this month's
Ink Pellet contains
A Final Haunt
After 33 extraordinary years, Susan Hill’s The Woman in Black will haunt the stage of the Fortune Theatre for the final time, as the production ends in the West End on Saturday 4th March 2023. PW Productions announce that after 33 extraordinary years in London’s West End, the theatrical sensation that is Susan Hill’s THE […]
Reaching for the Moon
Susan Elkin paid a visit to Half Moon theatre in London’s East End to chat with CEO Chris Elwell about their extensive education outreach and innovative theatre programmes. Half Moon Theatre sits in the heart of Limehouse in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, spitting distance from the DLR and mainline station. Formerly a pretty […]
National Youth Theatre Rep Company
The National Youth Theatre’s Rep Company is celebrating its first ten years and Susan Elkin paid a visit to learn more. Each year a group of fifteen or so talented NYT members, aged 18 to 25, are selected by audition to join this company. In just a few months they rehearse three shows, many of […]
Apprenticeships
An important and often overlooked route into the industry, especially for many non-performing roles. Susan Elkin has some suggestions. Theatre is like an iceberg. For every role on stage there are probably at least half a dozen technicians you can’t see. And the industry has been telling us for decades that there are skills shortages […]
School Shows
Never underestimate the power of a school production – for every single person involved. When you meet former students, sometimes from decades back in my case, it’s usually taking part in Oliver! or A Midsummer Night’s Dream that they reminisce about with shining eyes. Most importantly it’s a terrific bonding exercise. We hear a lot […]
New Perspectives
With three separate Lucian Freud exhibitions currently on, Graham Hooper took time to visit and here is his review of these contrasting shows. LLucian Freud would have been 100 this year, and that’s a good excuse to look back over his life and work, but especially his work, as the two have a rather nasty […]
Grandad Anansi – Half Moon Theatre
Predicated partly on Black History Month, Elayne Ogbeta’s muliti-layered play presents Grandad (Marcus Hercules) and his primary school age granddaughter, Abi (Jazmine Wilkinson) in his garden. Like everything else in this show, the garden designed by Sorcha Corcoran, is beautiful with lots of colour, light and plants that Grandad knows by name and talks to. […]
Theatre Review – The King of Nothing – Little Angel Theatre
Ben Glasstone’s charming, witty account of The Emperor Who Has No Clothes works well for two main reasons. First it is one of the most perceptive stories ever written, dealing as it does with vanity, self delusion, conformity and truth. It’s both topical and timeless. Second, we have a cost of living crisis and the […]
Book Review – Activist
by Louisa Reid Published by Guppy Books Cassandra, narrator of this powerful verse novel, is a reluctant sixth former in a prestigious mixed school, formerly all boys, where toxic culture simmers. Driven by her own experience, and by nature a feisty “shouter” she campaigns forcibly for acknowledgement that some of the boys at school treat […]
Book Review – A Poetry Pedagogy for Teachers: Reorienting Classroom Literacy Practice
by Maya Pindyck and Ruth Vinz, with Diana Liu and Ashlynn Wittchow The thrust of this detailed, well-researched, quite academic book about the poetry in classrooms is that we shouldn’t teach students to search for meaning so that “the poem becomes a specimen for examination under the microscope of interpretative practices”. Instead we should experience […]
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Spread your artistic wings this summer and take part in one of dozens of creative activities being run by engage, the organisation that tirelessly promotes access and enjoyment for all to the visual arts. No matter what kind of art you and your children enjoy, or even if you’ve never even thought about participating in […]
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The Classical Road Show organisation has given many thousands of children in London and the Home Counties exceptional musical experiences through its innovative concerts and workshops, and this year’s big concert experience project takes place on June 8th at the Fairfield Halls, Croydon. The project is an interactive hour-long concert for junior schools with live […]
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Published by Bloomsbury Niki Flacks is described as a director, actor, teacher and psychologist. The most pertinent role, it turns out, is the latter; for to be able to do any of the three requires knowledge of self and the human condition. A regular tutor at the Actors’ Centre, the testimonials speak warmly of her […]
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Published by Peripeteia Press There are times when a book lands on your desk and it’s akin to manna from heaven. For those of you who have read my Editor’s Letter on page 3, you will know that the Hopley household, like thousands of others, is in the grip of exam revision. So I left […]
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Published by Pogo Learning Nick Handel is a former BBC producer and has used this skill to write a fantastic, easy to use resource that uses film to develop creative writing. Today’s youngsters have a highly developed visual knowledge. Brought up on a diet of video films, games and animated learning techniques – something has […]
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Published by Hachette Mind Games is set in a future where almost everything is virtual. Everyone loves the way life is organised, except for a group of people – the refusers. Refusers don’t go into these virtual worlds because they don’t like it or don’t want to. And among these refusers is a girl called […]
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As I take my seat at the Bristol Old Vic, I wonder how a book that is essentially a memoire of sexual encounters can be put on stage and deliver a great story. This play, in fact, is based on John Cleland’s book Memoirs of a Woman, which tells the infamous life of Francis Hill, […]
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Jonathan Harvey’s play Beautiful Thing is doing the rounds again – marking its 20th anniversary. It’s a great story that deserves a revival, and this one, with the confident and accomplished Charlie Brooks (from EastEnders) brought a great energy to the production. Set in an inner city London council estate, Harvey’s sparkily-written script tells the […]
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When a play deals so obviously with the story of pain, deep tragedy and explores the sheer baseness of human nature, one does wonder why we go to the theatre to see it. That could well be the story of this production of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, the adaptation of John Boyne’s award-winning […]
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Experimental theatre maker TIM CROUCH, pushes boundaries and flies in the face of convention. His ideal dinner party follows the same lines – stand back and be inspired! The venue would be Wooda Farm, nestling on the side of a valley near Crackington Haven in north Cornwall. My old friends Max and Gary farm sheep […]