Gray O’Brien as “retired” inspector John Rebus in Rebus: A Game Called Malice
SCOTTISH crime author Sir Ian Rankin has been writing about “this guy Rebus” since 1985.
The first book was published in 1987; the latest, Midnight And Blue, arrived last Thursday. “I’ve spent more than half my life with him. I still don’t quite know what makes him tick. I keep writing about him to get to the core of his identity,” he says.
Rankin has harboured thoughts of bumping off his gnarly Edinburgh inspector, but he reckons Rebus will tell him when it’s time to hand in his badge. Not this year, it would seem, what with the BBC television series, then the play and the book.
It turns out Rebus has done the quitting bit already after 30 years in A Game Called Malice. He has retired from Police Scotland, he tells his fellow guests at a swanky dinner party in Heriot Row, one of those plush, high-ceiling Edinburgh town houses full of “art, books and fancy pictures”. Terry Parsons’ stylish design more than does it justice, filled with paintings.
Brought to the party by lawyer Stephanie Jeffries (Abigail Thaw, a familiar face from Endeavour), Gray O’Brien’s John Rebus looks a little incongruous at such a gathering.
Standing at the back, observing, listening, suited and booted but tie undone, he is reading the room, not the room reading him, he later tells us, in one of those waspish, whiplash monologues that would be a voiceover on screen but has the added impact of breaking theatre’s fourth wall here.
In the kitchen, never seen, is a fancy-dan chef, hired for the night to let party hostess Harriet Godwin (Teresa Banham) focus on hosting the murder mystery game she has invented. It turns out, of course it does, that in playing the game, the guests expose secrets, fallible character traits, of their own.
Rebus is the only one who never leaves the room at any point, for a fag, a phonecall or whatever, so when casino boss Paul Godwin (Neil McKinven) discovers a bloodied body in an en-suite bathroom, while having a nosey upstairs, all fall under Rebus’s suspicion, as he laconically returns to detective duty with that familiarly unnerving manner.
Who’s dead? That would be telling, and besides, Rankin and co-writer Simon Reade do their stage business so briskly, so smartly, we are all heading home by 9.15pm, case solved, Rebus’s droll epilogue sending us on our way.
The murderer? Was it Harriet, always on edge, or Stephanie, whose past is not without unfortunate blemish? Or Godwin, one of those business types who gives to charity, likes to wear bespoke suits that speak far too loudly, and skates very close to the edge of the law.
Or maybe Godwin’s savvy young belle (Jade Kennedy), an influencer on social media, forever tapping away, who may run too close to the wind. Or Harriet’s partner, Jack Fleming (Billy Hartman), no replacement for late husband Callum, and doesn’t he know it.
Loveday Ingram’s direction, playful, dry witted and suspenseful, matches the pace, humour and intrigue of Rankin and Read’s dialogue, her cast delivering good performances all round.
O’Brien, who caught the eye as Juror 7 in Twelve Angry Men at the Grand Opera House earlier this year, has exactly the right hangdog air for Rebus, always stirring, playing his own game by his own rules in pursuit of the truth. Welcome back; that retirement was never going to last
Rebus: A Game Called Malice, York Theatre Royal, until Saturday, 7.30pm plus 2pm Thursday and 2.30pm Saturday matinees. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
UPDATE, 18/10/2024:Author Ian Rankin will take part in Friday’s post-show discussion with company members. Earlier in the day, sometime between 3pm and 6pm, he will be popping into Criminally Good Books, in Colliergate, to promote his October 10 novel, Midnight And Blue.
DEL Boy in a musical, a Dungeon murderess, a Greek teen tragedy and a top-Rankin Scottish detective are well worth investigating, advises Charles Hutchinson.
New attraction of the week: The Black Widow, York Dungeon, Clifford Street, York, from today, from 10am
THIS Hallowe’en season’s new show at York Dungeon opens today. Be prepared to encounter the grim tale of Britain’s first female serial killer: Mary Ann Cotton.
A north easterner with a propensity for lacing tea with a drop of arsenic, the Black Widow was convicted of only one murder but is believed to have killed many others, including 11 of her 13 children, and three of her four husbands. Box office: thedungeons.com/york/tickets-passes/. Pre-booking is essential.
Jude Kelly: Striving for a gender-equal world in The WOW Show
The WOW factor: The WOW Show with Jude Kelly, York Theatre Royal, tomorrow, 7.30pm
WOMEN of the World founder, chief executive officer and theatre director Jude Kelly CBE was director of West Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds, from 1990 to 2002 and London’s Southbank Centre from 2006 to 2018 and set up the WOW Foundation charity in 2010 to achieve a gender-equal world.
In an evening of optimism, determination and laughter, she explores “our often exasperating and confusing journey towards gender equity, covering everything from money, sex, race, food, and ageing”. Expect personal anecdotes, guests and big ideas. “The message is: If you are a woman or you know a woman, please show up!” says Jude. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Sam Lupton: Playing Del Boy in Only Fools And Horses The Musical at the Grand Opera House, York
“Plonker” musical of the week: Only Fools And Horses The Musical, Grand Opera House, York, October 14 to 19, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Wednesday and Saturday matinees
BASED on John Sullivan’s long-running BBC One series, his son Jim Sullivan and comedy treasure Paul Whitehouse’s West End hit, Only Fools And Horses The Musical, combines 20 songs with an ingenious script.
“Join us as we take a trip back in time to 1989, where it’s all kicking off in Peckham,” reads the 2024-25 tour invitation. “While the yuppie invasion of London is in full swing, love is in the air as Del Boy sets out on the rocky road to find his soul mate, Rodney and Cassandra prepare to say ‘I do’, and even Trigger is gearing up for a date (with a person!). Meanwhile, Boycie and Marlene give parenthood one final shot and Grandad takes stock of his life and decides the time has finally arrived to get his piles sorted.” Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
Gray O’Brien in the role of Inspector John Rebus in Rebus: A Game Called Malice at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Nobby Clark
Thriller of the week: Rebus: A Game Called Malice, York Theatre Royal, October 15 to 19, 7.30pm; 2pm, Wednesday, Thursday; 2.30pm, Saturday
SCOTTISH crime writer Ian Rankin’s much-loved detective, John Rebus, takes to the stage in a new storyco-written with Simon Reade. Gray O’Brien, from Coronation Street, Casualty and Peak Practice, plays Rebus in a cast also featuring Abigail Thaw and Billy Hartman.
When a splendid Edinburgh mansion dinner party concludes with a murder mystery game, suddenly a murder needs to be solved. However, guests have secrets of their own. Among them is Inspector John Rebus, but is he Is playing an alternative game, one to which only he knows the rules? Rankin will attend the October 18 post-show discussion with the cast. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Chris Mooney and Helen Spencer: Playing lovers with opposite takes on their relationship in The Last Five Years at the NCEM, York. Picture: Simon Trow
Debut of the week: Wharfemede Productions & Black Sheep Theatre Productions in The Last Five Years, National Centre for Early Music, St Margaret’s Church, Walmgate, York, October 17 to 19, 7.45pm
HELEN Spencer and Nick Sephton launch their new York company, Wharfemede Productions, in tandem with Black Sheep Theatre Productions, by staging The Last Five Years, Jason Robert Brown’s musical story of two New Yorkers, rising novelist Jamie Wellerstein and struggling actress Cathy Hiatt, who fall in and out of love over the course of five years.
Combining only two cast members, York Theatre scene luminaries Chris Mooney and Spencer, with a small band, expect an intimate and emotive evening of frank storytelling and gorgeous music. Box office: ticketsource.co.uk/wharfemede-productions-ltd.
Alexander Flanagan-Wright in Helios, a modern take on an Ancient Greek myth, performed under the Great Hall dome at Castle Howard
Theatrical event of the week: Wright & Grainger in Helios, The Great Hall, Castle Howard, near York, October 17, 5pm and 7.30pm
A LAD lives halfway up an historic hill. 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 play 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,” says writer-performer Alexander Flanagan-Wright, who presents his delicate tale with a tape-player beneath the Great Hall dome’s mural, painted by 18th century Venetian painter Antonio Pelligrini, whose depiction of the Fall of Phaeton was the thematic inspiration behind Helios. Box office: castlehoward.co.uk.
Squeeze: 50th anniversary celebrations at York Barbican
Recommended but sold out already: Squeeze, York Barbican, October 18, doors 7pm
DEPTFORD’S answer to The Beatles mark their 50th anniversary as Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook manage to Squeeze in hit after hit, like pulling musses from a shell. Don’t miss the support act, one Badly Drawn Boy.
