Woogie Jung, left, Tom Pavey and Efe Agwele: Reduced Shakespeare Company’s 2026 tour cast for The Complete Works Of William Shakespeare (Abridged). Picture: Mark Senior
FORTY five years ago, Adam Long, Daniel Singer and Jess Winfield first staged a 20-minute Hamlet at the Shakespeare-themed Renaissance Faires in California.
If brevity is the soul of wit, as espoused by the soon-to-be-terminated Polonius in Act Two, Scene Two of Hamlet, then the anti-nuclear political action committee accountant, Santa Rosa graphic artist and Santa Cruz lawyer had hit on a formula for compact comedy gold.
Long moved to the UK 35 years ago; the trio’s Reduced Shakespeare Company first toured the UK 31 years ago, since when The Complete Works have spent nine years at the Criterion Theatre in London’s West End, featured in two television specials and transferred to more than 20 countries.
Now, Long is at the directorial helm for the 30th anniversary tour of a “re-booted, re-imagined, reinvented and updated” Complete Works, still squeezing 37 plays and, very briefly, the Sonnets, into under two hours (including a 15-minute interval).
On RSC duty for the first time are Mountview Academy of Theatre MA graduate Efe Agwele, South Korean-born, London-based Woogie Jung, in his debut UK tour, and University of Oxford DPhil in Biology student Tom Pavey in his professional bow.
Tour understudy Kiran Raywilliams is a Bristol actor, rapper, poet and DJ, who played David in York company Pilot Theatre’s Run, Rebel in 2023-2024, by the way.
This is a young company, charged with injecting fresh energy into a comedy classic that opens with a copy of the First Folio on a plinth, ready to be shredded alive. The pace is fast, then faster still, but the comic timing is not always there, sometimes pushing too hard or rushed. Serving up the gory Titus Andronicus as a YouTube cookery tutorial, for example, lacks comic bite.
Ironically on such a stiflingly hot night (Wednesday), the cast needed to warm up their audience, whose response times quickened and noise levels rose once audience participation, both on stage and in the auditorium, became central to the show.
Acts of reduction vary from Coriolanus not being performed, on account of an aversion to the second part of his name, to the History Plays being conducted as a game of football with the crown passed like a hot potato from king to king (and King Lear shown the red card for being only a literary creation).
The comedy style is irreverent, gleefully silly at times, delivered with costume and prop changes by the dozen, shaking up Shakespeare like an earthquake but still with a love for Will’s wondrous works. Corniest gag? How about “I invited Shakespeare to the pub, but he was Bard.”
Not everything works, but in Chinese meal tradition, there is always another play coming up for comedic short shrift in the RSC’s taming of rather more than a Shrew.
All’s well that ends well too in Act Two’s focus on Hamlet, in particular a Freudian analysis of the suicidal Ophelia, acting out her psyche, with the audience split into three to play the parts of her Ego, Id and Superego (the three components of the mind defined by Sigmund Freud’s structural theory of personality).
To finish: Hamlet in 30 seconds, then in five seconds, and finally, backwards. Silence is the rest…and the rest is silence until the post-show discussion with chairs on the stage for the only time.
Reduced Shakespeare Company in The Complete Works Of William Shakespeare (Abridged), York Theatre Royal, until Saturday, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Becca Magson’s Rita and Joe Gregory’s Frank in 1812 Theatre Company’s Educating Rita. Picture: Lauren Wyeth
RYEDALE Festival and 1812 Theatre’s Educating Rita, compact Shakespeare and Live At York Museum Gardens are uppermost in Charles Hutchinson’s recommendations amid the July heatwave.
Ryedale play of the week: 1812 Theatre Company in Educating Rita, Helmsley Arts Centre, tonight to Saturday, 7.30pm
SAMANTHA Hughes directs Helmsley Arts Centre resident troupe 1812 Theatre Company in Willy Russell’s comedy Educating Rita, wherein Frank (Joe Gregory) is a tutor of English Literature in his 50s whose disillusioned outlook on life drives him to drink and bury himself in his books.
