In Focus: Meadowfest, Malton’s Boutique Midsummer Music Festival, today, 10am to 10pm

MALTON’S boutique music festival takes place within the riverside meadows and gardens of the Talbot Hotel, Yorkersgate.

Anticipate a relaxed, joyful, family festival of uplifting sunshine bands, all-day feasting and dancing like no one’s watching.

Grab a hay bale, street food and something to sip and enjoy a mix of live music over two stages with Yorkshire bands to the fore.

Be Amazing Arts hosts the pop-up venue The Creativitent, a hive of activity with creative arts workshops, performances and storytelling, arts and craft zones and facepainting!

The Creativitent gives the opportunity for children, young people and their families to “discover their inner creativity, take to the stage, get crafty”.

This House We Built: Playing the Hay Bale Stage at 5pm. Picture: Ben Audsley

Music line-up

10am, Malton School Soul Band, Meadow Stage; 10.30am, Graeme Hargreaves, Hay Bale Stage; 11am, Gary Stewart, Hay Bale Stage; 12 noon, The Caleb Murray Band, Meadow Stage; 1pm, Alchemy Live, tribute to Dire Straits, Hay Bale Stage; 2pm, The Alex Hamilton Band, Meadow Stage; 3pm, Arrival, The Hits of Abba, Hay Bale Stage; 4pm, Alistair Griffin & Band, Meadow Stage; 5pm, This House We Built, Hay Bale Stage; 6pm, Huge, York party band, Meadow Stage; 7.15pm, The Y Street Band, Hay Bale Stage; Chesney Hawkes, Meadow Stage headliner, 8.45pm.

Box office: tickettailor.com/events/visitmalton.

Big kid Benson marks ten years of Just Joshing at children’s parties with afternoon of comedy chaos at Rowntree Theatre

Josh Benson: Sunday party to mark ten years of children’s parties

ALL-ROUND York entertainer Josh Benson performed his first children’s magic show in a kitchen in Fulford.

Now, after a decade of doing other children’s parties, Josh has decided he should have his own bash as a tenth anniversary present to himself.

On Sunday afternoon, this ever-perky purveyor of daft comedy chaos – “daft is cleverer than stupid,” he says – presents Just Josh’s 10th Birthday Party! at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York.

“It’s a big stage, much bigger than a church hall, community centre or school room that I usually do these shows in. I needed to upsize for this one,” he says.

Expect Josh’s usual comedy magic, juggling, “balloonology”, dancing and games, plus some extra-special surprises in a show for “anyone from four to 104”.

“It’s the perfect Sunday afternoon treat for the whole family. Yes, even Dad! It is Father’s Day after all!” he says.

“I’m having a huge Just Josh sign made for the stage – by Spectrum Signs in Elvington – as it’s my tenth year of these shows and I can have a sign if I want to! It’s six foot high with lettering that I’m painting blue and red as per my logo.”

Newly confirmed to play Muddles in Darlington Hippodrome’s 2022-23 pantomime, Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs after three seasons at Halifax’s Victoria Theatre, Josh is equally happy doing magic tricks to children or playing the silly billy to a panto crowd each winter.

Add to that list performing on the P&O Britannia cruise ship, as he was earlier this spring, when his act would be followed by Basil Brush, and being the Corntroller in charge of the summer entertainment at York Maze, at Elvington, Britain’s largest maze attraction.

“That’s why I need a triple-ended candle, not just one that burns at both ends,” says Josh. “As Corntroller since 2019, I write the shows, sing the theme tune, manage the shows and co-host them, and I’m a control freak, so like to be able to do everything.

Josh Benson signs up for York Theatre Royal’s Travelling Pantomime in 2020

“I’m overseeing five shows this summer: The Crazy Maze, a big corny game show; Cornula One, which has replaced the pig racing, using converted [should that be cornverted?] shop mobility scooters.

“Then there’s Cobzilla, the dinosaur meet-and-greet experience; Crowmania, the pantomime on wheels that had a big overhaul in 2021, and the Cornival, which is the closest to one of my kids’ parties, being a party more than a show.”

Josh, who will celebrate ten years at “Farmer Tom” Pearcy’s York Maze next year, is in charge of a team of 15 entertainers, with Maia Stroud, Kit Stroud, Sam Wharton and Fiona Baistow among the York names in the Crowmania cast. Charlotte Wood and Annie Donaghy play their part in the stage team too when available.

“The closest comparison to the Crowmania Ride is Disney’s Jungle Cruise. Imagine that with a much more sarcastic, very self-aware writer, lots of one-liners and way more corn and crow-based gags,” he says.

“The 25-minute ride is on a 110-seat trailer, pulled by a tractor, with 25 rides a day, so around 2,500 people can go on it on any one day if we’re full.”

After presenting seven years of children’s parties, “I knew we needed something like that at York Maze, so we introduced the Cornival, with an enormous foam cannon – which I can promise you won’t come out at the Joseph Rowntree show as there’s no grass there!

“But Sunday’s show will feature some of the York Maze characters, like Kernel Kernel, Sweetie Corn, his girlfriend, Russell Crow and Maizey, a pantomime cow with corn cobs around her neck.”

Josh still has first magic show business card, printed in June 2013. “I remember doing shows at Stockton on the Forest Village Hall, Rawcliffe Pavilion and a smaller one in Copmanthorpe for friends of my mum’s,” he says.

“I was 15, a kids’ entertainer who was a child myself and couldn’t drive, so my mum had to drive me to shows with my briefcases of tricks for full-on magic shows. But then I’m still a big kid, as we all know!” A big kid, who now drives a little grey van, as it happens.

Josh Benson, right, with fellow actors Ben Hunter and May Jackson, writer Tim Firth and composer Gary Barlow, promoting the 2015 premiere of The Girls at Leeds Grand Theatre. Picture: Matt Crockett

Reflecting on ten years of children’s parties, Josh says: “The thing that I really want to get across is that doing these shows is what’s been massively important to me, providing me with a constant that a lot of performers don’t have.