Strictly between us: Husband-and-wife dancers Aljaž Škorjanec and Janette Manrara look forward to A Night To Remember at York Barbican next June
Show announcement of the week: Aljaž Škorjanec and Janette Manrara: A Night To Remember, York Barbican, June 1 2025
STRICTLY Come Dancing favourites Aljaž Škorjanec and Janette Manrara – married since 2017 – will be touring next year with A Night To Remember, featuring an ensemble of “some of the UK’s very best dancers and singers”.
Aljaž, partnering Tasha Ghouri in the 2024 series, and It takes Two presenter Janette will “perform stunning routines to an eclectic array of music”, spanning the Great American songbook through to modern-day classics, backed by their own big band, fronted by boogie- woogie star Tom Seal. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk/whats-on/aljaz-and-janette-a-night-to-remember.
In Focus: Black Treacle Theatre in Accidental Death Of An Anarchist, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, Oct 15 to 19
Superintendent Curry (Chris Pomfrett) and DI Daisy (Adam Sowter) are pushed to the edge by The Maniac (Andrew Isherwood), when they are surprised in Accidental Death Of An Anarchist. Picture: John Saunders
BENT police and politics come under fire in York company Black Treacle Theatre’s provocative production of Dario Fo’s uproarious farce Accidental Death Of An Anarchist next week.
In a new adaptation by Tom Basden, creator of Plebs and Here We Go, the setting is updated to the rotten state of present-day Britain.
The satirical play is set in a police station where a suspect has “accidentally” fallen to his death, but did he jump or was he pushed? As the police attempt to avoid yet another scandal, a mysterious imposter (the Maniac) is arrested and brought in for questioning.
Seizing the chance to put on a show, he leads the officers in an ever-more ridiculous reconstruction of their official account, exposing their cover-ups, corruption and (in)competence.
The original 1970 Italian farce by Nobel Prize winner Dario Fo and Franca Rame was based on the real-life case of an anarchist suspected of a bombing, who plunged to his death from a Milan police station in suspicious circumstances and was later exonerated. Now comes the British re-boot.
The Maniac (Andrew Isherwood) peruses the Anarchist’s case file as Inspector Burton (Paul Osborne) interrupts him
Director Jim Paterson says: “I’m really excited to bring this new adaptation of one of my favourite plays to York. Dario Fo was a master of using comedy to talk about the social and political issues of the day – particularly state corruption and hypocrisy.
“What Tom Basden’s version does brilliantly is bring the plot bang up to date in both setting and references, taking in police scandals and political issues of recent years – as well as packing it full of hilariousjokes! It’s fast, furious and funny, and I can’t wait for opening night.”
Lead actor Andrew Isherwood says: “Playing the Maniac, I get the opportunity to play multiple roles, with a variety of voices, which is always fun for me as I really enjoy getting the chance to play around, have some fun and indulge a little bit, which I don’t normally get to express in the same show.
“I think audiences will get a real kick out of the bizarre nature of this show, with all its twists and turns and bitingly satirical elements woven in, all performed by a brilliantly talented cast!”
PC Joseph (Guy Wilson) attempts to keep a record of the increasingly complex story being spun in Accidental Death Of An Anarchist. Picture: John Saunders
Black Treacle Theatre in Accidental Death Of An Anarchist,Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, October 15 to 19, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee.Box office: https://tickets.41monkgate.co.uk. Running time: Two hours 15 minutes, including interval.
In the cast will be: The Maniac – Andrew Isherwood; Inspector Burton – Paul Osborne; DI Daisy – Adam Sowter; PC Joseph – Guy Wilson; Superintendent – Chris Pomfrett; Fi Phelan/PC Jackson – Jess Murray.
Production team: Director, Jim Paterson; lighting designer, Adam Kirkwood; set designer, Richard Hampton; costume/props, Maggie Smales.
Did you know?
Black Treacle Theatre’s past productions were: Constellations (March 2022), Iphigenia In Splott (March 2023) and White Rabbit, Red Rabbit (November 2023), all at Theatre@41, Monkgate, York.
Last Chance To See: Jack Ashton starring in Little Women at York Theatre Royal, today at 2.30pm and 7.30pm
Jack Ashton as Professor Bhaer in Little Women at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Charlotte Graham
STARRING in a much-loved television series can be a boon or a bother for an actor who becomes identified with a particular character. Directors may be reluctant to offer different sorts of role.
Happily, Jack Ashton, best known as the Reverend Tom Hereward in BBC One’s Sunday night staple Call The Midwife, has escaped being typecast. So much so that in York Theatre Royal’s production of Louisa May Alcott’s coming-of-age classic Little Women, he is playing not one but two very contrasting characters.
The link is that both are suitors of the titular Little Women – John Brooke and Professor Bhaer, the love interests for Meg and Jo March. Not that Jack downplays the problems of leaving Call The Midwife after five years as the vicar of Poplar in the series set in an East End Anglican convent in the late 1950s and 1960s.
“It was difficult, more difficult than I thought,” he admits. “It was hard for a few years for my agent to get me seen for something. If you’re known as a particular character, it can be hard to do something that’s opposite to that and challenge yourself, which is what you want to be as an actor.”
In the past Jack has said that Call The Midwife changed his life, a reference to becoming a father – of Wren, six, and Lark, two – through his relationship with co-star Helen George. “It was a lovely time in my life,” he says. So much so that the last time he acted in York, in Strangers On the Train at the Grand Opera House in March 2018, newly-born Wren came on tour with them.
Jack Ashton’s John Brooke and Ainy Medina’s Meg March in Little Women, adapted by Anne-Marie Casey, at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Charlotte Graham
Juliet Forster’s production of Little Women at York Theatre Royal, where he has performed since his early days as an actor, certainly offers the chance to do something different: two different characters in one show.
One of them, Professor Bhaer, requires a German accent, necessitating Jack to work with a voice coach.
He has not read Little Women, although he has seen Great Gerwig’s 2019 film version, and coincidentally has just finished working with Saoirse Ronan, who played burgeoning writer Jo March in the American movie.
While he has not worked previously with any of the Little Women cast members, he has done so with director Juliet Forster, York Theatre Royal’s creative director.
She directed him in productions that have punctuate his life, going from a young man fresh out of drama school in 2006 to present-day leading man, appearing in Twelfth Night and the Studio double bill of Escaping Alice and End Of Desire, as well as The Guinea Pig Club and The Homecoming under former artistic director Damain Cruden’s direction.
Jack Ashton rehearsing the role of Professor Bhaer in Little Women. Picture: S R Taylor Photography
York remains one of his favourite places. “It’s such a great city. I love coming back, it’s a no-brainer when that kind of offer, like Little Women, comes along,” says Jack.
“I have really good friends in York and I’ve befriended Rita and Paul, the original people on the digs list. I got so lucky because I stayed with them the first time and have continued to stay with them every time since.”
He is realistic about the pitfalls of being an actor. “Sometimes people think an actor’s life is quite glamorous. We just audition and audition, and sometimes people say ‘yes, we want you’. Most of the time they say, ‘no thank you very much’.”
He has several projects waiting to be seen, including Jonatan Etzler’s satirical comedy Bad Apples – the one with Saoirse Ronan – and a small role in Lockerbie, a Sky drama series about one man’s battle to learn the truth about the Pan Am Flight 103 bomb explosion over the Scottish town on December 21 1988. He continues to play Harry Chilcott in BBC Radio 4’s long-running series The Archers too.
Returning to the topic of Little Women, does he have any sisters? “Two older sisters,” he replies. “I can definitely relate to not being able to get a word in edgeways.”
Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
“We just audition and audition, and sometimes people say ‘yes, we want you’. Most of the time they say, ‘no thank you very much’,” says actor Jack Ashton
Gray O’Brien as Inspector John Rebus in Rebus: A Game Called Malice, on tour at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Nobby Clark
GRAY O’Brien makes his second stage appearance in York in 2024 next week, following up his Juror 10 in Twelve Angry Men at the Grand Opera House in May with Inspector John Rebus in Rebus: A Game Called Malice at York Theatre Royal.
Ian Rankin’s Scottish detective has been portrayed on stage, radio, television and online by such actors as Ken Scott, Brian Cox, Charles Lawson, John Hannah and, in six BBC One episodes in May and June this year, by Richard Rankin (no relation).
They have done so with varying degrees of success. John Hannah considered himself “miscast”, handing over to a more downbeat Ken Scott in the ITV series. Richard Rankin, the latest TV incarnation and younger than some of his predecessors, has met with approval.
O’Brien has not read the Rebus books, considering the thriller series to be “one of those things you get into or which just pass you by”, whereas devotees will be rushing out to acquire Rankin’s 25th detective novel, Midnight And Blue, published by Orion today (10/10/2024).
O’Brien has, however, spoken at length with the author, who says different actors bring out different aspects of Rebus, helping him to learn more about the character for the next book.