Enter Rita (Becca Magson), a forthright 26-year-old hairdresser who is eager to learn. After weeks of cajoling, she slowly wins over the hesitant Frank with her highly original insights and refusal to accept “No” for an answer. Box office: 01439 771700 or helmsleyarts.co.uk. Picture: Lauren Wyeth.
Michael Flatley’s Irish dancers in the 30th anniversary tour of Lord Of The Dance, in action at York Barbican tonight. Picture: Brian Doherty
Dance show of the week: Michael Flatley’s Lord Of The Dance30th Anniversary Tour, York Barbican, tonight, 7.45pm
THE 30th anniversary tour of Michael Flatley’s Lord Of The Dance promises a grand celebration of the revolutionary Irish dance production’s legacy, after captivating more than 60 million fans in 60 countries since its 1996 debut.
The 30 Years of Standing Ovations tour features “brand-new choreography, stunning costumes, state-of-the-art special effects and cutting-edge lighting, ensuring that the production continues to push boundaries and deliver an unforgettable experience”. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk/whats-on/lord-of-the-dance-30th-anniversary/.
Clive Francis’s Sir Humphrey Appleby in I’m Sorry, Prime Minister. Picture: Johan Persson
Political drama of the week: I’m Sorry, Prime Minister, Grand Opera House, York, until Saturday, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday matinees
JIM Hacker is back, older, but perhaps not wiser, and still utterly baffled by the real world. Hoping for a quiet retirement from government as the master of Hacker College, Oxford, Jim (Robert Kitson, replacing the indisposed Simon Rouse) instead finds himself facing the ultimate modern crisis: cancelled by the college committee. Enter Sir Humphrey Appleby (Clive Francis), who has lost none of his love for bureaucracy, Latin phrases and well-timed obstruction.
Can Humphrey and Jim outmanoeuvre the hostile students, the Fellows and reality itself? Or is it finally time to say “I’m Sorry, Prime Minister”? Brimming with wit, nostalgia and more double-speak than a press briefing, the final chapter in the evergreen comedy series is written and directed by Jonathan Lynn,co-directed byMichael Gyngell and presented by The Barn Theatre, Cirencester. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
Reduced Shakespeare Company’s 2026 tour cast for The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged), squeezing into York Theatre Royal this week
Shakespeare shake-up of the week: Reduced Shakespeare Company in The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged), York Theatre Royal, until Saturday, 7.30pm plus 2pm Thursday and 2.30pm Saturday matinees
MARKING 30 years of performances in the UK, the Reduced Shakespeare Company’s 2026 tour company of Efé Agwele, Woogie Jung, Tom Pavey and Kiran Raywilliams presents Hamlet told backwards, a micro-condensed Othello scored to a ukulele, a carnage-filled Titus Andronicus presented as a YouTube cookery tutorial and the History Plays as a manic football game, passing the crown from king to king.
Californian co-founders Adam Long, Daniel Singer and Jess Winfield have re-booted, re-imagined, reinvented and updated the restless comedy for a new generation to undertake a rollercoaster ride through all 37 of the Bard’s First Folio of plays. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Stephen Smith’s Claude Monet in A Montage Of Monet at York Medical Society. Picture: Amie Barton-Young
Storytelling actor of the week: Threedumb Theatre presents Stephen Smith in A Montage Of Monet, York Medical Society, Stonegate, York, tonight, 7.30pm and July 11, 3pm; One Man Poe world premiere, July 11, 7.30pm
THREEDUMB Theatre artistic director and actor Stephen Smith performs Joan Greening’s new play exploring French Impressionist artist Claude Monet’s life and loves: his two marriages, his first wife’s devastating death, his lover’s erratic behaviour, his suicide attempt, his thoughts on fellow Impressionists and the torment of his failing eyesight. The 55-minute Monet montage combines projection design and Joe Furey’s music with Smith’s storytelling in two York performances.
