Derby Theatre is preparing for a new adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book , in an adaptation by Neil Duffield, which will be the theatre’s first ever production to full integrate BSL signing into the production. BTG’s Midlands Editor Steve Orme speaks to director Sarah Brigham about the production, followed by Ivan Stott, who wrote the songs and will play Baloo, and Caroline Parker MBE, who will play Tabaqui and be signing for other characters in the play. The Jungle Book runs from Fr...
Mar 30, 2019•19 min•Ep. 181
Highlights of the launch event for the Manchester International Festival 2019, held in Manchester on 7 March 2019. Introduced by MIF artistic director John McGrath, this episode also features announcements from festival participants including Phelim McDermott of Improbable Theatre, Kwame Kwei-Armah of Young Vic Theatre, actors Maxine Peake and Juliet Stevenson, Leo Warner of 59 Productions, writer Lolita Chakrabarti, choreographer Claire Cunningham, Mary Anne Hobbs of BBC 6 Music and grime artis...
Mar 09, 2019•35 min•Ep. 180
From Shore to Shore is a play written by British playwright Mary Cooper in collaboration with M W Sun based on real migration stories from Chinese communities throughout the UK that will tour nationally to Chinese restaurants and Chinese community centres rather than theatres. For this episode, BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to the play’s director, David Tse, and veteran British Chinese actor Ozzie Yue, who leads the cast, about the play, the process of collecting stories, their own family co...
Feb 26, 2019•42 min•Ep. 179
The latest production from Manchester-based new writing theatre company Box of Tricks is SparkPlug , written and performed by David Judge based on his own experiences being brought up as a mixed race child by a white stepfather in 1980s Manchester. The production is directed by Box of Tricks Joint Artistic Director and co-founder Hannah Tyrrell-Pinder and begins its 9-week tour at HOME in Manchester , where BTG editor David Chadderton spoke to David and Hannah in a dressing room during a break f...
Feb 14, 2019•36 min•Ep. 178
Conrad Nelson’s production of Shakespeare’s comedy Much Ado About Nothing for Northern Broadsides Theatre Company had a cast change on the first day of rehearsals when Reece Dinsdale had to drop out of the key role of Benedick due to a family illness and Robin Simpson took over the role. BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Robin during the second week of rehearsals about the additional pressure that may have put on him and also about the production as a whole, playing Shakespeare, performing co...
Feb 01, 2019•24 min•Ep. 177
A new consortium has been formed to produce new theatre for young audiences, including Pilot Theatre, Derby Theatre, Belgrade Theatre Coventry, Mercury Theatre Colchester and York Theatre Royal. The first production to come out of this collaboration will be a new adaptation of former Children's Laureate Malorie Blackman's hard-hitting YA novel Noughts and Crosses , which raised issues or racism and forbidden love in an alternative version of our own world. For this episode, director Esther Richa...
Jan 27, 2019•26 min•Ep. 176
The Honest Actors’ Podcast was founded by Belfast-born actor Jonathan Harden in 2015 and is currently launching its third and final series, featuring long, frank discussions with experienced actors about the joys and torments of their chosen career. As he was in the midst of launching new episodes in the days leading up to Christmas 2018, BTG Editor David Chadderton turned the tables on Jonathan, asking him about his life and career as an actor, as well as what he has learned from the last three...
Dec 23, 2018•52 min•Ep. 175
Lichfield Garrick is presenting an alternative show as well as its panto this Christmas as New Old Friends will be staging the latest in its "Crimes of..." series: Crimes of the Christmas Pudding . BTG Midlands editor Steve Orme speaks to director Nel Crouch and Jill Myers who plays Belgian detective Artemis Arinae. Crimes of the Christmas Pudding runs at Lichfield Garrick from Wednesday 5 December 2018 until Saturday 5 January 2019.
Dec 08, 2018•16 min•Ep. 174
2018 marks the second time Evolution Productions has produced Cinderella at the Marlowe Theatre, Canterbury after the venue re-opened in 2011. Simon Sladen speaks to the theatre's resident Dame Ben Roddy and Marlowe regulars Lloyd Hollett and Phil Gallagher as they star in their fourth panto together. Simon, Ben, Lloyd and Phil discuss this year's show, their approach to playing the Ugly Sisters and Buttons, the trio's affinity with the Marlowe as well as some top tips for those starting out in ...
Dec 02, 2018•14 min•Ep. 173
Derby Theatre's Christmas show for 2018 is Mike Kenny's adaptation of Hansel and Gretel from the tales collected by the Brothers Grimm. BTG Midlands Editor Steve Orme talks about the show to Derby Theatre Artistic Director Sarah Brigham, who is directing the production, and actors Craig Anderson and Yana Penrose, who play the title roles of Hansel and Gretel. Hansel and Gretel runs at Derby Theatre from Friday 30 November 2018 to Saturday 5 January 2019....