“There are people who want me to move away from it, which I don’t understand. I’ll go from playing to 1,500 at the panto to playing to 30 children in a village hall on a day off, but work is work.

“I’m very lucky that I’ve built up a reputation where kids really want me to do their parties; they’re adamant that it has to be Josh! That’s so beautiful and lovely, and I don’t feel like an expensive babysitter but an entertainer.

“You’re being booked for your skill set rather than kids just being shoved on to a bouncy castle. Bouncy castles are my Kryptonite! You don’t need to do anything. Just book me and I’ll do it all, no bouncy castle, because how can I compete with an amazing bouncy castle that frankly I’d prefer to be on?! Mind you, bouncy castles have gone up in price, but that’s inflation for you!”

Josh had started his professional theatre career with York Theatre Royal, aged ten, in the 2007 Berwick Kaler pantomime Sinbad The Sailor, later appearing there as John Darling in Peter Pan, and going on to play Little Ernie in the award-winning BBC Morecambe & Wise biopic Eric & Ernie.

He was chosen for the cheeky-chappie role of Yorkshire schoolboy Tommo in Gary Barlow and Tim Firth’s The Girls, the Calendar Girls musical, appearing from 2015 to 2017 in the world premiere at Leeds Grand Theatre and The Lowry, Salford, and the subsequent West End run at the Phoenix Theatre, London.

He did four seasons of The Good Old Days at Leeds City Varieties Music Hall, taking his magic act down to London for the Players Music Hall at Charing Cross Theatre and Cockney Sing-Along at Brick Lane Music Hall before launching his one-man cabaret act It‘s Not The Joshua Benson Show/Josh Of All Trades.

“Especially when I was living in London, actors were doing kids’ parties because they had to, for the money, but I do them because I haven’t fallen out of love with them,” he says.

 “It’s part of what I do: kids’ parties; the cruise ships; the York Maze summer season and Hallowscream; the panto comic, which I started doing as Buttons in Cinderella at the Pomegranate Theatre in Chesterfield in 2018, and the Brick Lane Music Hall adult pantomime in London, mixing panto with Carry On humour, from January to March each year.

“Those shows take a huge amount of thought, written by David Phipps-Davis, a renowned panto dame. The next one will be my third year, Peter Pan And His Loose Boys. Last time it was Goldilocks And The Bare Bears and before that, Robin Hood And His Camp Followers.

Just Josh and WonderPhil: Josh Benson and Phil Grainger’s magical double act at the 2019 Great Yorkshire Fringe in York

“They’re panto for adults, which is cleverer, I think. Not dropping the C-bomb but full of clever lines. With these pantomimes, you have adults that are prepared to be kids for the next couple of hours, where I can be naughtier but with the same energy levels as at a family pantomime.”

Josh bills himself as the “Josh of All Trades, Master of None”, having never trained conventionally in anything, but he has skills aplenty that add up to being “Just Josh” joshing around.

“I may have been doing kids’ parties for ten years but annoyingly I didn’t come up with the ‘Just Josh’ name until I did a double act show with WonderPhil [Easingwold magician, actor, soul singer, guitarist, event organiser and polymath Phil Grainger]. When we first made a show for the Great Yorkshire Fringe in York in 2019 – called Making A Magic Show – we wrote it the night before from 10pm to 4pm, then did the first performance!” he recalls.

Sunday’s audience can expect an appearance by Phil Grainger on Zoom and should look out for the Halifax pantomime drummer, Robert Jane, too. “There’s nothing better than pantomime percussion and no-one better at reading my unpredictability than Robert,” says Josh.

“Frankly he makes me funnier, with his Swanee whistles and an actual slap stick, and he makes the sound of falling down better with a drum roll. Knocking my knees together is funnier with a cowbell accompaniment than without. I think the term ‘punctuating the movements’ is really key to comedy and pantomime, and I learnt a lot about that at Halifax.”

Reflecting on cramming so much into 25 years, Josh says: “I wouldn’t say ‘no’ to doing another West End musical, but the perception that I want to be famous? No. not really. I just want to be good and keep it real.

“I got a little bit of a taste of fame when I was doing The Girls, when I definitely wanted to be a star, the next Bradley Walsh, but I realised that once you get there, it’s the hardest thing to stay normal in showbiz.

“I’m happy to be me in this life, where it’s real. Theatre is my first love and always will be, but I’m just lucky that I can do everything, the kids’ parties, the York Maze, the big family pantomimes at Christmas. I like to tread that line.

“My dad [Josh’s sometime partner in cabaret and former Rowntree Players’ panto dame Barry Benson] drummed into me that while it’s nice to be important, it’s more important to be nice. It’s simple advice, but he’s right.”

Josh Benson: Just Josh’s 10th Birthday Party!, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, Sunday, 4pm. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk

Stilly Fringe takes over At The Mill for fiesta of theatre, comedy, music and metaphysics

Mouth-watering prospect: Holly Beasley-Garrigan in Opal Fruits on July 28

THE Great Yorkshire Fringe exited stage left from York in 2019 after five years, 1,200 shows, 9,000 performers and 110,000 visitors.

Frustrated by red tape, impresario Martin Witts pulled the plug on his fiesta of comedy, theatre, spoken word and children’s shows, since when the black hole in York’s summer entertainment calendar has never been filled.

In no way on the same scale, but occupying the same pre-Edinburgh Fringe slot, here comes the Stilly Fringe, out on the fringes of York at Stillington Mill, the home of the At The Mill arts hub, Saturday café and guest-chef supper club nights.

Running from tonight(July 22) until July 31, this is the latest enterprise from newly married Alexander Flanagan Wright, North Yorkshire writer, theatre-maker and visionary facilitator, and Megan Drury, Australian actor, writer and creative artist.

