The Arts Section

An extraordinary portrait of a remarkable man

JACK Dickson, a member of the art department at Bryanston School, Blandford, was featured on a recent edition of Bill Bailey’s BBC series Extraordinary Portraits. The programme featured Jack’s portrait of a remarkable, life-saving, railway worker, Rizwan Javed. East Londoner Rizwan, who works for London Underground, has saved 29 people from taking their own lives…

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Marine in March

THE Marine Theatre at Lyme Regis welcomes Brit pop singer songwriter John Power on Friday 28th March and Bristol MC and songwriter Gardna on Saturday 29th. The very musical month of March finishes with Jazz by the Sea with Opa Rosa (pictured, who play the music of the Balkans and Eastern Europe to the Dorset…

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Happy birthday, Bath Literature Festival

ASK many people which is their favourite English city … the answer will often be Bath. It’s hardly surprising – a pearl of fine Georgian stone houses, terraces, circuses, crescents and streets, set in a spectacular valley, with some of the country’s finest Roman remains and a history of art, culture and literature. A roll call…

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A choral journey from Dorset to Covent Garden

DORSET’s Artsreach rural touring charity is working on a unique collaboration with the Anglo-Chilean band Quimantú and community singers from several Dorset choirs to perform Misa de los Mineros, The Miners’ Mass, in a series of concerts across the county, starting in April. The first Dorset concert takes place in Blandford Parish Church on Friday…

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March workshops for Dorset Women

DORCHESTER has a rich history, and one of its most recent important contributions not only to the town, county and country has been its community plays. It has staged seven – the greatest number of community plays anywhere in the world. The most recent, Spinning the Moon, was due in 2020 and was scuppered by…

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Moviola in March

A FILM which has already garnered many awards and is expected to win more at the Oscars suddenly feels uncannily topical as well. Conclave, the drama surrounding the selection of a new Pope, could hardly be more timely as one of the most in-demand films for March with Moviola audiences. Based on Robert Harris’s gripping…

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Rainforests teetering on the edge

EAST Devon’s Shute Festival continues its series of inspiring talks on 12th March at the Peek Chapel in Pound Street, Lyme Regis, with Julia Hailes, ambassador for the Rainforest Trust. She has recently returned from the Guyanas – British Guiana (as it was), Suriname and French Guiana – where the forests still stand, 83.5%, 93%…

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Dickensian ghosts with a comic twist

THE Gavin Robertson company returns to Dorset in March with three performances of a double bill of Dickens’ short haunted stories, with a comic twist! The Ghost of a Smile will be at Sandford Orcas village hall on Friday 7th, Powerstock Hut on Saturday 8th and Shillingstone’s Portman Hall on Sunday 9th, all at 7.30pm….

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The 39 Steps, Salisbury Playhouse

ALFRED Hitchcock’s film version of John Buchan’s 1915 novel is widely regarded as one of the greatest movies of all time, and every subsequent iteration is judged by this 90-year-old behemoth. So perhaps it is no surprise that a member of the audience, leaving Salisbury Playhouse’s terrific new production of the Patrick Barlow four-handed version…

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The Winter’s Tale, Tobacco Factory, Bristol

SHAKESPEARE is back at Bedminster’s Tobacco Factory, in a stunning new production by Heidi Vaughan, the venue’s artistic director and CEO. It seems a long time since the company Shakespeare at the Tobacco Factory was last performing on the cigar packing room floor of the former Wills Factory. Andrew Hilton’s company ran for 20 years…

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