Gray O’Brien’s Juror 10, left, with Michael Greco’s Juror 7 in Twelve Angry Men at the Grand Opera House, York, in May. Picture: Jack Merriman
As he prepared to play Rebus, O’Brien asked the writer which books he should read to gain an insight into the character. Rankin’s reply came as a surprise. “He said, ‘don’t read them, you don’t need to, because this man is completely on his own. He’s now at a certain age where he’s retired. What’s been in the past is the past’,” O’Brien recalls.
In the new play, the retired detective finds himself at a posh Edinburgh dinner party where the guests play a murder mystery game. “He’s sitting there, a fish out of water thinking, ‘what the heck have I got myself into?’,” says O’Brien. “Then we discover why he’s really there, something happens, and the real Rebus bounces back.”
O’Brien likes how the whodunnit aspect was handled by Rankin, who co-wrote the play with Simon Reade after penning the first draft. The genre demands a denouement where the suspects are gathered together and the guilty party is exposed. “But we do it differently in this play,” he says, without giving too much away.
Given that his books are read worldwide, Rankin was keen to write a play that could be staged around the globe – another reason he wanted no constraints on the portrayal of the stage Rebus.
“It’s not Ken Stott’s Rebus or John Hannah’s Rebus. Your reading of the book is different to my reading of the book,” O’Brien says. “You read something like Lord Of The Rings or Game Of Thrones and you have the characters very much set in your head. Then you see it televised and go, ‘that’s the character I’m seeing in my head’.
Writer Ian Rankin, in the rehearsal room, reading the script for Rebus: A Game Called Malice. Picture: Jonathan Phang
“I can’t mimic or can’t try to copy someone else’s Rebus because we’re all made up completely differently. I can’t hold myself the way Ken Stott holds himself. We’re all different shapes, different sizes, we’re educated differently, we’re from different regions.”
Rebus’s accent was important to O’Brien, who grew up in Ayreshire, Rebus hails from Fife. Both men have Scottish accents but not necessarily the same-sounding accent. The Glasgow-born actor was keen to pay homage to the Edinburgh accent when the production played the Festival Theatre there last month and not resort to a generic Scottish accent.
“To English listeners it probably won’t matter as much,” he says. “Some people thought I was crazy doing an Edinburgh accent because I’m Scottish and I have a Scottish accent. I found the rhythms difficult because it’s a bit like getting someone from Milwaukee to do a Minnesota accent. They’re quite different. The Edinburgh vowel sounds and the line endings are completely different from the West Coast of Scotland.”
O’Brien has played major TV roles as Tony Gordon in Coronation Street, Richard McCaid in Casualty and Dr Tom Deneley in Peak Practice, but theatre remains an essential part of his work, whether touring in the 1954 courtroom drama Twelve Angry Men or starring alongside Dallas star Patrick Duffy in the American caper Catch Me If You Can.
“Theatre is a necessity because TV work stops and sometimes it doesn’t stop forever but there are certainly long hiatuses,” he says. “New people come into TV. Casting directors who championed you leave, the new ones don’t know you, and young people come in and don’t know my work. So you can get overlooked. Many careers crash and burn.
“I can’t mimic or can’t try to copy someone else’s Rebus because we’re all made up completely differently,” says Gray O’Brien
“I’ve been very, very lucky with the loyalty of [the late] producer Bill Kenwright. He’s always wanted me on stage if I’m available. Pretty much every year I get asked to do one of these stage tours. I jump at the challenge each time.”
O’Brien takes the responsibility of touring theatre seriously. “People are paying their hard- earned cash to come and have an experience in theatre. I would always encourage people to come and see a live play,” he says. “You don’t know what’s going to happen. There’s always a jeopardy moment on stage.
“It could be performance 100 or performance 24 where things don’t go fully as expected. Maybe an actor tries something slightly different and says a line with a different inflection. It can change the dynamic of the piece and it’s very exciting.”
What is the worst thing to have befallen him on stage? “Drying is terrible, just literally dropping the ball for half a second,” he says, referring to forgetting lines. “People don’t realise the concentration that’s involved in a play. You’ve got to be completely on the moment and be listening to everything.
“You cannot for a second think, ‘I wonder if I should have fish fingers tonight’. As soon as that happens you’releft with a cue but don’t know what you’re saying. That happens all the time and it’s just how quickly you can pick it up.”
Rebus: A Game Called Malice, York Theatre Royal, October 15 to 19, 7.30pm; 2pm, Wednesday and Thursday; 2.30pm, Saturday. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Ed Gamble: No mention of hot dogs at the Grand Opera House, York, despite the show title and tour publicity photo. Picture: Matt Crockett
IT would not be a Gamble to the see the comedian of that surname, Peter Hook’s Joy Division and New Order excavations, a Miss Marple mystery or a new Rebus play, advises Charles Hutchinson.
Comedy gig of the week: Ed Gamble, Hot Diggity Dog, Grand Opera House, York, tonight, 7.30pm
ED Gamble is promising “all your classicGamble ranting, raving and spluttering, but he’s doing fine mentally. Promise”. After all, he co-hosts the award-winning podcast Off Menuwith James Acaster, is a judge on Great British Menu and Taskmaster champion, hosts Taskmaster The Podcast and The Traitors: Uncloaked and has his own special, Blood Sugar, available on Amazon Prime. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
Not Gonna Lie: Fool(ish) Improv conjure comedy from audience stories at The Old Paint Shop, York Theatre Royal
Improv gig of the week: Fool(ish) Improv present Not Gonna Lie, The Old Paint Shop, York Theatre Royal Studio, tomorrow, 8pm
THIS show by Paul Birch and co will take the truth to task by using real stories from the audience to improvise “unbelievable comedy”. Not so much Who’s Line Is It Anyway but more Who’s Lie Is It Anyway, Fool(ish) welcome you to a playful night of joy, nonsense and completely making things up.
“Come confess and unburden yourselves of some silly secrets, tales of the office and childhood memories and we will shape them into surreal sketches and sensational scenes,” say the Yorkshire improvisers trained by the best in Chicago Long-Form improv. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Peter Hook: Revisiting Joy Division and New Order with The Light at York Barbican. Picture: Mark McNulty
York rock gig of the week: Peter Hook & The Light, Substance World Tour, York Barbican, tomorrow, doors 7pm; start 8pm; curfew 11pm
PETER Hook & The Light compare and contrast his bands Joy Division and New Order’s Substance compilation albums, playing both Manchester groups’ vinyl versions in full, complemented by 12 tracks featured on CD editions.
Hook will be joined by David Potts, his regular companion from Monaco and Revenge, on guitar and vocals, new addition Martin Rebelski, from Doves, on keyboards, Paul Kehoe on drums, and Paul Duffy, from The Coral, deputising for Hooky’s son, Jack Bates, on bass. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
Martin Stephenson: Back with The Daintees in Malton
Ryedale gig of the week: Martin Stephenson & The Daintees, Milton Rooms, Malton, October 13, 8pm
MARTIN Stephenson’s focus will be on You Belong To Blue, the February 2023 album that saw original Daintees’ members Gary Dunn, Anthony Dunn and Charlie Smith, plus a selection of special guests, joining up with the Durham-born singer-songwriter once again.
His Malton set will feature Daintees and Stephenson solo favourites stretching back to his 1986 debut Boat To Bolivia as he dips into country, folk, jazz, blues, skiffle and reggae. Box office: 01653 696240 or themiltonrooms.com.
Billy Mitchell and Bob Fox: In tandem at the Milton Rooms
Duo of the week: Billy Mitchell and Bob Fox, Milton Rooms, Malton, October 15, 7.30pm
THIS is a rare opportunity to see North Eastern masters of vocal harmony and musicians Billy Mitchell and Bob Fox perform once again as a duo after several years of individual work. Actor, singer and songwriter Mitchell founded Jack The Lad in the 1970s and was Lindisfarne’s the front man for eight years until their retirement in 2003.
He has undertaken two tours of The Lindisfarne Story and performs in The Pitmen Poets with Fox, Jez Lowe and Benny Graham, presenting songs and stories of Durham and Northumberland’s coal mining communities. Fox interprets traditional and modern songs, played the Songman in the National Theatre’s Warhorse and first toured with Mitchell in 2006, leading to their studio album of Tyne and Wear songs Back On City Road. Box office: 01653 696240 or themiltonrooms.com.
Gray O’Brien as Inspector John Rebus in Rebus: A Game Called Malice, on tour at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Nobby Clark
York play of the week: Rebus: A Game Called Malice, York Theatre Royal, October 15 to 19, 7.30pm; 2pm, Wednesday, Thursday; 2.30pm, Saturday
SCOTTISH crime writer Ian Rankin’s much-loved detective, John Rebus, takes to the stage in a new storyco-written with Simon Reade. Gray O’Brien, from Coronation Street, Casualty and Peak Practice, plays Rebus in a cast also featuring Abigail Thaw and Billy Hartman.