Selkie myth making: Hannah Davies and Jack Woods in The Ballad Of Blea Wyke on Saturday and Sunday night

“It’s come about because a bunch of our dear pals said, ‘can we come and do this?’, like most of the things we do here come about,” says Alex. “There seemed to be a critical mass to make us think these weekends would be a good way to test things out.

“We thought, ‘let’s do it in a communal and convivial way’ with that bond between audiences and performers giving it a different vibe, seeing new work with a chance to chat with the artists. We love doing that here.”

Presented in the mill gardens, either on the open-air stage on the repurposed tennis court or under the cover of the café-bar, the Summer At The Mill programme takes in theatre and spoken-word premieres, comedy, children’s shows, concerts, Gary Stewart’s folk club bills, even silent disco dance nights.

The Stilly Fringe largely mirrors that format but with the added intrigue of giving an early opportunity to see shows bound for the Scottish capital in August. “Six out of nine are going to Edinburgh,” says Alex. “The Lovely Boys, The Gods The Gods The Gods, Invisible Mending, Opal Fruits and Casey Jay Andrews’ double bill, The Wild Unfeeling World and A Place That Belongs To Monsters, are all heading there.”

The Lovely Boys: Opening Stilly Fringe tonight

First up, tonight at 7pm, will be Joe Kent-Walters and Mikey Bligh-Smith’s absurd clown bonanza, The Lovely Boys, followed by Harrison Casswell & Friends, an 8.45pm set of electric spoken word and live music fronted by the Doncaster poet and writer, who Alex first saw on a Say Owt bill in York.

Next will be Say Owt leading light, York poet, actor, playwright and spoken-word slam champion Hannah Davies’s The Ballad Of Blea Wyke, a lyrical re-telling of the selkie myth, set against the Yorkshire coast, complemented by original live music by Jack Woods, in work-in-progress performances at 7pm on Saturday and Sunday.

On both those nights at 8.45pm, and on July 27 and 28 too, Alex and fellow Easingwold School old boy Phil Grainger will give their first Stillington performances of The Gods The Gods The Gods, the third in their trilogy of spoken-word and live music shows rooted in ancient myths after Orpheus and Eurydice.

“We first did the show in Australia in early 2020 before the pandemic forced us home, and we’re going to do a big, loud, bopping version in the garden, different from the indoor production that had a pretty massive lighting set-up,” says Alex.

Three is a magic number: Alexander Flanagan Wright, left, Phil Grainger and Megan Drury in The Gods The Gods The Gods on July 23, 24, 27 and 28. Picture: Tom Figgins

“We’re having to look at how to play it within this landscape and within the Mill’s vibe, rather than trying to pretend we’re in a black-box theatre design. We’re just really excited to be telling these stories that we’ve been living with for three years.

“We’ve been doing loads of work with Megan as our dramaturg, and Phil and Tom (Figgins) have been re-working the music, re-writing some parts and writing plenty of new pieces.

“It feels like a two-year hiatus that has allowed us to think about these different story-telling modes to tell it with greater clarity.”

Why call this Wright & Grainger show The Gods The Gods The Gods, rather than plain old The Gods, Alex? “A lot of things come in threes and a lot of things in this show fall naturally  into threes,” he reasons. “It’s one of those powerful numbers: a triad, with the three of us [Alex, Phil and Megan] telling the story.

Small acts of creativity: Yoshika Colwell combines metaphysics, music and verbatim material in Invisible Mending on July 31

“There are in fact four stories, three of them everyday stories and one story of the Gods. Most of those stories are told in three parts, and we repeat things three times in parts – and it’s just a good title!

“It’s also the third in the series of storytelling pieces we’ve done, taking a big jump on from the first two with a lot bigger soundtrack of Phil’s songs and Tom’s music production and a more complex narrative that we’ve weaved into it.”

The Stilly Fringe also will present Opal Fruits, Holly Beasley-Garrigan’s solo show about class, nostalgia and five generations of women from a South London council estate, on July 28 at 7pm; Casey Jay Andrews’ The Wild Unfeeling World, a tender, furious and fragile re-imagining of Moby Dick, and A Place That Belongs To Monsters, a re-imagining of The Four Horsemen Of The Apocalypse, on July 29 at 7pm and 8.45pm respectively.

Lucy Bird, originally from Ampleforth, will head back north with her Birmingham company Paperback Theatre for an “utterly Brummie” re-telling of The Wind In The Willows on July 30 at 2.30pm and 7pm.

Yoshika Colwell will return to the Mill for the Stilly Fringe finale, Invisible Mending, her exploration of power in small acts of creativity through original music, metaphysics and verbatim material, presented in collaboration with Second Body’s Max Barton, on July 31 at 7pm.

For tickets, head to atthemill.org.

Monster won’t be spotted down At The Mill tonight and tomorrow after Alexander Flanagan Wright postpones premiere

What’s that coming over the field? It’s a Monster of a story, but just not yet as Alexander Flanagan Wright postpones this week’s premiere

ALEXANDER Flanagan Wright’s At The Mill premiere of his work-in-progress storytelling piece Monster tonight and tomorrow at Stillington Mill, near York, is delayed until further notice.

“You brilliant folks that have booked to come and see Monster this week – I’m afraid I’ve decided to postpone the show,” apologises Alex. “It’s pretty boring to have to do that, I admit, and I’m sorry for it.

“I’m excited about story, I’m excited about saying out loud. But now isn’t the time, and I’d be very sad to do something that absolutely wasn’t where it needs to be. So, I’d rather give you your money back and look forward to when the time is right. I’ll refund those tickets for you now.” 

What will unfold in Monster…eventually? Bloke in a fancy suit is stood in the Nevada desert. A warrior holding the head of Medusa is stood on top of a hill. The sky is lit bright with the neon lights of Vegas. We are trying to set foot in places no-one has ever been.

