... 'The Black Women' AMONG its other arts activities, the Keskidee Centre boasts a flourishing theatre workshop for both professional and aspiring actors, and this has produced an impressive showcase of an American play. Edgar White's The Black Women is a college view of some twenty-four hours in tne lives o! a mixed collection of New Yorkers, both temporary and permanent. As its title suggests ...

... Oh What A Lovely War' THE THIRD-YEAR professional acting course at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama with considerable assistance from their colleagues on the music course staged Oh What a Lovely War as its last production in the old theatre--the school finally moved to its new Barbican premises last month, builders' continuing occupation not withstanding. This particular pro ...

... 'Piaf' THE NAME Piaf strikes a chord in many hearts the world over for her legend lives on. The little French singer captivated audiences wherever she appeared. But it was not only the powerful voice which won her fame. The love affairs and tragic events of her life made dramatic headlines and titillated the gossip columns, bringing her renown of a different kind. Piaf, a new musical play ...

... 'Sailing Down Everest' SAILING Down Everest at the Round House Downstairs is a short rock opera, at least that seems the genre into which it most readily slots itself. Unlike most of its confreres, it is static, relying on slide projections and both live and animated film to supply movement while the costum ed singers tell their cautionary tale about the perils of popular music with the aid ...

... 'Find The Lady' BASED loosely on the legend of Salome and John the Baptist, Tom Maclntyre's new work Find the Lady was given an energetic workshop production at The Abbey's Peacock theatre. A mixture of styles, mood and colouring it takes Salome as a precocious young girl given to sexual exhibitionism, Herod and Herodias are tetchy with modern suburban unease and the whole is played out ...

... 'Cripple Play' ITS difficult to make a play visually interesting when the sole character is a woman confined to a wheelchair, though Cripple Play at the Arts succeeds- to a limited extent. The subject is a paraplegic, coping with the tediousness of daily routine, her aggressive tone betraying a sense of deep-seated resentment at lost opportunities, from career to motherhood. Stuffing toy ...

... 'Privileges' THE WRITERS' Theatre Company is a professional group which was formed to introduce new authors and their work to Birmingham. Their productions are presented mainly by the Arts Lab players who are a very talented quartet. An unusual and novel feature of this fusion of artists and author is that from the first get together they work in harmony and script, production and even ...

... The Young Ones' IN the early sixties, the days before rock musicals became rock operas, there was a pleasantly entertaining' movie called The Young Ones, with Peter Myers and Ronald Cass sharing responsibility for it, includ-( ing music and lyrics. Peter Myers has now adapted it as a stage show, which the Italia Conti School pre-; sented in its theatre recently direct ed by Mr Myers himself. ...

... 'I Am A Camera' THERE'S a lot to a German accent than trouble with the English W, but still Paul Grinbergs and Anna Lindup derived a lot of justifiable fun from their Germanically-intoned discussion of Lady Vindermere's Fan by Oscar Villde in the LAMDA production of John van Druten's I am a Camera. Justifiable because their German-ness went much further than this one effect, and ...

... 'At Swim-Two-Birds' AT SWIM-TWO-BIRDS is one of those Irish novels with which one either does or does not get along, rather like James Joyce. Dramatised by Audrey Welsh, Flann O'Brien's book was a success at the Dublin Abbey in 1970 and at the Edinburgh Festival in a fringe production in 1973. The Sugawn Theatre Club production recently was, however, the first London staging. Book and play ...

... 'HEDDA GABLER' AT THE DUKE OF YORK'S THE CENTRAL theme of jealousy which runs through Keith Hack's Forum Theatre. Billingham production of Hedda Gabler touches both Hedda herself and her husband of a few months. Jorgen Tesman. making them--for once--equally tragic figures. Envious in her youth of Thea? Elvsted's wavy hair (and even now bestowing predatory glances on it). Hedda now envjes ...

... Divinas Palabras NURIA ESPERT A PLAY by Ramdn Maria del Valle Incldn is a new experience and the opportunity of seeing his Divinas Palabras (Divine Words) is provided by the guest appearance of the Nuria Espert company at the Lyt-telton until June 25. Played in Spanish (with a simul taneous translation by Trader Faulkner), the play is directed by Victor Garcia with scenic distrac tions and a ...