British Theatre Guide Podcast

BTG's London Editor Philip Fisher reports from the New York theatre scene. Firstly, Philip talks to Jeremy Herrin about his work as Artistic Director of Headlong Theatre, his production of Michael Frayn's Noises Off, which he is directing with an American cast for Roundabout, and his wider career. Philip also talks to Red Bull Theater’s Artistic Director Jesse Berger about the company's latest production, The Changeling, and the company’s genesis and mission to present Jacobean theatre and Shakespeare to New Yorkers, reviving plays rarely, if ever, seen in the city. (Photo of Jeremy Herrin: Dan Wooller)

BTG London editor Philip Fisher, during his annual reviewing trip to the US, talks with Theatermania columnist Michael Feingold about trends in New York theatre both on and off Broadway and discusses shows that should not be missed.

Donovan Christian Cary has been the resident Dame at the Princes Hall, Aldershot for over a decade. He speaks to BTG Panto Editor Simon Sladen about playing Dame and his pantomime career that has gone from auditioning in a car for the role of Genie to playing the Fairy Superior in 2015's Cinderella.

Alex Wright is a Yorkshire-based theatre-maker who as a founder member of Belt Up Theatre reached national audiences with a series of immersive, free-form adaptations of well-known works. Since then he has set up The Flanagan Collective, with which he continues to adapt, write and direct a range of pieces. For the past nine months he’s been part of a group—including artists, producers and a pub landlord—which has been responsible for The Fleeting Arms, a ramshackle, open pop-up arts venue run for and with York’s creative community. The Fleeting Arms is due to close its doors as a performance venue on the 31 December 2015 and in its final month the whole building has been dedicated to a new, immersive adaptation of The Great Gatsby, which Alex has directed. In this episode, Alex talks to BTG Yorkshire Editor Mark Smith about staging The Great Gatsby, how he approaches immersive performance and the experience of running a pop-up arts venue in the centre of York. (Gatsby photo credit Ben Porter)

The first Christmas production at HOME Manchester will be the English language stage première of Cornelia Funke’s best-selling children’s fantasy novel Inkheart. In this episode, we speak to Irish actor Will Irvine, who returns to Manchester to play Capricorn, the ultimate "baddy", and to director Walter Meierjohann, who directed an earlier adaptation of this story in Germany in 2006. Inkheart, adapted for the stage by Stephen Sharkey and Walter Meierjohann for HOME Manchester, runs from Friday 4 December 2015 to Saturday 9 January 2016. For more information and to book tickets, see homemcr.org or call the box office on 0161 200 1500.

In this episode, we look at two very different non-pantomime versions of the Snow White story that can be seen this Christmas. Natasha Holmes is artistic director of Yorkshire-based Tell Tale Hearts, a company that creates highly visual participatory theatre for children and families based on ideas from the children themselves. Just before rehearsals began, Natasha talked to us about a version of the popular fairy tale that features Yorkshire miners as well as aerial performance from outdoor theatre specialists Pif-Paf. The production is at the Lawrence Batley Theatre in Huddersfield from 11 to 27 December 2015. Newcastle-based balletLORENT is currently touring its new dance version of Snow White created by the same team as last year's Rapunzel. Choreographer Liv Lorent spoke to us about this collaboration with Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy and composer Murray Gold, better-known for his music for the TV series Doctor Who. Snow White from balletLORENT began its tour in October 2015 at Northern Stage in Newca

Leeds-based children’s theatre company tutti frutti has teamed up with York Theatre Royal and playwright Emma Reeves, Olivier-nominated for her adaptation of Jacqueline Wilson’s Hetty Feather, on a new adaptation of the children’s folk tale Snow Child, inspired by Arthur Ransome’s adaptation of this traditional tale entitled The Little Daughter of the Snow. Emma spoke to BTG editor David Chadderton early in the rehearsal period about the play, tutti frutti's collaborative production methods and her career writing adaptations of children's classic literature for stage and TV. Snow Child by Emma Reeves, directed by Wendy Harris for tutti frutti, opens on 3 October 2015 at The Arc in Stockton on Tees and tours the UK and Ireland, with a brief visit to Hong Kong and Singapore, until March 2016, ending at York Theatre Royal. For more information, see tutti-frutti-org.uk. Snow Child illustration by Jessica Knight

