The Arts Section

Shaken, stirred – and very funny

CIRENCESTER’s adventurous independent Barn Theatre opens the 2025 season with a new comedy featuring a casting director facing the challenge of casting an actor for the world’s most famous spy. Jordan Waller’s A Role to Die For, running from 30th January to 15th March, stars Olivier Award-winner Janie Dee, and is directed by another Olivier…

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Celebrity Weakest Link at the Barn

A STARRY line-up of celebrities, including the Queen’s son, food writer Tom Parker-Bowles, singer-songwriter Toyah Willcox and Lord Michael Grade, will take part in a special edition of The Weakest Link, chaired by the TV programme’s founder presenter Anne Robinson, at Cirencester’s Barn Theatre on Saturday 18th January. The charity event is raising funds for…

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Martin Shaw stars in Bolt’s Tudor classic

HOT on the heels of the triumph of Wolf Hall on television, Bath Theatre Royal takes audiences once again into the dark corridors of power and the dangerous glamour of the court of Henry VIII, with a new production of Robert Bolt’s great drama, A Man for all Seasons, running at the theatre from Thursday…

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An adult feline frolic

BATH’S Ustinov Studio opens its 2025 season with three performances of CAT the Play, performed by Richard Kieswick as a man who dreams of fame in one of Lord Lloyd Webber’s most popular musicals, based on the work of T S Eliot. Described as a comedy drama with a dark twist, CAT the Play was…

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Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet at Bristol Hippodrome

WHEN Shakespeare wrote “The most excellent and lamentable tragedy of Romeo and Juliet”, he created the two most loved and recognisable pair of lovers the world has ever known. Originally Romeo was described as being 16 years old and Juliet 13, but while Romeo appears to have matured in age over the years, Juliet remains…

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Midnight Mole in The Egg

MIDNIGHT Mole continues at Bath Theatre Royal’s dedicated children’s theatre space The Egg until Sunday 9th February. Described as a heart-warming adventure for the very young, it is full of puppetry and music, and specially created for younger audiences aged between six months to four years old. Audiences can join Madame Ranevsky in her favourite…

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The ART of friendship

INCREDIBLY popular – but seriously contentious – Yasmina Reza’s play ART is one of the great plays of the last 30 years. There are many who think it is laugh-out-loud funny and others who find it navel-gazing and pretentious. Make up your own mind when you watch a performance of ART by Somerleigh Players at…

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Powerful play starts Swan’s new season

YEOVIL’S Swan Theatre starts it 2025 season with a production of Diane Samuels’ 1993 play Kindertransport, on stage from 20th to 25th January at 7.45. Evelyn is happily settled into middle aged, middle class England. But when her daughter Faith discovers some old documents in the attic, she is forced to confront her past –…

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Off to see the wizard!

SHAFTESBURY Arts Centre’s music and drama group will be stepping out on the yellow brick road for this year’s pantomime, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. at the Bell Street venue from 23rd January to 1st February. Written by Nigel Holmes and directed by Sophia Ruel, the show follows the original book by L Frank Baum,…

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