Phil Grainger and Alexander Flanagan Wright in the grounds of Stillington Mill, where they will present The Gods The Gods The Gods next month. Picture: Charlotte Graham

So runs Alex’s preamble to “setting out to tell a story about finding places that we should never have found, about the difference between discovery and ownership, and the need to be a hero”.

“Some of that story happens now,” he says. “Some of it happens millennia ago. All of it is to do with people.”

In the immediate absence of Monster, Alex heartily recommends The Gods The Gods The Gods, his collaboration with actor, musician and writer Phil Grainger, programmed for At The Mill’s theatre season on July 23, 24, 27 and 28 at 8.45pm each night.

“It’s a big, loud, weave of mythology, stories, big basslines, spoken word and soaring melodies,” he says. “We’re previewing it here At The Mill before heading up to the Edinburgh Fringe. So, if you fancy your fix of storytelling and myths, I can 100 per cent promise it to you there.”

Tickets can be booked at atthemill.org.

Taking trouble at At The Mill to build a community for the arts and the people

Daniel Kitson: Testing out new material in six Outside performances at Stillington Mill

SUMMER At The Mill is returning for a second season of creative, culinary and community events in the gardens of Stillington Mill, Stillington, near York.

“After the spectacular, gorgeous, fun, exciting, beautiful and heart-warming time we had throughout our inaugural summer last year – what a ride! – we’re over the moon to present the mixed bag of goodies that is Summer At The Mill 2.0,” says programmer, theatre director, writer and performer Alexander Flanagan-Wright.

“Until September 4, we’ll be hosting a load of wonderful events all about community, art, food and flipping good times. We’ll have a pop-up café and bar, community gatherings, theatre, music, comedy, supper clubs and special events.”

The “Wright stuff” is the work of outdoor theatre co-builder Alex, sister Abbigail Ollive (Saturday café cuisine queen and supper club supremo) and their retired headteacher parents Maggi and Paul Wright, together with partners Megan Drury and Paul Smith. That “stuff” also takes in weddings, events and shepherd’s hut accommodation: truly a village cottage industry, you could say, albeit somewhat larger than a cottage.

A Supper Club gathering at At The Mill

“We just had a blast summer,” says Alex. “It was kind of by accident. It felt very serendipitous or of its moment, saying, ‘here is a way we can gather safely, our local community and the arts community, post-lockdown’.

“So this summer is a chance to see if people still care, and so far the evidence is that they do, with the return of the busy Saturday café, the Crafty Tales show [The Case Of The Missing Bunny] that sold out, our Pizza & Cocktail Night and the Dance Dance Dance Big Bank Holiday Silent Disco.

“Last year felt like a huge rush of adrenaline, and then you think, ‘OK, where do we go forward this year for beautiful experiences together?’. Already this year, we’re meeting new people coming to the events and the café.”

Summing up the essence of At The Mill, Alex says: “We believe a feeling of community is so important when people want to have an evening out. Whereas commercial theatre can feel merely transactional, with us, the means is the art, but the end result is a sense of community, and that feels the right way round.

Alexander Flanagan-Wright: At the heart of At The Mill

“On top of that, eating outside together, drinking outside together, is a lovely thing to do, and we have the space and setting to do that.”

Where once Stillington Mill’s 18th century mill would produce flour, now the At The Mill combines food with food for thought, new recipes at the Supper Club, new works on stage. “We’re very clear with the artists about that. Everyone we’ve asked, we’ve said, ‘we think you’re cool, we like your work, do you want to come and play with us?’,” says Alex.

“What we have in abundance is space and time, imagination and a community. What we don’t have in abundance is cash, but we find most performers end up walking away with cash in their pocket.

“We don’t say to them, bring a particular show. What you get instead is artists testing out new material, so it becomes a genuine relationship with the audience built around nurturing new work. We’re seeking an equal balance between the two communities, where they care about each other, and if we do our part well in bringing them together, then they will meet in a beautiful way, and hopefully that process is more valuable, than, say, a Q&A session in a theatre.”

The Saturday cafe at At The Mill, baked by Abbigail Ollive

Alex continues: “Hopefully too, we’re going to be able to sustain that culture of being able to welcome artists for whatever they want to try out, and of audiences being continually excited about seeing new work at such an early stage, performed by people they wouldn’t expect to be passing through their village.”

A case in point is Edinburgh Fringe favourite Daniel Kitson, the Denby Dale stand-up comedian, who asked to take part in the Theatre At The Mill programme after he was tipped off by storytelling performer Sam Freeman.

“Daniel got in touch to say hello, could he come and do a show? I don’t know what the show is about; I don’t know if Daniel does yet, but that feels a pretty exciting thing to be going on, and testament to our aim for brilliant performers to test out their work to our community,” says Alex.

“I’m also aware that there will be those who don’t know who Daniel Kitson is and would just see him as someone standing up in a garden! But it feels beautiful to know that his shows in May will be his first in two years and it’s great to be part of that work-in-progress experience.”

Chris Stokes: Storytelling comedy in Lockdown Detective at At The Mill on May 26

Clearly, plenty of people know exactly who Daniel Kitson is: his 8pm performances of Outside on May 23 to 25 have sold out already and his June 8 to 10 run looks close to following suit.

What’s in store from Kitson? Here’s the show blurb: “Daniel hasn’t been on stage for over two years. And, to be entirely honest, he’s not really missed it. It is, however, his actual job and everyone’s gone back to work now. So, he’s picked out a comfy pen, bought a new notebook and booked himself a summer’s worth of outdoor shows to find out whether he can still do his job and what, if anything, he has to say to large groups of people he doesn’t know.”

Given his performing hiatus and lack of practice, Kitson predicts the shows are “likely to be relatively rickety affairs”. “But Daniel’s already written the question ‘Do worms feel fear?’ in his new notebook, so we should be okay,” the blurb adds. “Also, if it gets boring – you can just use the time to look at the sky and feel small.”

