THE 250th anniversary production of Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s immortal comedy The Rivals, sub-titled A Trip to Bath, comes “home” to the Theatre Royal as part of its 2026 tour. The 23-year-old Sheridan was catapulted to success by the play, which held a mirror up to the preposterous antics of his day. So it is no…
LEWIS Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland is one of the greatest works of English literature – beautifully, poetically written, full of vivid and unconventional characters, jam-packed with imaginative touches and extraordinary events, somewhere between a rainbow dream and a fever-nightmare, and memorably illustrated, so that we all know what the White Rabbit or the Cheshire Cat…
UP and down the country, people (often with no particular connection to Scotland) gather to celebrate the birthday of Rabbie Burns – but Dorset has its own dialect poet, and this year the annual Tea with William Barnes on Sunday 22nd February coincides with what would have been Barnes’ 225th birthday. For the past nine…
WE all know the identity of Sherlock Holmes’s arch-nemesis, don’t we – but what if the real “killer” was the great detective’s creator? Find out more when Sherlock Holmes: The Death and Life comes to the Ustinov Studio at Bath Theatre Royal on Friday 30th and Saturday 31st January. The premise of this witty one-man…
THE creative ferment of Frome, Somerset’s most artistically active town, has produced a new play which draws on the writer-performer’s own experience as a taxi driver. Rank, by Dan Gaisford, is touring to Dorchester Arts at the Corn Exchange on 29th January, Bridport Arts Centre on 30th, Poole’s Lighthouse on 31st, Bath Theatre Royal’s Ustinov…
WHAT do you do if your cinema is planning to show all three Lord of the Rings films in one epic screening – but you only have the sound-tracks? You improvise. All three parts of the saga – all those hobbits and heroes, elves and orcs, dwarves and wizards … Parody of the Rings is…
THE Boxer Rebellion is remembered as a frightening episode in China’s history – but partisan Western reporting means we have a very one-sided view of the insurrection. An unusual solo show, Chinese Boxing, coming to Bath Theatre Royal’s Ustinov Studio from 27th to 29th January, gives the Chinese side of the story. The play, written…
MOSCOW Drug Club are hard to pigeon-hole – but hugely poplar, appealing to lovers of gypsy jazz, Berlin cabaret and French chanson. The group has two tours, starting in January, with Dorset’s Artsreach and Somerset’s Take Art. The local dates begin on Friday 30th at Drimpton. The late winter tour continues at Salisbury Arts Centre…
CABARET should always have a frisson of wanton wit, a hint of burlesque, some risqué songs … and even a pinch of decadence. In the capable hands of Charlie Bicknell and Louise Innes it also has balls or claws – or Claus, if you will. The always in-demand duo picks up its tour in on…
THE new exhibition at the Somerset Rural Life Museum at Glastonbury is Legacy in Making, running from 24th January to 10th May. Presented by Somerset Art Works in partnership with the South West Heritage Trust=, it celebrates the legacy and future of the Somerset Craft Guild. It shows the remarkable breadth of contemporary and historic…
MANY of us would love to have paintings, drawings or limited edition prints, but can barely afford them in these cash-strapped times – well-known Wiltshire artist Nick Andrew is offering work from some of his drawing projects at reduced prices on Saturdays throughout January and 6th February. On view at Nick’s Bull Mill Studio at…
ALISON Steadman, one of the best-loved and most versatile actresses of her generation, will be the special guest at the Pipeline masterclass at Poole’s Lighthouse arts centre on Wednesday 11th February. Acclaimed for her stage, television and film roles, Alison first came to prominence in television plays Nuts in May and Abigail’s Party – she…
A NEW free exhibition at Poole’s Lighthouse arts centre, RNLI: Stories of Courage 1939-45, opens on Saturday 15th January, exploring the way the volunteer lifeboat crews saved lives at sea in dangerous conditions, including a lifeboat that was one of the famous “little boats” that rescued soldiers pinned down on the beaches at Dunkirk. The…
PRIMARY school aged children in around the south west have a chance to experience live music, when the BSO’s Explore the Orchestra tour visits the University of Exeter on 30th January, Bristol Beacon on 27th March and Poole Lighthouse on 19th and 20th May with a series of free Explore the Orchestra concerts. With the addition…
BATH Festivals has announced some of the highlights of next year’s international music festival, with tickets for five concerts released early – a perfect post Christmas gift for the music-lover in your life! The international music festival will run from Saturday 30th May to Sunday 7th June, and the first of the newly released events…
BATH Literature Festival 2026 has announced that Maggie O’Farrell, the bestselling author of Hamnet, is coming to Bath to celebrate the release of her new novel, Land. The award-winning Irish author of novels including Hamnet, The Marriage Portrait, After You’d Gone, The Hand That First Held Mine and her memoir I Am, I Am, I…
KLEZMER, the music of Jewish Eastern Europe and the Balkans, is haunting and poignant, but it can also be infectiously energetic, urging you to join in with its fast and furious dance rhythms. Catch the Zeffe klezmer band at the Beehive Centre at Honiton on Saturday 31st January at 7.30pm. It’s just the thing to…
YES, we know, it’s mid-winter – but right now we all need something to look forward to, and we’re looking ahead to the end of July when Poole Harbour Festival celebrates its tenth anniversary, and the Kaiser Chiefs headline the main stage. So, in this gloomy, cold, wet January, let’s try to imagine long summer…
LOCALS and visitors have just over a month to take advantage of a rare opportunity to climb high into the ruins of Corfe Castle, and see the breathtaking views from a special platform on the Keep. The platform will be closed to visitors from the end of February, as a £2 million, three-year conservation project…
BRIDPORT’s atmospheric Electric Palace begins a season celebrating a centenary of cinema on Sunday 25th January at 3pm, with a screening, accompanied by a live score, of Robert Wiene’s 1920 masterpiece, Das Cabinet des Dr Caligari. Written by Hans Janowitz and Carl Mayer, this is the quintessential work of early German Expressionist cinema and is…
GEOFF Norcott is that very rare thing in the UK comedy scene – he is a Conservative! But coming out as a right-winger hasn’t impeded his career too badly, and he is now on a new tour, Basic Bloke 2 – “There’s no Bloke without Fire” – coming to Salisbury Arts Centre on 31st January,…
THE classic sitcom that made Martin Clunes a star comes to the stage of the Barn Theatre at Cirencester – Men Behaving Badly, by the show’s original creator Simon Nye, will be the adventurous little theatre’s first Built By Barn production of 2026, running from 30th January to 7th March Men Behaving Badly, the play,…
BATH Literature Festival has announced its first event, a pre-festival evening with historian Tom Holland, co-host of the hit podcast The Rest is History, at Bath Forum on Friday 22nd May at 7pm. Travel back to the Roman Empire as Tom Holland celebrates his translation for Penguin Classics of Suetonius’s influential Lives of the Twelve Caesars….
ONE of the cliches of the media at the turn of the year is to run features that riff on the theme of “new year, new you” – Moviola doesn’t need memes and mundanities as there are always new films to excite its rural audiences, and this new year is no exception. The first quarter…