When a splendid Edinburgh mansion dinner party concludes with a murder mystery game created by the hostess, suddenly a murder needs to be solved. However, guests have secrets of their own. Among them is Inspector John Rebus, but is he Is playing an alternative game, one to which only he knows the rules? Rankin will attend the October 18 post-show discussion with the cast. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
1812 Theatre Company’s poster for The Mirror Crack’d, a Miss Marple mystery, at Helmsley Arts Centre
Ryedale play of the week: 1812 Theatre Company in Agatha Christie’s The Mirror Crack’d, Helmsley Arts Centre, October 16 to 19, 7.30pm
1812 Theatre Company presents Rachel Wagstaff’s adaptation of Agatha Christie’s 1962 thriller, wherein Hollywood star Marina Gregg has moved into Gossington Hall and has been persuaded to host the village fête.
When the harmless Heather Badcock, a St John’s Ambulance volunteer with not one enemy in the world, is poisoned by a drink meant for Marina, Chief Inspector Craddock quickly realises the wrong person has died. Fortunately, his aunt, Miss Marple, lives in the village, ever ready to unravel the truth behind the killing as seven suspects face investigation. Box office: 01439 771700 or helmsleyarts.co.uk.
Strictly between us: Husband and wife Aljaž Škorjanec and Janette Manrara announce A Night To Remember tour for 2025
Show announcement of the week: Aljaž Škorjanec and Janette Manrara: A Night To Remember, York Barbican, June 1 2025
STRICTLY Come Dancing favourites Aljaž Škorjanec and Janette Manrara – married since 2017 – will be touring next year with A Night To Remember, featuring an ensemble of “some of the UK’s very best dancers and singers”.
Aljaž, partnering Tasha Ghouri in the 2024 series, and It takes Two presenter Janette will “perform stunning routines to an eclectic array of music”, spanning the Great American songbook through to modern-day classics, backed by their own big band, fronted by boogie- woogie star Tom Seal. Tickets go on sale on Friday at 10am at yorkbarbican.co.uk/whats-on/aljaz-and-janette-a-night-to-remember.
In Focus: Pickering Musical Society in Wonders Of The West End, Kirk Theatre, Pickering, October 10 to 13
Paula Paylor, left, and Danille Long in Pickering Musical Society’s Wonders Of The West End. Picture: Robert David Photography
CURTAIN up tomorrow, Pickering Musical Society is in full swing, putting the final touches to its highly anticipated autumn concert Wonders Of The West End.
This year’s production promises to be a spectacular event, featuring not only the society’s talented performers but also more than 40 dancers from the Sarah Louise Ashworth School of Dance.
In a dazzling programme of classic and contemporary show tunes, selections include iconic hits from Gigi, Half A Sixpence, Oliver! and Waitress, to name but a few.
Colin Wragg in Wonders Of The West End. Picture: Robert David Photography
The cast and dancers have been working hard under the expert guidance of resident musical director Clive Wass, who will be conducting the orchestra each night.
“The combination of live music, powerful vocals, and stunning choreography promises an unforgettable night of theatre,” says director Luke Arnold. “The carefully curated programme offers something for everyone, whether you’re a fan of the golden age of musicals or the latest West End sensations.
“It would be remiss to reflect on the music without a special mention to the society’s rehearsal pianist, Carl Schofield, who has worked tirelessly with the cast over the past three months to help deliver a stunning performance.”
Under the parasol: Alice Rose in Wonders Of The West End.Picture: Robert David Photography
This year’s concert marks the debut of regular principal actress Courtney Brown as assistant director under Luke’s stewardship.
“It has been a privilege working with Courtney,” he says. “I could not have wished for a better assistant. We have got on fantastically well from day one and our interest and taste in musical theatre is very similar, which has helped us create a unified production. I look forward to working with Courtney again and seeing her develop as a director.”
Pickering Musical Society presents Wonders Of The West End, Kirk Theatre, Pickering, October 10 to 13, 7.30pm nightly. Box office: 01751 474833 or online at Wonders of the West End (littleboxoffice.com).
Pickering Musical Society’s full company for Wonders Of The West End. Picture: Robert David Photography
Nun better: Freida Nipples in one of her burlesque guises
YORK’S new cabaret club, The Old Paint Shop, opens its doors in the Theatre Royal Studio for the first time on Saturday when York queen of burlesque Freida Nipples presents The Exhibionists.
The internationally award-winning Freida – who keeps her real name under wraps, except on her passport – will be welcoming some of her favourite and most fabulous performance artists from across the UK and further afield, from burlesque to drag and beyond, with the guarantee of glamour, gags and giggles.
York-born performer and promoter Freida is no stranger to the Theatre Royal stage, having presented drag queens, acrobats, whip crackers, circus acts, sideshow performers and ‘stripteasers’ of many different flavours there, from comedy caricatures to sensual fan dancers.
Such is her popularity – not least at her Baps & Buns Burlesque nights at Rise@Bluebird Bakery, Acomb – that not only October 5’s 8pm launch show has sold out but so too have her The Exhibitionists: Hallowe’en Edition shows at 6pm and 9pm that close the inaugural Old Paint Shop season on October 26.
In between, the Studio space that previously housed the theatre’s workshop will present comedy, improv, jazz, folk and more in a cabaret nightclub setting with tables and chairs. Full details can be found at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
“The big question is, are you ready for it?” teases Freida ahead of The Exhibitionists’ arrival. Judging by the hattrick of sell-outs, the answer is a resounding Yes.
“I just fell in love with it,” says Freida Nipples. “I instantly knew I wanted to become a burlesque act”
What first drew her to burlesque? “I’d just gone to university to study sociology and politics in Manchester,” she recalls, sitting in big Fifties spectacles and civvies at the Theatre Royal. “It was the day before my 20th birthday, when I saw a poster for a burlesque show in Oxford Road. I didn’t have any plans for my birthday and thought, ‘this sounds fun’.
“I went with friends, and it was like a huge lightning bolt to my heart. It was, ‘oh my god, these are my people’, and I just fell in love with it. I instantly knew I wanted to become a burlesque act myself.”
As chance would have it, she met her “burlesque mother” that very night, the legendary Lady Wildflower. They did not speak, beyond Lady Wildflower saying, “thank you for coming”, but “I then went to her burlesque classes. She produces lots of burlesque shows in the north, in Manchester and Yorkshire, and she’s one of the best tutors in burlesque.
“There are burlesque schools, but we don’t have many here apart from in London, but Lady Wildflower teaches lots of classes in Manchester and Leeds.”
The nascent burlesque performer needs to build their “act”. “You learn basic burlesque movement through the classes, and your act can be anything. Often people think of burlesque as having this vintage jazz club vibe, and that can be part of it, but actually there can be a lot of variety,” says Freida. “It’s all just art basically, it’s not all about taking your clothes off.
“Some will do comedy; some will do clowning, some will be political, but it’s definitely not just Jessica Rabbit. So, for example, for my show, I like to tick the classic Fifties’ box .”
“It’s all just art basically, it’s not all about taking your clothes off,” says Freida Nipples
Expect “a lot of bare flesh” – “we don’t like to be modest,” says Freida – but humour and stories are equally important. Lady Wildflower will be doing her majestic Moth Queen act, while Ebony Silk’s Marvel comic-themed act is described as “nerdlesque”. “She comes out as a stormtrooper and then tells a story about that character rather than doing a traditional striptease.”
What does Freida say to opponents of burlesque? “When Lady Wildflower and Heidi Bang Tidy started the Hebden Bridge Burlesque Festival ten years ago, lots of people called them ‘middle-class strippers’, but they were saying, ‘we are women doing what we want with our bodies. Who are you to say we can’t?’. I’ve been lucky not to have had too much of that going on.”
Banish preconceptions of burlesque acts playing to men in dirty raincoats. Seventy five per cent of Freida’s audiences are women: “Maybe it’s about seeing a version of themselves on stage,” she says.
“That’s part of it – body positivity. There aren’t many places you can go to see a lot of different body types. A lot of people find that very refreshing, especially when you don’t get diverse body types in the papers and magazines where there’s usually only one type. Young and slim. That’s not what you’re going to see at a burlesque show.
“Gay guys and couples are regulars too. Men on their own, with or without dirty raincoats, are a rarity. In eight years of producing shows in York, I don’t recall seeing a men’s group in the audience – but literally everyone is welcome”.
Freida is as much a promoter as a performer. “When I started in London, I struggled to find somewhere to perform so I started a night at the Old Nun’s Head, at Nunhead Green, near Peckham, putting my own money into it, as I still do,” she says.