Smith also presents the world premiere of his latest Poe double bill (The Business Man and The Case of M. Valdemar) ahead of his Edinburgh Fringe residency. Box office: York, 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark’s Andy McCluskey and Paul Humphreys: Summer of Hits concert at Live At York Museum Gardens
Rock and pop festival of the week: Futuresound presents Live At York Museum Gardens, Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark, tomorrow, gates 5pm; Self Esteem, Friday, gates 5pm, and Super Furry Animals, Saturday, gates 4pm
WIRRAL synth-pop pioneers Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark open Futuresound’s third season of Live At York Museum Gardens concerts tomorrow with a Summer of Hits bill featuring Heaven 17, China Crisis and rising Newcastle singer-songwriter Andrew Cushin.
Mercury Prize nominee Self Esteem, aka Rotherham singer, songwriter and actress Rebecca Lucy Taylor, tops Friday’s line-up, featuring London indie group The Big Moon, South African ghetto funk musician Moonchild Sanelly and Nigerian-born musician and spoken-word artist Joshia Idehen.
Welsh psychedelic rock band Super Furry Animals are Saturday’s headliners, joined by singer-songwriter Baxter Dury, indie-pop septet Los Campesinos!, Nottingham alt-country band Divorce and North Wales psychedelic act Pys Melyn. Box office for July 10 and 11: futuresoundgroup.com/york-museum-gardens-events.
Ross Noble: Playing York Comedy Festival at Live At York Museum Gardens on Sunday
Comedy event of the week: Futuresound presents York Comedy Festival, Live at York Museum Gardens, York, Sunday, gates 3pm
TOPICAL comedian Russell Howard (9.30pm), from Russell Howard’s Good News, and Geordie surrealist Ross Noble (8.35pm) take top billing at the second open-air York Comedy Festival, promoted by Futuresound.
In Sunday’s line-up too will be Irish stand-up and podcast sensation Joanne McNally (7.40pm); stand-up and presenter Russell Kane (7.10pm); Big Kick Energy podcaster and comedian Suzi Ruffell (6.15pm); Barry From Watford (5.45pm), the 82-year-old comic creation of Alex Lowe; cult stand-up hero and viral sensation Jeff Innocent (4.50pm) and Britain’s Got Talent finalist Nabil Abdulrashid (4.20pm), all hosted by Jared Christmas. Box office: yorkcomedyfestival.com.
The Gesualdo Six: Performing Wishing Tree: A Choral Journey at St Lawrence’s Church, York, on July 14 at 3pm as part of Ryedale Festival. Picture: Ash Mills
Festival of the week: Ryedale Festival, July 10 to 26
RYEDALE Festival presents 60 events this month in 40 different venues, including Tenebrae, pianist Junyan Chen, The Gesualdo Six, Dunedin Consort, John Wilson & Sinfonia of London’s An English Summer, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Northern Sinfonia and Opera North.
Taking part too are tenor Mark Padmore and pianist Christopher Glynn, Sheku & Isata Kanneh-Mason, pianist Benjamin Grosvenor, Eliza Carthy and The Restitution, soprano Erika Baikoff, cellist Laura van der Heijden, BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artists and Kirkbymoorside Town Brass Band. For the full festival programme and tickets, go to: ryedalefestival.com.
Hannah Davies and Jack Woods: Re-imagining of the selkie myth in a not-too-distant future in The Ballad Of Blea Wyke. Picture: Matt Jopling
Dystopian vision of the week: Hannah Davies & Jack Woods in The Ballad of Blea Wyke, Rise@Bluebird Bakery, York, July 10, 8.30pm; Helmsley Arts Centre, July 17, 7.30pm
IN North Yorkshire writer and storyteller Hannah Davies and musician Jack Woods’ dystopian re-imagining of the selkie myth in a not-too-distant future, a young woman wants to see the sea. A stranger stands on a cliff. The last grey seal swims towards the shore.