At The Mill’s role in nurturing new work ties in with Alex’s own creativity as a writer and director, whether directing The Flanagan Collective, heading off to Australia with songwriter/musician/performer/magician Phil Grainger or spending last September to December in New York, making the immersive piece Tammany Hall for the Soho Playhouse.

Gary Stewart: Hosting regular Folk Club nights at At The Mill

“We meet loads of brilliant people when touring our work, and it’s great that they want to come here to test new pieces,” he says. “We’re delighted that people will hone shows here just before the Edinburgh Fringe kicks off, or will do shows here that aren’t going to Edinburgh but fit that vibe.”

Picking out upcoming highlights, singer-songwriterTom Figgins follows up last summer’s gig – his first in four years – with a return tomorrow; Chris Stokes’s storytelling comedy show, Lockdown Detective, is booked in for May 26, and Scottish musician Gary Stewart, now resident in nearby Easingwold, will host his regular Folk Club night on May 27, June 24 and July 8.

“For his first night, it’ll be just Gary and his guitar, performing Paul Simon songs solo rather than with his Graceland band. It’s lovely for us that a local musician, who’s internationally renowned, came here and said, ‘I want to play here every month and bring acts here regularly’,” says Alex.

At The Mill’s ERII Platinum Jubilee celebrations will take in Jubilee Jubilee, A Very Jubilant Cabaret, on June 3 and A Right Royal Knees Up, with live music and pizza, on June 5.

Maddie Morris: 2019 BBC Radio 2 Young Folk Award winner, playing a Music At The Mill gig for the first time

Leeds folk duo Maddie Morris & Lilian Grace will make their At The Mill debut on June 12, performing together as Death And The Daughter and playing solo works too. Their 2022 project, The Sticky Monsters, is influenced by the artwork of Swedish artist John Kenn and their compositions deal with childhood, poverty and more general reflections on culture and the idea of fear.

“I saw Maddie, the 2019 BBC Radio 2 Young Folk Award winner, at The Courthouse, Rural Arts’ home in Thirsk, and she’s an absolute folk musician, studying folk music at Leeds University and looking at contemporary politics through the lens of the folk tradition,” says Alex.

Gemma Curry’s York company Hoglets Theatre will perform the children’s show The Sleep Pirates on June 19 (10am to 1pm); York spoken-word collective Say Owt will host a poetry-writing workshop on June 25 (5pm), followed by an evening showcase (7.30pm); Heady Conduct Theatre will combine physical storytelling with live music to tell the Greek myth of Tiresias on July 10, and Paperback Theatre will stage their charming account of roguish Toad’s misadventures, The Wind In The Willows, on July 30 at 2.30pm and 7pm.

Alex himself has a couple of contributions to the season: Monster, a work-in-progress new story, on June 16 and 17, and The Gods The Gods The Gods, the Wright and Grainger show whose Australian premiere tour was curtailed by the pandemic, now making its British debut on July 23, 24, 27 and 28 at 8.45pm.

Gemma Curry in Hoglets Theatre’s The Sleep Pirates

“In its full iteration, it’s a big, heavy show, but this will be a lighter version before we take it to the Edinburgh Fringe,” says Alex of the final work in Wright & Grainger’s trilogy of myths, after Orpheus and Eurydice, both sell-outs at last summer’s At The Mill season.

The Gods The Gods The Gods, with its four stories and 14 compositions, corals big beats, soaring melodies and heart-stopping spoken words as it “calls us to the crossroads where mythology meets real life”.

“The Gods are gathering and you’re invited,” says Alex. “We’re excited about testing it out here, to wrangle up the story, to see that all the text and music works, and then add lights for Edinburgh, where we’ll be doing it in the Assembly’s 200-seat spiegeltent.”

The Mill’s summer programme will continue to add new events, with full details, including tickets, at athemill.org. Shows start at 7.30pm unless stated otherwise.

The Flanagan Collective’s Alexander Flanagan-Wright and Gobbledigook Theatre’s Phil Grainger staging Orpheus and Eurydice at At The Mill’s socially-distanced summer season in 2021. Picture: Charlotte Graham

Heady Conduct view the world differently to rejuvenate Greek myths of blind prophet Tiresias in At The Mill show at Stillington

Simon Rodda in Heady Conduct Theatre’s Tiresias

HEADY Conduct Theatre conclude the short tour of Tiresias, their storytelling show of rejuvenated Greek myths and legends, in July 10’s At The Mill performance at Stillington, near York.

“Tiresias is the 600-year-old blind prophet who pops up in a lot of Greek myths but hasn’t a story of their own,” says co-artistic director Beck Rogers. “We were fascinated by them; a blind prophet, who walks with royalty and rejects, contends with some of the heavyweights of the ancient Greek world and lives as both a man and woman.

“At the heart of our play we ask the audience, ‘if you could choose to know your future, would you want to?’.” 

Last performed pre-pandemic on the other side of the world in New Zealand, the show is told by one actor, co-artistic director Simon Rodda, and one musician, Rachel Barnes, who have played Brighton, Penzance, Suffolk and St Albans before their tour finale in North Yorkshire.

Rodda plays Tiresias, the blind prophet given the gift to predict Zeus’s future. In 600 years of life, Tiresias has incredible encounters with royalty, rejects, heroes, murderers and a snake-wrangling baby, as well as becoming the first person to be transformed from a man into a woman.

Barnes accompanies his performance with singing and a live score played on guitar and cello in Heady Conduct’s intoxicating theatre piece about the extraordinary ability of humans to face adversity, often with mischief, humour and acts of rebellion.

Rodda says: “I can’t wait to perform these ancient stories in this beautiful, hand-crafted hidden gem of a theatre venue. The stories surrounding Tiresias’s life offer a unique and unrivalled perspective.