“One of my most poular acts is where I start as a nun and then reveal the devil inside, done to [AC/DC’s] Highway To Hell,” says Freida
“Even now that’s one of the biggest stresses. Ticket sales and the cost of costumes – and I have zero sewing skills! For professional cosumes, you’re looking at a minimum of £500 and it can go up to £10,000. Nice underwear, £150. Wigs, £150.”
She launched Freida Nipples Productions in York in 2017. “I did shows in The Basement at City Screen a few times a year, then some at the Impossible York bar, and I now host a regular show, Baps & Buns Burlesque, at Rise@Bluebird Bakery, as well as the Theatre Royal nights” she says.
“I sometimes do shows at the more intimate Cat In The Wall [in Stonebow] too, and this year I hosted a Valentine’s Day night at The Crescent [Freida Nipples Presents…Valentine’s Day 2024 – Burlesque, Drag & Cabaret, ‘full to the brim full with titillating talent’].
“I like to bring performers from all over the country and would love to have international acts too, like Lady Wildflower does at Hebden Bridge, such as bringing in a headliner from Australia.”
Looking forward to Saturday, Freida says: “I am so honoured to be opening The Old Paint Shop as my grandfather used to do paint work for local productions in his twilight years. He’s one of my influences, especially my love of the 1950s.”
Freida Nipples will be appearing in various guises, not least as a nun. “I was never shy, but drama was my least favourite subject at school [Queen Margaret’s in Escrick]. I found it terrifying. So Freida is me, but revved up,” she says. “I’m not terrified because I feel I’m being me, whereas if I had to play a charcater in a play, maybe I would be.
“‘Reveal’ is what I do, as I’m not a dancer, I didn’t train in dance, so my costume is really integral to my act,” says Freida
“I love fashion, I love design. ‘Reveal’ is what I do, as I’m not a dancer, I didn’t train in dance, so my costume is really integral to my act.
“I find playing to 1,000 peope easier because you just go on and do your stage show, whereas when it’s up close and personal you have to adapt and change your choreography, though it’s harder to interconnect with your audience when there are 1,000 people there.”
Freida, who uses her spare bedroom as her home studio, is putting together a new addition to her acts. “It’s a kind of rebellion by my inner angry punk girl against how much capitalism and consumerism is attacking our industry, so I’m working on making a costume out of bin bags,” she says.
“Burlesque shows are a lot more performance art than people realise. Not just cabaret, but lots of stories in the artform that people don’t expect.
“Trixie Blue [‘burlesque echantress, show host principal at House of Trixie Blue and Newcastle Burlesue Festival producer’] once said that going to a burlesque show is like going to Aldi: coming in expecting one thing but going away with so much more after shopping in the middle aisle!”
“Very much living our best child-free life” with her boyfriend, Freida’s burlesque diary for September took her to Drax Working Men’s Club for a charity night and The Macbeth bar in Hoxton, London, for Temple Of Love, “a celebration of all things goddess”.
Now comes The Exhibionists. “I was very nervous choosing a name for the shows as I don’t like giving things names. Like they want a name for the three or four shows that I’ll be doing at the Old Woollen [at Sunnybank Mills, in Farsley, Leeds] next year, after I was invited to do their drag show, Glamourpussy,” says Freida.
Freida Nipples at the Impossible Bar, York. Picture: Daisy Daydream
“It’s The Exhibitionists at the Theatre Royal because my nan’s friend Olga said the theatre was in Exhibition Square; it’s Baps & Buns at Rise because it’s a bakery. Now I just need a name for the Old Woollen shows.” [Freida had used the does-what-it-says-on-the-tin Freida Nipples Presents: A Night of Burlesque & Cabaret for her August 27 revue night there].
As for her own stage name, Freida worked under several guises at the start of her career. “Finding a name is the most difficult thing, as with a drag act, finding something that’s not already taken. At first I used a few other names, like Curvella De Ville, which is good, but there were lots of De Villes already,” she recalls.
“After I went to a burlesque workshop in Sheffield, on the train back home, we were talking about using vintage names. Like, think of your nana’s name, but ‘Janet’ wasn’t giving me glamour!”
‘Freida’, her great aunt and sister’s name, however, had possibilities. “When I realised ‘Freida’ had the potential to be wordplay on ‘free’, I knew it had to be Freida Nipples’.”
Freida Nipples presents The Exhibitionists, The Old Paint Shop, York Theatre Royal Studio, October 5, 8pm, and The Exhibitionists: Halloween Edition, October 26, 6pm and 9pm; all sold out. Box office for returns only: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
One last question
Do you ever reveal your real name, Freida?
“No, but it’s on my passport. My family and friends know…but when I’m at work…it’s Freida Nippes.”
Bottom of the page: “It’s all just art basically, it’s not all about taking your clothes off,” says Freida Nipples
Ian Rankin reading the script for Rebus: A Game Called Malicein the rehearsal room. Picture: Jonathan Phang
NOVELIST Ian Rankin is contemplating killing someone. Not surprising, perhaps, as his business is crime in general and murder in particular.
What does come as a shock is the identity of the person he would like to bump off: his best-selling creation, Scottish detective John Rebus.
However, with a new play, Rebus: A Game Called Malice, heading to York Theatre Royal from October 15 to 19, the six-part BBC television series that aired in May and June, and a new book out next Thursday, Rebus is very much alive and investigating.
“I have tried to bump him off or get rid of him several times,” confesses the Fife-born crime writer and philanthropist, who was knighted for services to literature and charity in June 2023.
“But he seems to want to stick around. He refuses to leave my head.” Indeed so. Earlier attempts to rid himself of Rebus, including the detective’s retirement, have ended in failure.
“With the previous novel, I thought this is the end because at the end of the book he’s in court charged with murder and in the dock waiting to be sentenced,” Rankin explains.
“I thought, ‘what a great way to finish the Rebus series,’ then fans disagreed. They said, ‘we need to know what happened in court. Was he found guilty or not guilty?’, so I’ve written this latest book to explain that and answer the question.
“The end of this new book is, I think, a very good end to the series, so let’s wait and see. It’s up to him, not up to me. It’s up to Rebus. He’ll tell me when he’s had enough of me.”
The latest Rebus thriller, Midnight And Blue, will be sending Rankin out and about to do interviews and head to Yorkshire on a book tour to discuss the landmark novel, meet readers and sign copies.
His 7.30pm visit to The Cat Club, Pontefract, on November 21 has sold out, but tickets are still available for his Farsley Book Festival appearance at the Old Woollen, Sunnybank Mills, Town Street, Farsley, Leeds, on November 22, hosted by Truman Books from 12.30pm to 3pm. To boo tickets, go to: trumanbooks.co.uk/event/an-afternoon-with-sir-ian-rankin or ring 0113 805 6019.
Crime writer Ian Rankin, second left, with Rebus: A Game Called Malice cast members Billy Hartman, left, Abigail Thaw and Gray O’Brien. Picture: Jonathan Phang
Before then, at York Theatre Royal, he will take part in the post-show discussion with members of the Rebus: A Game Called Malice company after the October 18 performance of his new play, co-written with Simon Reade.
The plot? A splendid dinner party in an Edinburgh mansion concludes with a murder mystery game, wherein a murder needs to be solved. However, the guests have secrets of their own, threatened by the very game they are playing.
Among them is Inspector John Rebu, but is he playing an alternative game, one where only he knows the rules? Cue suspects, clues and danger with every twist and turn and a shocking discovery – a yes, a real-life murder – that sends this game called Malice hurtling towards a gasp-inducing conclusion.
After mentioning his Yorkshire connections – Rankin’s mother grew up in Bradford and he still has family around there and Leeds, whom he hopes will attend the play in York – he enthuses about his upcoming train journey from Edinburgh to York.
“I like taking the train,” he says. “It’s a joy with Durham, Newcastle and the coast. A beautiful part of the world to do by train. And you get to go into the railway station bar – The Tap, isn’t it? – and have a pint.”
Tickets are selling well for the Theatre Royal run of Rebus: A Game Called Malice, testament to the public appetite for whodunnit, detective and crime stories. “It’s a very popular genre and producers know it will put bums on seats. It’s a good night out,” says Rankin.
“You’re working hard mentally in a fun way, there’s an interval when you can get a drink and discuss with your friends and family what you think is going on, what happens next. And you’re in and out of the theatre in two hours. As far as I’m concerned, I want to be home and in bed by ten o’clock.”
Rebus has been a hit on stage from the start. Rankin recalls being told by the manager of the King’s Theatre, where the first play, Rebus: Long Shadows, premiered in Edinburgh, that “he’d never seen takings like it”. “So they were very happy because they were selling more drinks at the interval,” says Rankin.
He wrote the first draft of the latest Rebus play during lockdown, “basically to entertain myself”. “It was written without anyone knowing I was doing it,” he says. “When I read it I thought, ‘it’s short but I like it’, so I showed it to Simon Reade, who is a professional playwright with whom I’d worked previously. He picked it apart and put it together again – and that’s what we’ve got.”
