A Murder is Announced | December 2004

By Agatha Christie. Directed by Rene Hughes. The residents of Chipping Cleghorn are astonished to read an advert in the local newspaper that a murder will take place the following Friday at 7:30 p.m. at Little Paddocks, the home of Letitia Blacklock. All the residents of the town expect that it is a murder mystery…

Lettice and Lovage | October 2004

By Peter Shaffer.  Directed by Patricia Melluish. Lettice, employed as a stately home tourist guide, has inherited theatricality and eccentricity from her mother. Caught embroidering the history of the house by Lotte, her supervisor, she is dismissed. During the dismissal interview they uncover common ground with the result that she and lotte develop an unlikely…

Fringe Benefits | June 2004

By Peter Yeldham and Donald Churchill. Directed by Howard James. Two couples decise, this year, to change their plans for a customary annual holiday, since the wives are sick of Torremolinos and the husbands are engineering an assignation with two girls. A young man, who fancies the two women, arrives and predictably hilarious complications result….

Steel Magnolias | April 2004

By Robert Harling. Directed by Jon Clark. The regular customers of Truvy’s beauty shop. the centre of a small town in Louisiana, enjoy a staple diet of gossip. They share the good times and bad and set the world to rights. But, when one of their number dies following an operation, they find a deep strength…

Garden | February 2004

By Alan Ayckbourn. Directed by Paul Marshall. The action takes place in the Manor House, Pendon, home of Teddy and Trish Platt, during an August Saturday. Attractions include: Maypole dancing, Morris Dancing, Hoop-la, Bat the Rat, Tombola, Fortune Telling, Family Feuds, Jilted Mistress, Celebrity Guest and Political Chicanery. All presented in inimitable Alan Ayckbourn style. Maypole dance…

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe | December 2003

By C. S. Lewis, adapted by Adrian Mitchell, with music by Shaun Davey. Directed by Rosemary Harris. Visit the fantastic and magical land of Narnia with the four children who have passed through the wardrobe gateway. Meet Aslan, the great King Lion, and wonder at the deadly struggle to free the land from the clutches of the evil White…

The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie | October 2003

By Muriel Spark, adapted by Jay Presson Allen. Directed by Rene Hughes. Meet Jean Brodie, eccentric, radical schoolteacher, fascinating her ‘set’ of sixteen year old girls with her ideas, beliefs and relationships with men. Out of pique, one of the ‘set’ arranges her dismissal for her fascist sympathies, ending the career of ‘an Edinburgh Festival…

The Memory of Water | June 2003

By Shelagh Stevenson. Directed by Howard James. When Mary, Theresa and Catherine meet on the eve of their mother’s funeral, conflicts and tension from the past materialise.  In this comedy of sparkling exchanges of everyday lies, through humour and depth of compassion, the strains of family relationships are revealed.  The story is set in a…

Neville’s Island | April 2003

By Tim Firth. Directed by Bill Morley. A comedy in think fog. A team-building exercise in the Lake District by Gordon, Angus, Roy and Neville becomes a near-farcical shipwreck on an island in Derwentwater. With fog, unfriendly wildlife and being cut off from civilisation, the intended bonding process turns into a humorous fight for survival….

Amy’s View | February 2003

By David Hare. Directed by Jon Clark. Love without conditions is Amy’s belief; a conviction with which Esme, her mother, a leading actress, committed to the memory of her dead artist husband, cannot come to terms. However, over a period of sixteen years, through her experiences, it is a view Esme finally comes to understand….