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 […]
Theatre Reviews
Our theatre reviews aim to bring you the latest and best performances of plays, dance and music. Ink Pellet celebrates the country’s vibrant regional theatres – from performances of the classics and set texts, to new plays that will inspire and support you.
Once again, we have a merry band of discerning teachers who visit plays in their town (sometimes earning themselves a free programme and interval drink)to review for the magazine.
We’ll also review something you might like – just for sheer pleasure! If you would like to join our panel of reviewers, please join in or email the editor john@inkpellet.co.uk.
-
William Shakespeare’s genius has been an inspiration to so many generations. Romeo and Juliet is one of the most powerful love stories ever told, and has been portrayed in many guises for over 400 years. John Humphrey’s production of this iconic play initially was a little bewildering as to the message he wanted to convey, […]
-
The novel has acquired iconic status since its publication in 1981. And David Wood’s sensitive dramatization, after opening at Chichester, enjoying two West End runs and now touring until the end of May, is rapidly going the same way. And it gets better each time I see it. Evacuee Willie Beech, abused by his mentally […]
-
Given how many films and TV adaptations there have been over the years it takes real imaginative flair to do something original with this text. Sally Cookson and her team have certainly come up with a different concept. The Littleton proscenium is presented as a huge white curtained hollow box within which designer Michael Vale […]
-
Recently the opportunity arose within my GCSE Drama group for a few of us to go to the Gulbenkian Theatre, a small theatre on campus at the University of Kent in Canterbury, to watch a production of William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, one of his most well-known and macabre tragedies. I decided I would go, as I […]
-
Having read Mark Haddon’s best-selling novel only a few weeks before seeing the National Theatre’s production of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, I wondered if this would be a hindrance or a help. But believe me, this touring NT production took the story of Asperger’s suffer Christopher onto yet another magical […]
-
Based on the unexplained suicide of four women who starved themselves to death over a period of 40 days and who systematically destroyed any clues that might have helped us to understand their actions, Lippy will not be every theatregoers cup of tea. If the play’s subject is bleak, the dramatic treatment of the subject […]
-
Presenting a classic like Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice for the theatre holds certain risks. Patrons who are seasoned lovers of the English classics have certain expectations, and would be disappointed if the stage production differs greatly to the novel. Fortunately Tamara Harvey’s production rose to the challenge, bringing the story to life with its […]
-
2015 marks the centenary of Arthur Miller’s birth and the RSC has honoured it with a near definitive account of what is probably Miller’s finest play – Death of a Salesman. Miller’s powerful, painful take on the elusive Great American Dream is not easy to bring off on stage but Gregory Doran’s characteristically assured touch […]
-
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, […]
-
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 […]