On her 18th birthday, tough care-leaver Cerys breaks the city’s lockdown and travels to the coastal cliffs that birthed her, the crumbling landscape drawing her back to her mythic past. Cue a haunting interweaving of story, music, poetry and song. Box office: York, https://bluebirdbakery.co.uk/rise;Helmsley, 01439 771700 or helmsleyarts.co.uk.
SledOne’s mural, What Walks Amongst Us, taking shape at AcombFest. Picture: Art of Protest
MURALS in Acomb, early music beyond borders, Mystery Plays on waggons, a political swansong and compact Shakespeare keep Charles Hutchinson’s thoughts off the July heatwave.
Art event of the week: AcombFest, Acomb, York, today and tomorrow
CURATED by Art of Protest, York’s first international street art festival continues today and tomorrow with its theme of A Return To Nature, featuring 20 art installations, live murals, RARE Collective’s Paint Jam, spray battles and more than 30 bands, DJs and performers, across 22 venues.
Look out too for interactive family-friendly workshops, an art market, history walks and talks, special events and tastings and a community cinema. Muralists taking part include SMUG, from Australia, Sheffield muralist Peachzz, wildlife artist Curtis Hylton and Acomb’s very own SledOne. For full details, go to: https://acombfest.co.uk/.
Baroque collective Solomon’s Knot: Performing Friedrich Nicolaus Bruhns’ St Mark Passion, directed by Jonathan Sells, at The Quire, York Minster, on July 10
50th anniversary event of the summer: 2026 York Early Music Festival, Beyond Borders, until July 11
THE premier British early music festival marks its 50th anniversary with a celebration of “just how far early music has travelled – beyond the borders of the myriad historic venues of our city to a worldwide audience,” says director Delma Tomlin.
The festival welcomes The Sixteen, B’Rock Orchestra & Vocal Consort, Imago Mundi, mezzo-soprano Helen Charlston, Solomon’s Knot and NCEM Platform Artists Anacronia and Contre le temps, among others. Box office: 01904 658338 or ncem.co.uk/yemf.
Bodhan Pitel’s Herod in DSpace Ukrainian Theatre’s The Massacre of the Innocents in the York Mystery Plays 2026. Picture: John Saunders
Theatrical outdoor event of the week: 2026 York Mystery Plays, streets of York, tomorrow, 10.30am to 4.50pm
THE four-yearly staging on the York Mystery Plays on pageant waggons takes place at four locations across the city: free viewing at the Minster Refectory Gardens, Deansgate, (from 10.30am) King’s Square (from 11.10am), St Sampson’s Square (from 11.50am) and ticketed seats at Dean’s Park (from 12.30pm). Ten core plays will be complemented by further extracts to tell the story from The War In Heaven to Doomsday. For full details, go to yorkmysteryplays.co.uk; tickets, ticketsource.com/york-festival-trust.
Clive Francis as Sir Humphrey Appleby in I’m Sorry, Prime Minister. Picture: Johan Persson
Political drama of the week: I’m Sorry, Prime Minister, Grand Opera House, York, July 7 to 11, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday matinees
JIM Hacker is back, older, but perhaps not wiser, and still utterly baffled by the real world. Hoping for a quiet retirement from government as the master of Hacker College, Oxford, Jim (Robert Kitson, replacing Simon Rouse) instead finds himself facing the ultimate modern crisis: cancelled by the college committee. Enter Sir Humphrey Appleby (Clive Francis), who has lost none of his love for bureaucracy, Latin phrases and well-timed obstruction.