York-based Pilot Theatre is currently in rehearsals for Outsiders, a new re-imagining of Albert Camus’ novel L’Etranger. The play is written by Emteaz Hussain and staged by the Australian director Fraser Corfield. It works around the spare narrative of the original to focus on two marginalised female characters, Marie and Sumaya, exploring the experience of migration and the impact of trauma in the lives of these two women. In this episode, director Fraser Corfield and performers Lou Broadbent and Sara Sadeghi talk to BTG’s Mark Smith about the process of creating this new piece as a cross-cultural collaboration and discuss the relevance of the play in the light of the current political climate around immigration and migration. The production opens at CAST in Doncaster from 24 to 26 September 2015 before touring through autumn to the University of York, Barnsley Civic, Derby Theatre, Liverpool Playhouse, Canada Water in London, Hull Truck, the Lawrence Batley Theatre in Huddersfield and the Tobacco Factory in

BTG Midlands editor Steve Orme talks to actor Robert Powell, who has taken over the title role in Mike Bartlett's King Charles III from Tim Pigott-Smith for a UK tour which began in September 2015. Powell talks about taking on the most difficult role he has ever played as well as looking back on his 50-year acting career, including his iconic TV performance as Jesus of Nazareth in 1977, an uncharacteristic 6-year run in hospital soap Holby City, playing comedy with Jasper Carrott and the loneliness of touring. For more information about the tour of King Charles III, see the production's web site. (Robert Powell photo credit: Steve Orme.)

Michael Billington has been theatre critic of The Guardian since 1971 and of Country Life since 1986, but began reviewing for The Times in 1965. He is the author of biographies of Harold Pinter and Peggy Ashcroft, critical studies of Tom Stoppard and Alan Ayckbourn, a celebration of Ken Dodd and a collection of reviews, One Night Stands. At his home in West London, Michael talks to BTG's Philip Fisher about his new book, The 101 Greatest Plays from Antiquity to the Present, and about his 50-year career as a theatre critic. Photo credit: Natasha Billington

Northern Broadsides resident director Conrad Nelson is directing the company's first production in its 23-year history of Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale as well as appearing as jealous Sicilian King Leontes and composing the music. In this episode, Conrad speaks about the production and about the challenges of touring a cast of thirteen to venues with very different types of performance space, from proscenium to traverse and in-the-round. The production will open at co-producer Harrogate Theatre from 18 to 26 September 2015 before touring to Oldham Coliseum, Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds, Lawrence Batley Theatre in Huddersfield, Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough, Everyman Theatre Cheltenham, the New Vic in Newcastle-under-Lyme, The Dukes Theatre in Lancaster and Liverpool Playhouse before ending at the company’s home theatre of The Viaduct in Halifax from 24 to 28 November. For more information, see www.northern-broadsides.co.uk.

BTG's Philip Fisher talks with theatre critics Mark Fisher and Neil Cooper about their picks of this year's Fringe and International Festivals. The productions discussed include 887 by Robert Lepage and The Encounter by Simon McBurney in EIF and, in the Edinburgh Fringe programme, the Jennifer Tremblay Trilogy at Assembly Roxy and Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour at the Traverse. Mark Fisher is an Edinburgh-based freelance journalist and critic specialising in theatre and the arts who writes for The Guardian, Scotland on Sunday and The Scotsman. He is the author of The Edinburgh Fringe Survival Guide: how to make your show a success and How to Write About Theatre: A Manual for Critics, Students and Bloggers. Neil Cooper is an arts writer and critic based in Edinburgh who currently writes for The Herald, The Quietus, The List and Scottish Art News and has written for Bella Caledonia and Product. He has contributed chapters to The Suspect Culture Book and to Dear Green Sounds: Glasgow's Music Through Time and Bu

In a wide-ranging discussion, BTG's Philip Fisher talks with theatre producer Richard Jordan about this year's Edinburgh Fringe and International Festival highlights, star ratings, reviews web sites, Edinburgh venues old and new and more, including Richard's own Fringe productions.