“Beck and I are neurodiverse and are advocates for those who view the world differently. To enhance the storytelling experience for the audience, we use language, live music, physical movement and sensory atmospheres to tell Tiresias’s tale.”

Tickets are on sale at: atthemill.org/summer-at-the-mill-calendar/tiresias/10-07-22

Why Serena is playing only men in farcical overhaul of The Hound Of The Baskervilles

Niall Ransome as Dr Watson, Jake Ferretti as Sherlock Holmes and Serena Manteghi as Henry Baskerville in The Hound Of The Baskervilles, on tour at York Theatre Royal from Tuesday

THE Hound Of The Baskervilles is at loose this Haunted Season at York Theatre Royal, returning Serena Manteghi to the city where she cut her acting teeth.

“I studied [at the University of York] and lived in York for many years and still work there often,” she says, ahead of the October 19 to 23 run. “It’s my spiritual home and I’ve been assured I can now call myself an honorary Yorkshire lass, so I’m very much looking forward to heading back there.”

Although based in London, Serena has spent plenty of time up north this summer, performing in early August in Alexander Wright and Phil Grainger’s Eurydice at Theatre At The Mill, Stillington, and later that month in the Harrogate Theatre community play Our Gate in and around the Wesley Centre, Harrogate.

Now she is part of a fast-moving cast of three in Lotte Wakeham’s production of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s most celebrated detective tale as it receives a farcical overhaul, with Serena playing only men in Steven Canny and John Nicholson’s adaptation, first staged by Peepolykus in 2007 with West End success.

The story is as familiar as ever: world-renowned detective Sherlock Holmes and his colleague Dr Watson are asked to unravel the mystery surrounding the untimely death of Sir Charles Baskerville. Amid rumours of a cursed giant hound loose on the moors, they must act fast in order to save the Baskerville family’s last remaining heir.

“Yes, they’re all male characters that I’m playing, but I’ve not really thought about their gender; you just play the character – and I have played men before,” says Serena Manteghi, as she shares a laugh with Niall Ransome. left, and Jake Ferretti

What ensues, however, is an exhilarating collision of farce, ingenious theatrical invention and comic performances to “offer a brand-new twist on the greatest detective story of all time”, in the hands of the multi role-playing Serena, Jake Ferretti’s Sherlock Holmes and Niall Ransome’s Dr Watson.

“I play a whole host of colourful characters, including Sir Charles Baskerville, Dr Mortimer, a helpful London cabbie, three ‘yokels’ (one wise, two less so) and last but not least, the romantic lead (after Dr Watson, of course) and newest Squire of Baskerville Hall, Sir Henry Baskerville,” says Serena, who heads to York after breaking in the Bolton Octagon Theatre and Original Theatre Company production on the road under tour director Tim Jackson following rehearsals in London.

“Yes, they’re all male characters that I’m playing, but I’ve not really thought about their gender; you just play the character – and I have played men before.

“There were male characters in Build A Rocket, Christopher York’s one-woman play I did for the Stephen Joseph Theatre [Scarborough], and I played Rene Magritte in Belt Up Theatre’s Lorca Is Dead [York Theatre Royal, May 2010].

“And there are female characters in this show, played by Jake Ferretti, just as they were played by men when it was created by three wonderful performers [Javier Marzan, John Nicholson and Jason Thorpe]. I predominantly play Sir Henry, in the spirit of that original production.”

Serena Manteghi as LV in The Rise And Fall Of Little Voice at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, in 2017. Picture: Tony Bartholomew

One consequence has come from the four weeks of shows so far, demanding more than “Olympian dexterity” from Serena, Jack and Niall. “It’s been quite hard on my voice because I’m having to use a much lower register all the time, so I have to work hard on my warm-ups,” says Serena, who is no stranger to challenging her vocal cords, having played LV, with all her singing voices, in The Rise And Fall Of Little Voice at the SJT in 2017.

Likewise, The Hound Of The Baskervilles, and indeed myriad Sherlock Holmes stories have been stretched in multiple ways. “I think the books are woven so deeply and lovingly into our cultural vocabulary that, growing up in the UK, you feel the infamous Holmes and Watson are just a part of the literary furniture, as it were. Like Father Christmas,” says Serena.

“That said, I absolutely loved the recent BBC adaptations [starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman] and would tune in as soon as they were aired for fear of someone spoiling the mystery.

“I think the diverse versions work because the Holmes and Watson partnership is so iconic; the performers and the audience begin from such a familiar starting point and that means you can take them on a slightly unexpected journey.”

Holmes and Watson are embedded in our cultural psyche as much as Morecambe & Wise, suggests Serena. “They’re loved just as much, and that dynamic is beautifully honoured by Jack and Niall; that joy Holmes and Watson have in each other’s company, which is so apparent in Conan Doyle’s writing,” she says.

“It’s an utter pleasure to perform ,” says Serena Manteghi of Peepolykus duo Steven Canny and John Nicholson’s stage adaptation of The Hound Of The Baskervilles, as she teams up with Jake Ferretti and Niall Ransome

“Any literary die-hard fanatics of Conan Doyle will be pleasantly surprised by our show: it’s a comedy retelling,  written by a well-established comedy partnership in Steven Canny and John Nicholson – we met John when he came to see it in Exeter – and it’s an utter pleasure to perform. You’d be very hard-pressed not to enjoy yourself watching this play.”

Ah, but  is it still scary, Serena? “There are some scares, but it leans heavily on the humour, less so on scariness,” she says. “Every spooky note is buttoned with a gag, but it’s not a send-up. It never mocks the story; it’s more an affectionate take on it.

“Very often, when you have farcical versions of the classics, you have to leave behind the story, but here you do get the whole story, just laden with joy and fun.”