Can Humphrey and Jim outmanoeuvre the hostile students, the Fellows and reality itself? Or is it finally time to say “I’m Sorry, Prime Minister”? Brimming with wit, nostalgia and more double-speak than a press briefing, the final chapter in the evergreen comedy series is written and directed by Jonathan Lynn,co-directed byMichael Gyngell and presented by The Barn Theatre, Cirencester. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
Reduced Shakespeare Company’s 2026 tour cast for The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged)
Shakespeare shake-up of the week: Reduced Shakespeare Company in The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged), York Theatre Royal, July 7 to 11, 7.30pm plus 2pm Thursday and 2.30pm Saturday matinees
MARKING 30 years of performances in the UK, the Reduced Shakespeare Company’s 2026 tour company of Efé Agwele, Woogie Jung, Tom Pavey and Kiran Raywilliams presents Hamlet told backwards, a micro-condensed Othello scored to a ukulele, a carnage-filled Titus Andronicus presented as a YouTube cookery tutorial and the History Plays as a manic football game, passing the crown from king to king.
Californian co-founders Adam Long, Daniel Singer and Jess Winfield have re-booted, re-imagined, reinvented and updated the restless comedy for a new generation to undertake a rollercoaster ride through all 37 of the Bard’s First Folio of plays. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Stephen Smith’s Claude Monet in A Montage Of Monet
Busiest actor of the week: Threedumb Theatre presents Stephen Smith in A Montage Of Monet, York Medical Society, Stonegate, York, July 8, 7.30pm and July 11, 3pm; One Man Poe, Ripon Theatre Festival, Ripon Arts Hub, July 10, 8pm; One Man Poe world premiere, York Medical Society, July 11, 7.30pm
THREEDUMB Theatre artistic director and actor Stephen Smith performs Joan Greening’s new play exploring French Impressionist artist Claude Monet’s life and loves: his two marriages, his first wife’s devastating death, his lover’s erratic behaviour, his suicide attempt, his thoughts on fellow Impressionists and the torment of his failing eyesight. The 55-minute Monet montage combines projection design and Joe Furey’s music with Smith’s storytelling in two York performances.
Smith also presents four of Edgar Allan Poe’s Gothic horror works (The Tell-Tale Heart, The Pit and The Pendulum, The Black Cat and The Raven) in Ripon, followed by the world premiere of his latest Poe double bill (The Business Man and The Case of M. Valdemar) in York. All six, amounting to 18,000 Poe words, will be performed at the Edinburgh Fringe. Box office: York, 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk; Ripon, ripontheatrefestival.org.
Musical of the week: Top Hat and Tails Theatre in Little Shop Of Horrors!, Friargate Theatre, York, July 9 to 11, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee
MEEK floral assistant Seymour Krelborn stumbles across a new breed of plant he calls Audrey II, a foul-mouthed carnivore that promises him fame and fortune if he keeps feeding it with blood. Over time, however, Seymour discovers Audrey II’s plans for global domination in Howard Ashman and Alan Menken’s sci-fi B-movie monster spoof, presented here with a live band and professionally hand-crafted puppets. Box office: ridinglights.org.
Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark’s Andy McCluskey and Paul Humphreys: Summer of Hits show at York Museum Gardens on Thursday
Music festival of the week: Futuresound presents Live At York Museum Gardens, Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark, July 9, gates 5pm; Self Esteem, July 10, gates 5pm, and Super Furry Animals, July 11, gates 4pm
WIRRAL synth-pop pioneers Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark open Futuresound’s third season of Live At York Museum Gardens concerts on Thursday with a Summer of Hits bill featuring Heaven 17, China Crisis and rising Newcastle singer-songwriter Andrew Cushin.
Mercury Prize nominee Self Esteem, aka Rotherham singer, songwriter and actress Rebecca Lucy Taylor, tops Friday’s line-up, featuring London indie group The Big Moon, South African ghetto funk musician Moonchild Sanelly and Nigerian-born musician and spoken-word artist Joshia Idehen.