Nov 24, 2018•16 min•Ep. 172
BTG panto editor Simon Sladen speaks to pantomime company Imagine Theatre ’s Managing Director Steve Boden and Robert Marsden, director of the Victoria Theatre, Halifax’s pantomime and associate professor at Staffordshire University. 2018 will see Imagine Theatre present 14 pantomimes in venues across the United Kingdom having grown from 8 productions in 2009. In this episode, Steve and Robert discuss Imagine Theatre’s style of pantomime, the company and genre’s recent evolution and the state of...
Nov 13, 2018•34 min•Ep. 171
The first in-house production in HOME Manchester’s autumn and winter season for 2018 is a new production of French writer Jean Genet’s 1947 play The Maids , in an English version by Martin Crimp. The play will be directed in-the-round at HOME by Lily Sykes, an English-born director who has lived and worked in Germany for the last ten years and has recently become a German citizen. In a break during rehearsals, BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Lily about the play, existentialism, polarisation...
Nov 03, 2018•36 min•Ep. 170
Red Ladder , which bills itself as “Britain’s leading radical theatre company”, this year celebrates its fiftieth anniversary, tracing its roots back to the left-wing agitprop theatre of the 1960s. To celebrate, instead of its usual fare of new political writing, it has turned to Brecht’s Mother Courage and her Children , which artistic director Rod Dixon has staged as a promenade production in a warehouse in Leeds featuring Pauline McLynn (Mrs Doyle in classic sitcom Father Ted) in the title ro...
Oct 10, 2018•56 min•Ep. 169
Mark Smith talks to Conrad Nelson and Deborah McAndrew about their brand new version of Dario Fo's classic They Don't Pay? We Won't Pay! (also known as Can't Pay? Won't Pay! ). The show is a co-production between York Theatre Royal and Halifax-based company Northern Broadsides , where Conrad Nelson is the Artistic Director. They discuss the company's past and future, the process of adapting and translating theatrical language "from Milan to Middlesborough", and the careful precision required whe...
Oct 02, 2018•35 min•Ep. 168
The latest production from acclaimed theatre company RashDash , Future Bodies , has been produced in collaboration with Unlimited Theatre and HOME Manchester as a trailblazer event for the 2018 Manchester Science Festival. What does it mean to have and to be a body? As we increasingly fuse our biological brains with technology, at what point do we stop being human? Does it even matter? During rehearsals at HOME, BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to RashDash co-founder Helen Goalen, who is co-dir...
Sep 26, 2018•23 min•Ep. 167
Ian Rankin's Edinburgh detective Inspector Rebus, the star of many of his novels and short stories, is about to make his first ever stage appearance in a brand new story from Rankin with playwright Rona Munro. BTG Midlands Editor Steve Orme spoke about the production to Ian by phone from his home in Edinburgh, then in person to actors Charles Lawson (Jim McDonald in Coronation Street ) and John Stahl (Rickard Karstark in Game of Thrones ), who play, respectively, John Rebus and his nemesis, the ...
Sep 22, 2018•28 min•Ep. 166
Where We Began is a new piece of theatre devised by a multicultural cast and instigated by Stand and Be Counted Theatre . This company works extensively with asylum seekers, migrants and others seeking sanctuary. Here, BTG reviewer Mark Smith speaks to writer/performer Rosie MacPherson, one of the Artistic Directors of Stand and Be Counted, and Tafadzwa Muchenje, one of the devisers and performers of the show. They discuss the company's development as well as Taf's own route to working with SBC....
Sep 15, 2018•25 min•Ep. 165
For its first production of the autumn 2018 season, HOME in Manchester has again teamed up with Lyric Hammersmith for a pairing of two of Shakespeare’s plays, Othello and Macbeth , assembled into one production by director Jude Christian to highlight, in particular, the stories of the female characters in both plays. A week before the production’s Manchester opening, Jude spoke to BTG editor David Chadderton at HOME about how the production came about and redressing the gender politics in Shakes...
Sep 07, 2018•27 min•Ep. 164
The Fun Palace was an idea conceived originally by influential theatre maker Joan Littlewood with architect Cedric Price in the early 1960s. Their building-based idea was never built, but writer and actor Stella Duffy OBE came up with the idea to resurrect it in a different way for Littlewood’s centenary in 2014. This has become a fast-growing annual event co-directed by Stella with Sarah-Jane Rawlings and is about to celebrate its fifth anniversary. In this episode, David Chadderton talks to St...