Look out for David Woodhead’s set and costume designs too. “They’re beautiful. That’s another reason to see the show,” says Serena. “The set is just gorgeous to behold, elevated and malleable for multiple uses, and everything we wear is beautifully made.” In other words, no tat, Sherlock!

Original Theatre Company and Octagon Theatre Bolton present The Hound Of The Baskervilles, York Theatre Royal, October 19 to 23, 7.30pm; 2pm, Thursday; 2.30pm, Saturday. Age guidance: eight upwards. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

By Charles Hutchinson

REVIEW: Eurydice, Serena Manteghi & Phil Grainger, Theatre At The Mill, 7/8/2021

WRITER Alexander Wright and composer Phil Grainger presented Eurydice last summer, first as part of At The Mill’s six nights of six works, then at York Theatre Royal’s Pop-Up On The Patio festival.

The sister piece to Wright and Grainger’s Orpheus had, however, been shaped on overseas duty by Serena Manteghi and Casey Jay Andrews to award-winning success at the Adelaide Fringe in 2019, and it was actor-singer Serena who headed to Stillington last week to reacquaint herself with Eurydice…and a live audience.

For her first stage appearance in a year, she was joined by pantalooned Phil, on electric guitar, occasional humorous interjections and vocals, under the shelter of At The Mill’s bar after the forecast of a deluge forced a late switch of location from the Mill’s open-air theatre.

The rain subsequently did play its part, but only for second-half cameo that complemented rather than ruined the top billing.

“It feels weird calling it a performance. It’s just us chatting,” said Serena, but she was underselling the performance’s combination of formality and informality, and the skills required to deliver its graceful ebb and flow, both in word and song in heightened moments.

In Serena’s hand throughout was a book, Alex’s book, containing both his Orpheus and Eurydice stories. Alex had performed that way too, not because he couldn’t be bothered with learning the lines, but because he loves the feel of the book in which he wrote those lines.

Serena broke off to explain the roots of her following the same performative practice – “a tradition,” she called it – and the book then became more of a comfort blanket, there for her to check a line in case she dried.

Eurydice is a spoken-word show, but one that is theatrical too, given how Serena moved around the café bar and interacted with Phil and his sympathetic, symbiotic guitar, especially when duetting instinctively on songs, whether Phil’s own compositions to Alex’s lyrics or interpretations of apposite Kate Bush and Cyndi Lauper numbers.

Wright’s story is billed as a “tale about being a daily superhero and the need to let go of the stories we think define us”, prompted by his realisation that while Orpheus’s underworld story is familiar, we never hear Eurydice’s account, not even one word from her. History, even in myths, puts the ‘his’ into history, rather than telling her story.

Wright rights that wrong, creating Eurydice as her “untold story imagined and reimagined for the modern-day and told from her perspective”. All the more so last Saturday and Sunday, now that Serena was saying those words, while Alex restricted himself to electronica and sound duties to the side of the bar.

At the outset, Eurydice becomes Leni, five years old on the first day of the rest of her life in a one-parent household, when she wants to wear her superhero costume to school. Attentive listening is then required to follow the story’s path because Wright eschews reportage in favour of storytelling language more poetic, more affecting, more rhythmic, more heart-felt, in part torn from his own torrid back-story.

The story may be ancient, but Wright’s interpretation feeds into the modern world in its detail, although it also remains timeless, such is the universality of its themes of love, cheating, flash-flood romance and finally breaking free. “Hold me in a moment made of everything,” is an image we all want to hold, because we know it can only be impermanent.

In Manteghi’s performance, with Grainger a responsive musical radar to her side, Eurydice’s tale of love and loss, a bee tattoo and a bee sting became even more moving, still cathartic for Wright, but now truly Eurydice’s story, told her way.

REVIEW: Alexander Wright, Remarkable Acts Of Narcissism; Michael Lambourne, Black Shuck, at Theatre At The Mill

Alexander Wright: In a field of one in Stillington

Alexander Wright, Remarkable Acts Of Narcissism; Michael Lambourne, Black Shuck: How It Came For Me, Theatre At The Mill, Stillington

THEY take the trouble at The Mill to be innovative.

From deciding no-one was for tennis on a pot-holed court to building an outdoor theatre in its stead; from unicorn ice cream to fairy-lit gardens; from Saturday morning pop-up cafés to supper club nights; from the green shoots of SeedBed try-outs for emerging talent to works in full bloom by Alexander Wright, Phil Grainger, York theatre-makers Anna Soden (Strawberry Lion Theatre) and Gemma Curry (Hoglets Theatre) and music events with Jessa Liversidge and Gary Stewart.

The Wright stuff, getting it right, as parents Paul and Maggi and son and daughter Alex and Abbigail oversee an arts enterprise with community at its heart. Make that two communities, those who live around there and those who work in the arts. Food, soul food and food for thought at the former corn mill.

Your reviewer has long championed the theatre work of both Alexander Wright and Michael Lambourne, sometimes in tandem (The Tempest and The Great Gatsby) or in their own projects. Summer At The Mill has brought an opportunity to see them both in a new light: Alex giving his debut solo performance (with guests) and Michael hatching his storytelling debut.

Alex is a writer, director, actor, musician, visionary, facilitator but… “I’ve never really stood in front of people and performed my own stuff, on my own, for an extended period. So, now, I am…and I’m nervous about it,” he said beforehand, natty for the night in suit, trainers and trilby.

In his hand was a brown envelope, as Alex’s eyes invited immediate interaction. Yours truly took it, and no, checking the content, it wasn’t a bribe. Inside was a poem, Narcissus. Alex had found his first guest to read aloud, and so the informality and unpredictability of Remarkable Acts Of Narcissism had begun, the one certainty being that Alex’s words would not be on his lips alone.

He was in salesman’s mode too. Not snake oil, but those alchemical Wright words bound in a slim volume,  Remarkable Acts Of Narcissism: a collection of poems and stories “put together for a gig I decided to do of my own writing in a theatre I built in my own garden”, with a title coined by Eurydice actor-musician Casey Jay Andrews.