Writing a play and a book present differing challenges. “You have to get in a completely different mindset. In a novel, you can be inside a character’s head, you can have a huge cast of characters, you can range widely over geography and time,” says Rankin. “A play is a much more succinct entity and the actors have to speak your ideas.
“A play is a much more succinct entity [than a novel] and the actors have to speak your ideas,” says Ian Rankin
“The challenge for me is in how different it is. You have to tell a story through voices in a way that I don’t when writing a novel. Very early in my writing career I was writing radio plays for the BBC. They were a lot of fun to do and I enjoyed working with the director and actors. Sometimes the actors came up with much better lines than mine. But the writer gets the credit when it’s broadcast, so it’s terrific from my point of view.
“Writing a novel is not collective. You sit there in splendid isolation for six months to a year. With a play, from quite early on it is collaborative, especially when the actors and director get involved.
“It changes shape because the intonation of each actor is different to the way I imagined the lines being spoken. The way they move around the stage is not how I imagined it might be. And every night in the theatre is, of course, subtly different from the night before.”
Assorted actors have played John Rebus both on stage and television, among them John Michie, who appeared in a try-out of A Game Called Malice but could not commit to a long tour this year.
Gray O’Brien, familiar to TV viewers through Casualty, Coronation Street and Peak Practice, takes on the role on the road, and Rankin is confident he will do the character justice.
Not protective of Rebus, he says each actor adds something to the role: “Every actor is going to give me a slightly different interpretation. Every actor that has played him on television, on radio, on stage has brought something new to the performance and my understanding of this complex character.
“I’ve been writing about this guy Rebus since 1985, and the first book was published in 1987. I’ve spent more than half my life with him. I still don’t quite know what makes him tick. I keep writing about him to get to the core of his identity. And so each actor helps me understand the character a little bit better.”
He missed the first week’s run of Rebus: A Game Of Malice at the Cambridge Arts Theatre on account of a pre-arranged holiday in Greece. He will turn 65 on April 28 next year and his wife has suggested that he might consider slowing down work-wise to enable them to go travelling.
It should be noted that this is a big ask of a writer who could not resist doing some work during a recent year-long sabbatical. His wife has been booking holidays aplenty, but will she be more successful at encouraging him to take things easy than he has been so far at killing off Rebus?
Rebus: A Game Called Malice runs at York Theatre Royal, October 15 to 19, 7.30pm plus 2pm Wednesday and Thursday and 2.30pm Saturday matinees.. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Ian Rankin’s new Rebus book, Midnight And Blue, will be published by Orion Books on October 10.
Gray O’Brien’s Inspector John Rebus in a scene from Rebus: A Game Called Malice, directed by Loveday Ingram. Picture: Nobby Clark
Did you know?
GRAY O’Brien will be appearing at a York theatre for the second time in 2024. His role as John Rebus in Rebus: A Game Called Malice at the Theatre Royal follows his performance as Juror 10 in Twelve Angry Men at the Grand Opera House from May 13 to 18.
Ainy Medina, left, Laura Soper, Freya Parks, front, and Helen Chong in Little Women at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Charlotte Graham
SEPTEMBER 30 marks the 156th anniversary of the publication of the first volume of Louise May Alcott’s Little Women books. She wrote it in only ten weeks, a speed matched by the flashing hand of Freya Parks’s restless Jo March, beret in place as ever when at work, in Theatre Royal creative director Juliet Forster’s free-flowing production.
Alcott’s coming-of-age tale of the March sisters growing up in well-to-do New England during the American Civil War is deemed a “timeless classic” (to quote the Theatre Royal brochure), as popular now as when first published.
Yet the British stage has tended to stage adaptations of Jane Austen, Emily Bronte and Mary Shelley novels rather than Alcott. Looking back through The York Press archives, your reviewer cannot find any past productions in York, the closest being a Lip Service parody, Very Little Women, that toured the Theatre Royal in October 2004.
“I can’t remember ever reading Little Women as a child, but Sue [Ryding] did, and she wept buckets,” said her late partner in spoofery, Maggie Fox. “She said we must do it some time, so I had to read it, and she was absolutely right: we just had to do it. It’s so sanctimonious, so twee…just awful…and they’re Americans.”
Helen Chong’s Amy March and Nikhil Singh Rai’s Theodore ‘Laurie’ Laurence in Little Women. Picture: Charlotte Graham
Hold your high horses. Maggie went on to say the satire was applied with “affection, and also respect for Alcott. She was one of the first woman writers to write about her own life and she was able to make a living out of writing. She was incredibly successful in her own lifetime.”
Anne-Marie Casey brings a similarly affectionate tone to her adaptation of the story of sensible Meg (Ainy Medina), tomboy and would-be novelist Jo (Freya Parks, from the 2024 BBC series This Town), vain, silly Amy (Helen Chong) and consumptive, piano-playing Beth (York actress Laura Soper, in her first Theatre Royal appearance since her professional debut in Swallows & Amazons in 2019).
Sanctimonious? Twee? Just awful? No, no, and thrice no. Very American, yes, but Casey does not stir even a spoonful of sugar into her account of the siblings’ journey from childhood to adulthood in the mid-19th century.
Instead, she combines humour with sadness, candour with kindness, storytelling with travelogue, all the while addressing the matter of a women’s role in society, amid the fractious relationships, the pursuit of love, the absence of the father on chaplaincy duty in the war and the need for matriarch Marmee (York actress Kate Hampson) to be a single mother in such stressful circumstances.
The power of the written word: Freya Parks’s Jo March and Kate Hampson’s Marmee in Little Women. Picture: Charlotte Graham
Against the backdrop of a divided America’s November 2024 presidential clash coming down to a regressive man versus a progressive woman, with polar opposite views on such matters as abortion, resonance is not hard to find in Little Women.
Albeit that marriage is still the end-all, although not the be-all for Jo, who symbolically takes the lead when dancing, a habit forged in dancing with her sisters but also testament to her determination to do her own thing. Best summed up in burning the back of her dress when standing too close to the fire.
Parks is the stand-out here, a fiery talent fast on the rise (she heads off to her next filming engagement as soon as Little Women ends). The last time your reviewer saw an actor on the York stage destined for the heights was when Sally Hawkins, fresh from drama school, played Juliet in Romeo And Juliet. Parks’s Jo is full of humour, vigour, pathos, impetuous urges, artistic intellect and resolute ambition. Love too.
Medina, Chong and especially Soper more than play their part too, and there is a theatrical grace to the ailing Beth’s scene with Jo, culminating in an exit in white for Beth that symbolises the passing into death: a moment that film could not do so elegiacally or indeed so sparingly.
Clashing opinions: Freya Parks’s Jo March and Caroline Gruber’s Aunt March in Little Women. Picture: Charlotte Graham
Hampson’s Marmee is firm but as fair as her hair, always urging her daughters to maximise their talents, whether for music, dress-making, art or writing, equal in her love and counsel for each, but away from their gaze, sadness at her husband being away permeates the glowing surface.
A scene stealer emerges in Caroline Gruber’s match-making Aunt March, the Lady Bracknell of the piece with her waspish tongue, snobbery and insistent interventions.
And what of the men? Nikhil Singh Rai’s Theodore ‘Laurie’ Laurence is the handsome, elegant, well-mannered, fun-loving prankster and foil for Jo, with the devilish player streak below that smart, engaging, enquiring posh-boy, privileged surface. Hard to resist, like a matinee idol, you might say. Later, such a type would be found in a Tennessee Williams play.
Jack Ashton reveals the importance of being earnest in not one but two roles as men with academic minds, serious intentions and not much income: firstly John Brooke, Meg’s devoted tutor; then the Teutonic professor, Bhaer, who could have been borrowed from a Chekhov or Ibsen play.
Jack Ashton in rehearsal for his role as Professor Bhaer in Little Women
Forster’s direction brings out the nuances in all these performances, never over-stating anything, but letting the power of storytelling take grip, whether in the first act, where the action is concentrated in the March house, save for a skating accident depicted with clever use of lighting by Jane Lalljee, or the second, where Amy goes travelling in Europe and Jo heads to New York to begin penning her sensationalist stories.
Ruari Murchison’s set design, first used in Pitlochry Theatre Festival’s production, is first class too, making expressive use of curtains, wooden furniture and in particular silver birch tree trunks, sometimes used for hanging a coat to convey a transition from outdoors to indoors. Her costumes delight too, as do Erin Carter’s movement direction and the sisters’ singing in harmony by the piano.
Freya Parks. Remember that name. A tall woman amid Little Women, making a big impact, with a stellar career ahead.
