... The Dynasts EXETER THAT OVERWORKED phrase epic drama was never so aptly required to describe Thomas Hardy's classic work The Dynasts which the Northcott Theatre Company is currently staging in Exeter Cathedral, a venue which, in spite of its vastness, is still too restricted to house the massive quences of European politics in the early 19th century and the author's completely ...

... Fallen Angels NTC SEEING - and - feeling the urbane decadence of Noel Coward in a crammed community centre in rural Northumberland is a remarkable experience. Sitting on portable chairs beneath strip lighting we were taken, efforties- slv. it seemed, back into the Roaring Twenties with a production of Fal len Angels mounted on a budget of lust £400 by the Northumberland Theatre Company. And ...

... Chicago NEWCASTLE KANDER AND EBB's Cabaret was the first spark to set light to Tynewear Theatre Company's last highly-successful season at the Newcastle Playhouse so what more obvious than to repeat the trick this year with Chicaeo? But Chicago lacks its predecessor's most vital ingredient, the narrative drive inherited from its source in Isher- wood's Berlin stories. Once the basic ...

... What the Butler Saw HORNCHURCH FORTY REVOLUTIONARY decades of British theatre are being celebrated in the last months of 1981 at the Queen's, Hornchurch 50 if you count the Christmas show by David Wood as epitomising a new concern for quality in shows for young audiences. The season opened with the 1967 What the Butler Saw, Orton's last completed play. An dy Hinds' production whirled this ...

... Prostitute and Client MONTROUS REGIMENT I ALWAYS SUSPECTED that theatre audiences, notably the sort one might categorise as committed, much prefer their own text and voices to those provided onstage. The British premiere of an Italian feminist play, Dacia Maraim's script being translated by Gillian Hanna, would appear to prove the point. At three places in the script, the actors swing out ...

... PLAYERS Beauty and the Beast THE BEST pantomime has enchantment, romance, surprise, and an element of humour. This we have in the Players' Beauty and the Beast, a gentle, stylish recreation of the Planche work first seen at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, in 1841. The humour comes with charming touches of comedy, pungently absurd lines, and the celebrated Ptanchd (and Players') pun. The ...

... WINDSOR Jack and The Beanstalk MARY KERRIDGE has turned her writing skills to the most romantic and exciting of all pantomime themes and the Counsell team have worked their usual alchemy to produce perhaps the most effective Christmas show I can recall at Windsor. The first of these two ingredients are in the safe hands of David Heneker, Leslie Julian Jones, John Pritchett, Elizabeth Counsell ...

... READING IT IS, alas, unavoidable to draw comparisons with the superb production of John Morley's Aladdin of a couple of seasons back still so vividly in mind, and to vote the Hexagon's version, directed by Ralph Tobert, workmanlike rather than inspired, both in execution and casting. While the intricate superstructure that dominates the theatre's stage can be very effectively deployed to ...

... WATFORD THE YEARLY pantomimes at the Palace masterminded by actor/writer Peter John have earned themselves a reputation second to none. And this year's offering, the delightful Mother Goose, played by Peter John himself, is no exception. What is so exceptional about the talents of John is that he successfully manages to combine a pantomime with a message of the triumph of good over evil ...

... GUILDFORD IT MUST be an infinite source of consolation to pantomime casts that there are many people scattered around the auditorium who are hearing it all for the very first time. The new patrons, and the old, found Guildford's Robinson Crusoe much to their liking. There was a good mixture of fun, slap and romance, pood and evil in a traditional job economising in storyline and supporting ...

... The Barry Cheese Laughter Show BARRY ISLAND POPULAR Northern-based comedian Barry Cheese returns for the seventh successive season to top the bill at Barry Island Holiday Resort's Tuesday night family laughter show in the Gaiety Theatre. As in previous years his good, clean off-the-cuff comedy keeps young and old continuously laughing loud and long at a barrage of mainly-new jokes specially ...

... Thp Pro's and thp con's WAKEFIELD A WELL-TITLED play, The Pro's and the Con's, presented by Stanley Sher Entertainments Ltd, was given its premiere at Wakefield's Theatre Royal and Opera House. Author Seymour Sherman says that as a playwright his main aim is to entertain. So if Page Three is your idea of entertainment. then this light-hearted sex romp is for you. The action takes place in the ...