Aug 12, 2018•58 min•Ep. 163
In our first podcast episode on the 2018 Edinburgh Festivals, we speak to two people who are now veteran Fringe producers and performers. Rick Conte will return to the Fringe this year as Dog in the multi-award-winning Puppet State Theatre production The Man Who Planted Trees . However he is also performing and producing a new adaptation of The Time Machine by H G Wells that combines puppetry with human actors for The Scientific Romance Theatre Company, The Time Machine will be at the Scottish S...
Aug 02, 2018•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 162
The Theatre Royal in Nottingham is preparing for its annual Classic Thrillers Season featuring four different plays over four weeks: Peter Gordon’s Sleighed to Death , A Touch of Danger by Francis Durbridge, a new adaptation of Baroness Orczy’s The Scarlet Pimpernel by Louise Page and John Goodrum’s adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Nightmare Room . In this episode, BTG Midlands editor Steve Orme talks to Karen Henson from Tabs Productions about being back at the Theatre Royal after a year ...
Jul 26, 2018•14 min•Ep. 161
Philip Fisher talks to John Hopkins and Tuppence Middleton about the differences between working on stage and screen and most particularly their upcoming engagement in Vicky Jones's award-winning The One at Soho Theatre.
Jun 24, 2018•20 min•Ep. 160
As it prepares to leave its building in the hands of developers for refurbishment, Bolton’s Octagon Theatre takes its audiences on the road, literally, for its seasonal musical Summer Holiday , based on the Cliff Richard film. The performance begins at the new Bolton Interchange bus station where the audience will meet before travelling by bus with the actors to the theatre, where the rest of the production takes place. A little over a week before opening, BTG editor David Chadderton spoke to tw...
May 29, 2018•24 min•Ep. 159
Filament Theatre's latest production is Rufus Longbottom and the Space Rabbit , which was created after the production team collaborated with more than 600 schoolchildren on ideas for characters for the new show. At the start of the show's UK tour in Derby, BTG's Midlands editor Steve Orme spoke to Filament co-founder Osnat Schmool, who co-created the project and wrote the music and lyrics, and performer and sound artist Lula Mebrahtu, who plays the titular Space Rabbit using innovative music te...
May 22, 2018•22 min•Ep. 158
BTG's Philip Fisher talks to Amanda Mehtala from Theatre in Paris , a venture designed to open up the Parisian theatre scene to English speakers by providing English surtitles for French productions in major Paris theatres.
Apr 26, 2018•9 min•Ep. 157
The Tiger Lillies is an Olivier Award-winning and Grammy-nominated musical trio with more than thirty years of success around the world as a live band, as recording artists and as part of several theatre productions, including the Olivier Award-winning Shockheaded Peter on the West End. Their latest collaboration is with visual director Mark Holthusen and writer Peder Bjurman on a story set along the Mexican border, Corrido de la Sangre , which will be performed as part of the ¡Viva! Spanish and...
Apr 18, 20180•Ep. 156
Director Jake Murray, who was co-artistic director for Manchester's Royal Exchange Studio space with current Exchange Artistic Director Sarah Frankcom until he left Manchester in 2008, is back in the city with his new Durham-based Elysium Theatre Company. His latest production is of Stephen Adly Guirgis’s Pullitzer Prize-winning play Jesus Hopped The ‘A’ Train , which has only been produced twice in the UK before. BTG editor David Chadderton spoke to Jake at HOME Manchester a month before the pr...
Apr 11, 2018•30 min•Ep. 155
Legacy is a new play written by Paul Birch for the York Theatre Royal as an intergenerational collaboration: its cast is made up of Youth Theatre members as well as actors aged 65-plus from the local community. Exploring themes of corruption and the uses—and misuses—of individuals' online identities, the play uses a sci-fi thriller lens to examine some extremely timely questions. Mark Smith talks to director Kate Veysey and performers Hannah Brown and Shirley Williams about the development of th...
Apr 06, 2018•22 min•Ep. 154
James Brining has been Artistic Director of the West Yorkshire Playhouse since 2012. Prior to that, he spent sixteen years in Scotland as Artistic Director of TAG Theatre and then Dundee Rep. He talks here to Mark Smith about his forthcoming production of Sunshine on Leith , a musical based on the songs of The Proclaimers, which he originated with writer Stephen Greenhorn at Dundee Rep in 2007. In a wide-ranging discussion, James talks about the challenges and pleasures of returning to a play in...
Mar 25, 2018•39 min•Ep. 153
On 20 February 2018, regional theatre director, artistic director and chief executive John Blackmore died at the age of 77. He was chief executive at Bolton's Octagon Theatre for 12 years, but he also put together a plan to save Liverpool’s Everyman and Playhouse theatres, was Artistic Director of Manchester’s Library Theatre in the 1960s, founded the company that became Northern Stage in Newcastle, was one of the founders of Out of Joint, was director or artistic director of Midlands Arts Centr...
Mar 18, 2018•54 min•Ep. 152