Little Women, presented by York Theatre Royal in association with Pitlochry Festival Theatre, Scotland, at York Theatre Royal, until October 12. Performances: 7.30pm, September 27 and 28, October 1, 3, 5, 8 to 12; 2pm, October 2, 3 and 10; 2.30pm, September 28, October 5 and 12; 6.30pm, October 4 and 7; 7pm, October 2. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Kate Hampson in the matriarchal role of Marmee in York Theatre Royal’s production of Little Women. Picture: Charlie Kirkpatrick
GARDEN ghosts, a coming-of-age classic, a political groundbreaker, astronaut insights and an awful aunt stir Charles Hutchinson into action as autumn makes its entry.
Play opening of the week: Little Women, York Theatre Royal, September 21 to October 12
CREATIVE director Juliet Forster directs York Theatre Royal’s repertory cast in Louisa May Alcott’s coming-of-age story of headstrong Jo March and her sisters Meg, Beth and Amy as they grow up in New England during the American Civil War.
Adapted by Anne-Marie Casey, the production features Freya Parks, from BBC1’s This Town, as Jo, Ainy Medina as Meg, Helen Chong as Amy and York actress Laura Soper as Beth. Kate Hampson returns to the Theatre Royal to play Marmee after leading the community cast in The Coppergate Woman. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Steve Wynn: A night of stories and songs at Rise@Bluebird Bakery, Acomb. Picture: Guy Kokken
York gig of the week: Steve Wynn, I Wouldn’t Say It If It Wasn’t True: A Night Of Songs And Stories, Rise@Bluebird Bakery, Acomb, York, September 21, 7.30pm
STEVE Wynn, founder and leader of Californian alt. rock band The Dream Syndicate, promotes his first solo album since 2010, Make It Right (Fire Records), and his new memoir, I Wouldn’t Say It If It Wasn’t True (Jawbone Press), both released on August 30.
Touring the UK solo for the first time in more than ten years, his one-man show blends songs from and inspired by the book with a narrative structure of readings and storytelling. Expect evergreens and rarities from The Dream Syndicate’s catalogue, coupled with illuminating covers and reflective numbers from the new record. Box office: bluebirdbakery.co.uk/rise.
Ghosts In The Garden: Returning for fourth season with more locations and more wire-mesh ghosts. Picture: Gareth Buddo/Andy Little
Installation of the week: Ghosts In The Gardens, haunting York until November 5
GHOSTS In The Gardens returns with 45 ghosts, inspired by York’s past, for visitors to discover in the city’s public gardens and green spaces, with the Bar walls, St Olave’s Church and York Railway Station among the new locations.
Organiser York BID has partnered with design agency Unconventional Design for the fourth year to create the semi-translucent 3D sculptures out of narrow-gauge wire mesh, six of them new for 2024. Pick up the map for this free event from the Visitor Information Centre on Parliament Street and head to https://www.theyorkbid.com/ghosts-in-the-gardens/ for full details
Points Of View, stainless steel, by Tony Cragg, at Castle Howard. Picture: Nick Howard
Last chance to see: Tony Cragg’s Sculptures, Castle Howard, near York, ends September 22
TONY Cragg’s sculptures, the first major exhibition by a leading contemporary artist to be held in the grounds and house at Castle Howard, closes on Sunday after a successful run since May 3 that has seen a 12 per cent rise in visitor numbers since the equivalent period last year.
On show are large-scale bronze sculptures in the gardens plus works in wood, glass sculptures and works on paper, some being displayed for the first time in Great Britain. Opening hours: grounds, 10am to 5pm, last entry 4pm; house, 10am to 3pm. Tickets: 01653 648333 or castlehoward.co.uk.
Making her point: Lauren Robinson as politician Jennie Lee in Mikron Theatre’s premiere of Jennie Lee. Picture: Robling Photography
Political drama of the week: Mikron Theatre Company in Jennie Lee, Clements Hall, Nunthorpe Road, York, September 22, 4pm to 6pm
IN Marsden company Mikron Theatre’s premiere of Jennie Lee, Lindsay Rodden charts the extraordinary life of the radical Scottish politician, Westminster’s youngest MP, so young that, as a woman in 1929, she could not even vote for herself.
Tenacious, bold and rebellious, Lee left her coal-mining family in Scotland and fought with her every breath for the betterment of all lives, for wages, health and housing, and for art and education too, as the first Minister for the Arts and founder of the Open University. She was the wife of NHS founder Nye Bevan, but Jennie is no footnote in someone else’s past. Box office: mikron.org.uk/show/jennie-lee-clements-hall.
Crime novelists Ajay Chowdhury, left, and Luca Veste team up for The Big Read in York and Harrogate on Monday
Book event of the week: Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival presents The Big Read, Acomb Explore Library, York, September 23, 12.30pm to 1.30pm; The Harrogate Inn, Harrogate, September 23, 2.30pm to 3.30pm
THE North’s biggest book club, The Big Read, returns next week with visits to York and Harrogate on the first day, when visitors can meet the festival’s reader-in-residence, Luca Veste, and fellow novelist Ajay Chowdhury, who will discuss Chowdhury’s Sunday Times Crime Book of the Year, The Detective.
More than 1,000 free copies of tech entrepreneur, writer and theatre director Ajay Chowdhury’s 2023 novel from his Detective Kamil Rahman series will be distributed across the participating libraries. Entry is free.
Astronaut Tim Peake: Exploring the evolution of space travel at York Barbican
Travel show of the week: Tim Peake, Astronauts: The Quest To Explore Space, York Barbican, September 25, 7.30pm
BRITISH astronaut Tim Peake is among only 610 people to have travelled beyond Earth’s orbit. After multiple My Journey To Space tours of his own story, he makes a return voyage to share stories of fellow astronauts as he explores the evolution of space travel.
From the first forays into the vast potential of space in the 1950s and beyond, to the first human missions to Mars, Peake will traverse the final frontier with tales of the experience of space flight, living in weightlessness, the dangers and unexpected moments of humour and the years of training and psychological and physical pressures that an astronaut faces. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
Neal Foster’s Aunt Alberta and Annie Cordoni’s Stella in Birmingham Stage Company’s Awful Auntie at Grand Opera House, York. Picture: Mark Douet
Children’s show of the week: Birmingham Stage Company in Awful Auntie, Grand Opera House, York, September 26 to 29
CHILDREN’S author David Walliams and Birmingham Stage Company team up for the fourth time. Ater adaptations of Gangsta Granny, Billionaire Boy and Demon Dentist, here comes actor-manager Neal Foster’s stage account of Awful Auntie.
As Stella (Annie Cordoni ) sets off to visit London with her parents, she has no idea her life is in danger. When she wakes up three months later, not everything Aunt Alberta (Foster) tells her turns out to be true. She quickly discovers she is in for the fight of her life against her very own awful Auntie! Suitable for age five upwards. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
“Marmee is a really fascinating character to play,” says Kate Hampson of her role in Little Women. Picture: Charlie Kirkpatrick
YORK actress Kate Hampson returns to the York Theatre Royal stage on Saturday for the first time since her title role in the August 2022 community play The Coppergate Woman.
She will play Marmee, mother to the March girls, in creative director Juliet Forster’s repertory production of Anne-Marie Casey’s re-telling of Louisa May Alcott’s cherished American novel Little Women, presented in association with Pitlochry Festival Theatre.
She is joined in this coming-of-age story of growing up in New England during the American Civil War by This Town star Freya Parks as headstrong daughter Jo, Ainy Medina as Meg, Helen Chong as Amy and fellow returnee York actress Laura Soper as piano-playing Beth.
“It’s been a really challenging but joyful rehearsal period, working with Juliet again, and I can’t wait to play it to audiences – and I get to walk to work each day!” says Kate in a lunchtime break. “The cast are all fantastic, each bringing something new and unique to their roles. We’re all getting on really well, working with voice coach Yvonne Morley to get the accent right and united, because it’s not only a different [American] accent but an accent from a different time, and we have to sound related to each other.”
Describing Marmee’s matriarchal role, Kate says: “What’s really striking is that for most of the play, she’s a single mother, and that’s a hard task. She’s presented as wholesome and deeply loving, caring for each child equally, encouraging each of them to achieve their full potential, but she’s also Victorian, stiffer, more formal, than today.
“There’s a softness to her but there’s also that Victorian formality, which was the behaviour of the time. So you can’t go too gentle and soft in the role, even though she’s a great mum. It’s the way she gives them their autonomy that’s beautiful to watch. She lets her daughters make up their own minds, not collectively, but individually, seeing them as each being very different with very different needs.”
Kate continues: “Marmee is a really fascinating character to play. She’s a challenge because she’s often portrayed as this warm, kind woman, full of wisdom, the perfect mother, and to some extent she is that, but she’s multi-faceted, and I’m keen to explore that, especially in her relationship with Jo. Like when Jo says, ‘I have this rage’, and Marmee says, ‘I had this rage too and I had to learn to suppress it’.