Welsh psychedelic rock band Super Furry Animals are next Saturday’s headliners, joined by singer-songwriter Baxter Dury, indie-pop septet Los Campesinos!, Nottingham alt-country band Divorce and North Wales psychedelic act Pys Melyn. Box office for July 10 and 11: futuresoundgroup.com/york-museum-gardens-events.
If I Knew The Way, I Would Take You Home, by Matt Sewell
In Focus: Birds of the week: Matt Sewell exhibition for RARE Collective at WET, Micklegate, York,until mid-July
SHROPSHIRE artist, illustrator and author Matt Sewelll is the latest street art luminary to be showcased in RARE Collective’s collaboration with WET wine bar, in Micklegate, York, in aid of SASH (Safe and Sound Homes), the York youth homelessness charity.
“We’re really chuffed to have Matt return to York with his fabulous Riso prints,” says RARE Collective exhibition organiser Sharon McDonagh. “If you came to the Vandalfest charity street art show last year, you would have seen his cracking bird mural on Floor 3 of the big disused office block in Low Ousegate.
Artist Matt Sewell at work
Sewell is an avid ornithologist, contributing regularly to the Caught By The River website and publishing the books Our Garden Birds, Our Songbirds, Our Woodland Birds, Owls, Penguins and A Charm Of Goldfinches And Other Collective Nouns.
He has illustrated for the Guardian, Barbour, V&A Museums, BBC, National Trust, Greenpeace, Big Issue and Levi’s and painted walls for Helly Hansen, Puma and the RSPB (Royal Society for the Protection of Birds). He has exhibited in Great Britain, New York, old York, Tokyo and Paris.
Cuckoo Cuckoo Cuckoo, by Matt Sewell
Under RARE Collective’s partnership with WET, artists and photographers exhibit their work in a six-week solo show. As well as at WET, work can be bought online both during and after the exhibition run at rarecollective.co.uk.
In addition, a selection of Sewell’s prints is featuring in RARE Collective’s exhibition for AcombFest at The Crooked Tap, on show until August 15 in support of SASH.
Matt Sewell’s wall of bird prints for sale at WET
Exhibiting too are: spAm (Sharon McDonagh), Sola, Alison Jagger, Al Murphy, Anthony Appleyard, Boxxhead, HazardOne, Lady Mkei, Lincoln Lightfoot, Liskbot, Michael Dawson, Nicolas Dixon, Slice Of Lino, STATIC and Stephen Bottrill.
“RARE are working in collaboration with the Art of Protest Project, after being invited by AcombFest curator Jeff Clark and the AOP team to curate the live PaintJam at the Carlton Tavern, in Acomb Road, Holgate, today and tomorrow,” says RARE Collective curator Sharon McDonagh.
“This will involve nine artists painting live from 10am to 4pm each day (Boxxhead, HazardOne, Lady Mkei, Lincoln Lightfoot, Liskbot, Nicolas Dixon, Sola, spAm and VYZ); live DJ sets by Alilou, Bob Yenz, Conor Rogan, Free Da Karlos and Sola plus guests, audiovisual artists Fred DWolf, Sonas and JohnManBand on a huge screen, cocktails and mixology by Tulum Spirits Collective and street food by El Chappo, all in support of SASH.”
Did you know?
MATT Sewell is also a musician, performing as Sewell &The Gong with Chris Tate and as the deep-cut compiler of the compilation series A Crushing Glow.
Matt Sewell’s work environment
In Focus too: Michael Flatley’s Lord Of The Dance, 30th Anniversary Tour, York Barbican, July 6 to 8, 7.45pm
THE 30th anniversary tour of Michael Flatley’s Lord Of The Dance promises a grand celebration of the revolutionary Irish dance production’s legacy after captivating more than 60 million fans in 60 countries since its 1996 debut.
The 30 Years of Standing Ovations tour will feature “brand-new choreography, stunning costumes, state-of-the-art special effects and cutting-edge lighting, ensuring that the production continues to push boundaries and deliver an unforgettable experience”.
