Steve TimmsOne of the most remarkable theatre productions I’ve seen in recent years was Feelgood Theatre’s Macbeth, staged in Heaton Park 10 years ago, and which coincided with a week of torrential rain; performing in a muddy pool in damp costumes sorely...
Carmel ThomasonEarly Doors, the stage show of the BBC2 pub sitcom, returns to the Lowry for a limited run, and even the hottest day of the year can’t keep its punters away. The theatre is packed to the top, and it’s no surprise given the size of the Arena venues...
Liz RatcliffeSo, burn me at the stake but I was completely bewitched by Joan – part compelling theatre, part horrible-histories, part drag act and all hugely entertaining. The basic set comprises four mirrors and four crates forming a cross in the centre of the...
‘A bunch of clowns trying to do the impossible,’ is how Dylan Emery describes Showstopper! The Improvised Musical. It’s an insanely ambitious show he co-founded with Adam Megiddo in 2008, and soon became a must-see staple of the Edinburgh Fringe...
Georgina WellsMeraki Collective’s dance theatre work Kill a Witch or Die Trying, is performed as part of Waterside Art’s Refract festival. Their patchwork of movement and spoken scenes in response to the issues of sexism, misogyny and maltreatment of women...
The Lowry Galleries are hosting a special display giving a peak behind the scenes of the new cinema biopic celebrating Lowry’s life. Mrs Lowry & Son stars Timothy Spall as artist LS Lowry and Vanessa Redgrave as his mother Elizabeth, with whom...
Nathaniel Hall contracted HIV when he lost his virginity aged 16. Fifteen years on he’s written a play, ‘First Time’ about his experience. How did you find out you were HIV positive? I got ill while on holiday with my parents. I was 16-years-old and...
Lorraine Worsley-CarterArt with Heart’s roving art gallery, The Golden Years Caravan, extends a warm welcome wherever it parks, and we caught it as it rolled-up for the final day of its tour at Waterside Arts, as part of 10-day festival, Refract19. The experience...
On a city break to Copenhagen, Liz Ratcliffe discovers hygge might be the real secret to Danish happiness. I decided to book a city break for my partner’s birthday and wanted to go somewhere that neither of us had been to before. A Copenhagen city...
I feel lucky to have been at the debut performance of Wolf Hours, Minute Taker, aka Manchester-based Ben McGarvey, superb soundtrack to a series of short-film clips, made by a variety of film makers. The show is designed to give a depiction of the...