“She’s very pragmatic, she knows the limitations, and yet she wants her daughters to ‘dream big’, but she had that rage and sadness that she couldn’t do the things she wanted to do. She is both very loving and good at imparting knowledge, getting her daughters to solve their problems themselves, rather than spoon-feeding them.”
Kate has enjoyed shaping her interpretation of Marmee’s role in the rehearsal room. “You get this thing with character development where you start in one place, take it to another place, and then you have to bring it back to what feels the right place, pulling it back by thinking ‘would I be standing like this?’ or ‘would I be so affectionate at this point?’,” says Kate.
“It’s lovely to have had the time to do that, and I feel that on the first night, it’ll be where I want it to be, but characters always develop further in the run, when you find new things and the relationships develop too.”
Reflecting on the abiding popularity of Louisa Alcott’s story, Kate says: “I think she was so progressive as a writer. You only have to look at her own life, how she lived it, her relationship with her parents. She was progressive, she was feminist and she was brave.
“People can still identify with that. There are still the same issues on life’s journey; the ups and downs of family relationships in that world still prevail. There’s also the challenge to modern audiences, where they have to think: how can we continue to strive to be better and strive for more equality, especially in societies where there is still none. Both remain relevant goals, because it’s not finished, it’s not done.”
Urging York audiences to attend Little Women, Kate says: “Come and sit in a beautiful space and be entertained by a classic play told in a new way. You want people to enjoy it but to go away with questions to answer because the story still resonates.
“It deals with universal themes of family, love and loyalty, the good times and the bad times, so though it’s historical, you can make it relevant to today, resonating with the experiences we have to deal with or might yet have to face.”
Little Women, York Theatre Royal, September 21 to October 12. Performances: 7.30pm, September 21, 24 to 28, October 1, 3, 5 and 8 to 12; 2pm, September 25 and 26, October 2, 3 and 10; 2.30pm, September 28, October 5 and 12; 6.30pm, October 4 and 7, and 7pm, October 2 (fundraising gala). Post-show discussion: October 11. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
* The special fundraising gala performance on October 2 will raise vital funds for York Theatre Royal’s continued work as a producing theatre and for the development of future community projects.
John Hegley: Two poetry peformances at Helmsley Literary Festival. Picture: Jackie di Stefano
HELMSLEY Literary Festival leads off Charles Hutchinson’s recommendations to fill the cultural diary, joined by drag, folk and blues acts and an American coming-of-age classic.
Festival of the week highlight: Helmsley Literary Festival, Helmsley Arts Centre, John Hegley, New & Selected Potatoes, Saturday, 7pm to 8pm; I Am A Poetato, Sunday, 11am to 12 noon
POET, comic, singer, songwriter and spectacles wearer John Hegley heads to Helmsley with two shows, the first being his seriously funny, cleverly comic “best of golden oldies compilation with some new stuff” about love, family, France, art, the sea, dogs, dads, gods, taxidermy, carrots, glasses and…potatoes.
Second gig I Am A Poetato features An A-Z of Poems about People, Pets and other Creatures! Spelling it out for Helmsley, he promises Hedgehogs. Elephants. Laughing. Mandolin. Singing. Luton. Even a cardboard camel with moving parts. Yo! For full details of two days of talks, signings, readings, open mic and a quiz, with Hegley, Anne Fine, Joanne Harris, Harriet Constable and The Chase’s Paul Sinha, visit helmsleyarts.co.uk. Box office: 01439 771700.
Bianca Del Rio: Discussing politics, pop culture and political correctness at York Barbican
Drag show of the week: Bianca Del Rio, York Barbican, tonight, doors 7pm
COMEDY drag queen and RuPaul’s Drag Race champion Bianca Del Rio heads to York on her 11-date stand-up tour. Up for irreverent discussion will be politics, pop culture, political correctness, current events, cancel culture and everyday life, as observed through the eyes of a “clown in the gown”, who will be “coming out of my crypt and hitting the road again to remind everyone that I’m still dead inside”. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
Ryan Adams: Heading back to York Barbican on Friday
Return of the week: Ryan Adams, Solo 2024, York Barbican, Friday, doors 7pm
NORTH Carolina singer-songwriter Ryan Adams returns to York Barbican next week after playing a very long, career-spanning set there with no stage lighting – only his own side lamps – in April last year. This time he will be marking the 20th anniversary of 2004’s Love Is Hell and tenth anniversary of 2014’s self-titled album, complemented by Adams classics and favourites. Adams, who visited the Grand Opera House in 2007 and 2011, will be performing on acoustic guitar and piano. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
Harp & A Monkey: Songs of everyday life, love and remembrance at Kirk Theatre, Pickering
Folk gig of the week: Friday Folk presents Harp & A Monkey, Kirk Theatre, Pickering, Friday, 7.30pm
GREATER Manchester song-and-storytelling trio Harp & A Monkey specialise in poignant, uplifting and melodic short stories, both original and traditional, about everyday life, love and remembrance. In a nutshell, the extraordinary ordinary, from cuckolded molecatchers and a lone English oak tree that grows at Gallipoli to care in the community, medieval pilgrims and Victorian bare-knuckle boxers.
This versatile collective of artists, animators, storytellers and multi-instrumentalists has undertaken bespoke songwriting for soundtrack, film and art projects for the likes of Sky Arts and the Department of Sport, Media and Culture. Fylingdales Folk Choir will perform too. Box office: 01751 474833 or kirktheatre.co.uk.
York actress Kate Hampson in the matriarchal role of Marmee in Little Women at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Charlie Kirkpatrick
Play of the week: Little Women, York Theatre Royal, Saturday to October 12
CREATIVE director Juliet Forster directs York Theatre Royal’s new production of Louisa May Alcott’s coming-of-age story of headstrong Jo March and her sisters Meg, Beth and Amy as they grow up in New England during the American Civil War.
Adapted by Anne-Marie Casey, the production features Freya Parks, from BBC1’s This Town, as Jo, Ainy Medina as Meg, Helen Chong as Amy and York actress Laura Soper as Beth. Kate Hampson returns to the Theatre Royal to play Marmee after leading the community cast in The Coppergate Woman. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Seedling, by Sarah Sharpe, on show in Leeds Fine Artists’ 150th anniversary show at Blossom Street Gallery
Exhibition of the week: Leeds Fine Artists Celebrating 150 Years, Blossom Street Gallery, York, until October 31
LEEDS Fine Artists is celebrating its 150th anniversary with an exhibition at its regular York host, Blossom Street Gallery, featuring an inspirational collection of work demonstrating a wide range of styles and different media.
Taking part are: Sharron Astbury-Petit; Dawn Broughton; Jane Burgess; Mark Butler; Pete Donnelly; Alison Flowers; Roger Gardner; Margarita Godgelf; Dan Harnett; Peter Heaton; Nicholas Jagger; Michael Curgenven; Catherine Morris; Martin Pearson; Clare Phelan; Trevor Pittaway; Neil Pittaway; Annie Robinson; Annie Roche; Sarah Sharpe and John Sherwood. Opening hours: Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, 10am to 4pm; Sundays, 10am to 3pm.
Tim Peake: Exploring the evolution of space travel at York Barbican
Travel show of the week: Tim Peake, Astronauts: The Quest To Explore Space, York Barbican, September 25, 7.30pm
BRITISH astronaut Tim Peake is among only 610 people to have travelled beyond Earth’s orbit. After multiple My Journey To Space tours of his own story, he makes a return voyage with his stellar new show, sharing the collected stories of fellow astronauts as he explores the evolution of space travel.
From the first forays into the vast potential of space in the 1950s and beyond, to the first human missions to Mars, Peake will traverse the final frontier with tales of the experience of spaceflight, living in weightlessness, the dangers and unexpected moments of humour and the years of training and psychological and physical pressures that an astronaut faces. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
Lightning Threads: Showcasing their debut album, Off That Lonely Road, at Milton Rooms, Malton
Blues gig of the week: Ryedale Blues Club, Lightning Threads, Milton Rooms, Malton, September 26, 8pm
SHEFFIELD blues-rock trio Lightning Threads are influenced by the great rock musicians of another time, drawing comparisons with The Black Keys, Gary Clark Jr, Cream and The Doors.
Tom Jane, guitar and vocals, Sam Burgum, bass and vocals, and Hugh Butler, drums and keyboards, have been nominated for Best Album in the 2024 Blues Awards for their November 2023 debut, Off That Lonely Road, recorded with Andrew Banfield, of Superfly Studios, and graced by Kelly Michaeli’s gospel vocals. Box office: 01653 696240 or themiltonrooms.com.