“I’d like to be clear that no-one asked me to print this book, but it is cheaper to print £100’s worth and I have been unemployed for 18 months,” he said.

Unemployed? Building a theatre, writing, presenting and performing shows, more writing, organising Summer At The Mill, more writing. You know what they say, if you need something doing, always ask someone who’s busy.

So busy, in fact, that Alex had memorised only one piece, from his play The Gods The Gods The Gods; the rest of the two sets he would perform with book in hand: an excellent way to advertise its availability. Oh, did Alex tell you, he has a book for sale? Just checking.

Pink stickers marked the poems, short, very short and much longer, that Alex had picked out for the night, three written to his partner, Megan, to close the chasm of her being on the other side of the world in Australia.

“Stop taking notes, Charles,” he pleaded, but the memorable imagery kept coming: “Kissing snowflakes off each other”; “hand-me-down days, secondhand nights”.

Alex is wont to deflect attention from himself, often happy to play the ringmaster with acts to parade.  “I’m not that interested in poetry nights, if I’m honest”, he said, as he invited singer-songwriter Tom Figgins to reveal the fruits of the dormant songwriting gift he had resumed in lockdown for the first time since 2017. Beautiful, Tom, beautiful. He had arrived at 6.30pm, and already Alex had asked him to do the sound. That’s how these At The Mill shows work: off the cuff; heart on the sleeve; go with the flow. Just say ‘Yes’.

Abbigail, marketeer, baker, mother, puppet maker, pop-up café queen, had her party-piece cameo moment too, splitting an apple clean in two by applying just the right pressure. Pip pip.

“Logic and probability would suggest that someone here can play piano,” chanced Alex, knowing full well that childhood friend Jim Harbourne would oblige, already on site at the Mill for a week’s rehearsals to reactivate Beulah with fellow musician and composer Ed Wrenn for the first time in six years.

Alex went on to play drums, piano and guitar himself, but all the while, the words were to the fore, some from 2010/2011, “but most things are new – and I don’t mean that philosophically,” he said.

The interval brought a chance, you guessed it, to buy the book at the bar before a second half where Alex removed jacket and hat and informality reigned again. “**** knows why you get married in English and divorced in Latin,” he observed wryly.

His old school drama teacher joined him on stage; Harbourne and Wren reawakened two wonders from Beulah, Coffee In The Morning and Humans Fly; Abbigail was called on for another solo, this time vaulting a gate at the field’s edge, and no show would be complete without the Phil Grainger & Alex Wright double act.

On this occasion, Alex had written a poem for Megan, Phil, a song for his Aussie girlfriend Angie, and now they became one as Home, with Phil having learnt his closing guitar part on holiday in Cornwall. Alex sat cross-legged for the first time since primary school; crossed fingers might have been more apt, but they never freeze at a challenge, and one of the high points ensued, Damien Rice song references and all.

This night might never be repeated, but that’s the point. Words age on the page but they have their stage, their moment, as they come alive in unpredictable fashion when performed by Wright, his guest performers or audience volunteers. Writing can be solitary, lonely, but Wright writes to communicate with others for their joy, their sharing; their response in the moment. Narcissistic? Absolutely not! Plugging the book again one more time? Of course.

Michael Lambourne: Actor, writer and now storyteller

Wright had talked of pre-show nerves ahead of Remarkable Acts Of Narcissism. Michael Lambourne, on the other hand, radiates supreme confidence on stage, with a voice to set off earthquakes and the presence to draw you to him like a magnet.

He once played Prospero among the trees at Stillington Mill, but would joke in his York theatre days of his propensity to be cast in anthropomorphic roles. Animal magic, as it would always turn out.

Taking up Alex’s “call to arms” to test-drive a new piece at Theatre At The Mill, Michael headed north from the Cambridgeshire Fens with the ink barely dry on a ghost story based on the legend of the Demon Dog of East Anglia: a hound of unnatural size and omen of misfortune to those who encounter its stare.

And yes, he did play the hell hound, or rather he elicited its terrifying growl terrifically terrifyingly, because Michael was in “responsive storytelling experience” mode: a new venture for him and one that surely will be repeated.

He has lit the fire beneath the words of many others; likewise, others have performed his words, but for the first time, here he was giving breath to his own writing, to the manner born, in Black Shuck: How It Came For Me.

Like Alex’s show, Michael began with an air of informality, after a delightful set of transformative Scottish myths of travellers, selkies and winter and summer queens by former York Theatre Royal creative associate Shona Cowie.

In waistcoat and trilby, he explained why he wore his grandfather’s watch, despite it telling the correct time only twice a day, and how he had re-discovered his book of The World Of The Unknown Ghosts, with its scary picture of one-eyed black dog.

That image accompanied the tale of Black Shuck, “a story about the place I’m from”, one that Lowestoft lads The Darkness had highlighted on their debut album with the chorus “Black Shuck, Black Shuck, That dog don’t give a…”. You can fill in the rest.

“To be honest, I hope you don’t enjoy it,” said Michael, pulling the strings of an already rapt audience. He can rhyme with Ian Dury rhythm, spin a yarn with silken imagery, born of the “pancake-flat fields of the Fens”, and he is not averse to a political jibe. “Just like a lie on the side of a bus,” he observed.

Michael has never looked Black Shuck in the red eye, but his choice of Fenland folk tale and its portent of exit stage left or imminent change chimed with his own fate: his diagnosis at 40 with lymphoma, the blood cancer.

“My disease was a game but I couldn’t choose if I’d win or I’d lose…when Black Shuck found me,” he said at the finale. He is now in remission, back on stage, opening a new chapter rather than nearing The End. Long may Michael tell stories and have stories to tell in the voice with boom, not the voice of doom.