In the thick of the 2015 Edinburgh festivals, Fergus Linehan talks to BTG's Philip Fisher about his first year as director of the Edinburgh International Festival. For more information on the Festival, see www.eif.co.uk. (Photo credit: Eoin Carey)

This podcast episode features two veterans of the Edinburgh Fringe: actor and writer Pip Utton and comedian and animator Howard Read. Pip Utton's one-man shows have been a popular feature on the Fringe for more than two decades. This year, he is reviving one of his most popular shows, Adolf, but he will also launch a brand new show in which he plays Margaret Thatcher. Adolf will be at The Assembly Rooms on George Street for just one performance on 22 August. Playing Maggie will run at the same venue from 7 to 30 August. For more information about Pip, see www.pip-utton.co.uk. Howard Read has had a number of hit Fringe and touring shows as part of a double-act with his animated sidekick Little Howard, as well as two series on CBBC and a Royal Variety Performance. This year, he is launching a brand new character, a tiny elephant called Annabelle, in a show for a younger audience. Howard Read and Steve Pretty are performing Annabelle's Skirting Board Adventure at Just the Tonic at The Community Project at 11:30A

In his new play Edith in the Dark, playwright Philip Meeks has combined the unusual life and some of the lesser-known adult ghost stories of Edith Nesbit, celebrated author of children's classics such as The Railway Children, Five Children and It and The Phoenix and the Carpet. It will be at Momentum Playhouse at St Stephens in Edinburgh from 7 to 30 August with previews on 5 and 6. Les Enfants Terribles co-founder James Seager tells us all about the successful company's latest production, Marvellous Imaginary Menagerie, which will return to Edinburgh at Pleasance Beyond from 5 to 31 August. Guy Masterson, probably the best-known and most successful Edinburgh Fringe producer, director and actor, will perform Dylan Thomas The Man, The Myth with Thomas's granddaughter Hannah Ellis from 6 to 22 August and a cut-down version of his one-man Under Milk Wood, sub-titled Semi-Skimmed, from 23 to 31 August, both at Assembly Roxy. He tells us about both productions and shatters a few myths about the great Welsh post. F

Manchester's 24:7 Theatre Festival was founded in 2004 as a showcase for new plays, as well as for up-and-coming acting and directing talent. It has since become a key event on the Manchester arts calendar. A week before this year's 24:7, we spoke to co-founder David Slack together with the festival's general manager Annika Edge in Manchester about an eventful year for the organisation since the 2014 event. The 2015 24:7 Theatre Festival Big Festival Weekend will take place at the Martin Harris Centre for Music and Drama and the surrounding areas from 24 to 26 July 2015. For more information about all of the events and how to book for them, see www.247theatrefestival.co.uk.

The Studio at The Lowry in Salford supports and presents new work and new companies and artists in various ways. At a showcase on 21 April 2015, 11 artists and companies gave presentations about themselves and their work to potential supporters, sponsors and venue partners, and British Theatre Guide was able to speak to a few of them. The Letter Room is a devising theatre company from Newcastle. Its third show, Five Feet In Front, will première at The Lowry in June 2015. Kill The Beast's second show, He Had Hairy Hands, is currently on tour and due to return to The Lowry in May 2015, and the company is currently working on its third show with the working title of The Crystal Continuum. Lowry Associate Artist Monkeywood Theatre is a Manchester new writing company that has been creating new work since 2003. Its next show, By Far The Greatest Team, will be premièred at The Lowry in September. Laura Lindow is a writer-performer who has been commissioned by The Lowry together with two rural touring schemes to crea

In April 2015, Manchester-based Box of Tricks Theatre Company will begin a tour of Plastic Figurines, a new play by Ella Carmen Greenhill, at the Liverpool Playhouse Studio. In this episode, Ella and director Adam Quayle, during rehearsals in Manchester, speak about the writing of the play and its roots in Ella's real-life relationship with her brother, who is on the autistic spectrum. You can also hear about Ella's other work and about the philosophy of Manchester-based new writing company Box of Tricks. Plastic Figurines will open at Liverpool Playhouse Studio on 8 April 2015. It will then tour to London, Hemel Hempstead, Bury, Hull, Halifax, Southport, Ellesmere Port, Wigan, Barnsley, Harrogate, Salford, Derby, Shrewsbury and Mold. For more information, see boxoftrickstheatre.co.uk.

In November 2014, David Thacker announced that he would step down as artistic director of the Octagon Theatre in Bolton at the end of his current tenure in July 2015 after six years at the venue. Four months later, the theatre announced that its associate director and head of new writing, Elizabeth Newman, will take over from him. We spoke to Elizabeth at the Octagon about her new appointment, her ideas for the future of the venue, her campaigning on theatre issues—including speaking in Parliament—and her training and background as a director. Elizabeth Newman takes over as artistic director of the Octagon from July 2015. Her production of Noël Coward’s Private Lives runs in the main house from 26 March to 18 April 2015. For more information about the Octagon, see octagonbolton.co.uk.