Creative manager James Keegan says: “Michael Flatley has taught me that there are no boundaries in the creative space. When he burst onto the scene in the mid-90s, he took traditional Irish dancing to a place nobody had ever dreamed of, and that has been the key to the show’s success.
“Michael often says in rehearsals that we need to push the boundaries as much as we can, and if it’s too far or doesn’t work, we can always pull it back. That mindset is what keeps Lord Of The Dance evolving.”
Lord Of The Dance on its 30th anniversary tour. Picture: Brian Doherty
Keegan believes that the core elements of Flatley’s visionary production – choreography, music and storytelling – remain timeless while still evolving. “What made Lord Of The Dance famous 30 years ago is still what makes it work today: 40 of the greatest Irish tap dancers in the world performing in one line in perfect sync. It’s a spectacle that never loses its magic,” he says.
Reflecting on Flatley’s impact, Keegan says: “Professional Irish dancing didn’t really exist until Michael created his shows and added a more entertaining twist to the art form.
“He wasn’t just a dancer; he was a highly tuned athlete who could perform at astonishing levels for a full two-hour show, seven days a week. Today, we see young competitive dancers around the world striving to reach the levels he set.”
But beyond the footwork and the spectacle, Keegan reckons Flatley’s greatest legacy is his ability to inspire. “Michael’s motto has always been, ‘Nothing is impossible.’ He took an already intricate dance form and pushed it even further, breaking records like 38 taps per second and incorporating upper body movements that defied tradition,” he says.
Michael Flatley
“I’ve seen it time and time again: a dancer who never thought they could be a lead receives Michael’s encouragement, and before long, they are fulfilling their dream on stage.”
For Keegan, one moment stands out above the rest. “In 1997, I was a ten-year-old competitive Irish dancer in Manchester, struggling with the name-callers and the challenges of being a young male dancer,” he says.
“Then Lord Of The Dance came to town. Watching Michael and the cast that night at the Apollo Theatre changed everything for me. The masculinity, the precision, the energy, it was like nothing I’d ever seen before.
“I met Michael at the stage door, and suddenly, I knew that being an Irish dancer could mean being a superstar. Nineteen years later, I had the honour of sharing his final show with him at Caesars Palace, Las Vegas, in 2016. It was a full-circle moment I will never forget.”
Michael Flatley’s Lord Of The Dance dancers
As Lord Of The Dance embark on its 30th anniversary tour, Flatley reflects on the journey. “The magic of Lord Of The Dance lives on in the hearts of our audience, and I am thrilled to bring this iconic show back to the UK in 2026,” he says.
“30 Years of Standing Ovations celebrates the incredible journey we’ve shared with fans over the years. It’s a tribute to the enduring power of dreams, the joy of dance and the unwavering support of our audience. This tour is our way of saying thank you for three decades of unforgettable memories.”
Although Flatley, now 67, retired from performing during his final tour in 2016, he has remained at the helm of Lord Of The Dance, guiding its evolution while preserving its timeless magic.
Now, as the production prepares for its biggest celebration yet, fans can look forward to a breathtaking spectacle that honours the past, embraces the present, and inspires the future of Irish dance.
Adam Long: Reduced Shakespeare Company co-founder and director
THE new version of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged), rebooted and re-imagined for the 30th anniversary UK tour, is squeezing into York Theatre Royal from July 7 to 11.
After nine years at the Criterion Theatre in London’s West End, two television specials and performances in more than 20 countries, the Reduced Shakespeare Company brings this updated and reinvented classic comedy to a new generation of audiences as Efé Agwele, Woogie Jung, Tom Pavey and understudy Kiran Raywilliams take a rollercoaster ride through all 37 of the Bard’s plays.
Presented by The Theatre Chipping Norton and Selladoor Worldwide, through special arrangement with Music Theatre International, the 2026 version is written by director Adam Long and fellow Californian original writers and founder members Daniel Singer and Jess Winfield, who first teamed up 45 years ago when Adam was an accountant for an anti-nuclear political action committee, Daniel, a graphic artist in Santa Rosa and Jess, a lawyer in Santa Cruz.
Here come Hamlet told backwards, a micro-condensed Othello scored to a ukulele, a carnage-filled Titus Andronicus, presented as a YouTube cookery tutorial, and the History Plays as a manic football game between kings (although King Lear is disqualified for being fictional).
“We started touring it here in 1995 – 31 years go – and in the first year we did it at this incredibly beautiful theatre in York,” recalls Adam. “We did a show in Leeds and then there was a three-day gap before York, and we got this phone-call saying, ‘could we do a show in Plymouth in between?’, so we drove all the way down to Plymouth and back again!”
The Reduced Shakespeare Company (RSC) had begun as a street theatre troupe in San Francisco Bay in the 1980s, busking 15-minute versions of Romeo And Juliet and Hamlet to earn a living.
Most of the performances were at ‘Renaissance Faires’ where the RSC often had to share the stage with belly dancers and sheep. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged) was first performed at the Edinburgh Fringe in 1987, at 10am in a church basement.
From there, the RSC was invited to perform in Montreal, Tokyo, New York and London, and the rest is history, but what first drew Long and co to Shakespeare?
“I’m from California, where we were not forced to study it in the same way as you are here, so our love of Shakespeare came from seeing it live,” says Adam. “I loved Bugs Bunny and The Marx Brothers too and in my life they’re intertwined.”
The comedy style emerged from condensing the essentials of each play. “It comes down to what’s the plot and who are the characters? Like Romeo And Juliet is two teenagers high on hormones who make some bad decisions, and if that was on Netflix, you’d definitely watch it!” says Adam, who has lived in London for 35 years.
The Reduced Shakespeare Company’s 2026 tour cast for The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged): understudy Kiran Raywilliams, left, Efe Agwele, Woogie Jung and Tom Pavey, front
“We figured Romeo And Juliet was the play most people knew, along with Hamlet, so we book-end the show with those two plays. Romeo And Juliet gets a healthy 15 minutes; it’s like Romeo And Juliet shot out of a cannon: high-speed drama.
“We then highlight plays they’re less familiar with, like Titus Andronicus, the most gory play Shakespeare wrote – and one of the most gory plays I’ve encountered. It’s more gory than all Quentin Tarantino’s films condensed into one, so we devote only two minutes to it in the form of a YouTube cooking tutorial by Titus Andronicus.”
The Reduced Shakespeare Company version of Hamlet developed as the show did likewise. “When we got to the point where Ophelia killed herself, we thought it would be interesting to do a Freudian analysis, acting out her psyche, with audience involvement, and the response was so good, we had to do an encore, where we did Hamlet in only 30 seconds,” says Adam.
“Demands came for another encore, so we did it in five seconds. Then we were all just sitting in the pub, thinking about what more we would do with it, and Jess, I think, suggested: ‘what if we were to do it backwards, like in a parlour game?’.”
Hamlet in reverse is now the staple final act of the show, but which plays were the hardest to adapt? “The Histories, because they’re not as funny as the tragedies, and they’re also not as well known,” says Adam.
“So we thought, ‘how do we take all the Histories and condense them into something that will be entertaining for the audience?’. It’s like a football game with the crown being passed from king to king and gradually we got it down to 90 seconds.”
Asked to pick a favourite Shakespeare play, Adam says: “I know it’s a predictable answer, but I do love Hamlet. I think that if I was a playwright and it was the only play I wrote, I would feel it was a job well done without having to write another 36 plays!”
The Reduced Shakespeare Company in The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged), York Theatre Royal, July 7 to 11, 7.30pm plus 2pm Thursday and 2.30pm Saturday matinees. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk Age guidance: Ten plus.Post-show discussion on July 8.
