... Tape pirates are sunk TRADING standards officers in Humberside have cracked a black market operation selling thousands of pirate tapes of chart topping artists. Three men have now been success fully prosecuted, the British Phonog raphic Industry said this week. The trio were charged under the Trade Descriptions Act with a total of 27 offences of supplying counterfeit goods. One of the men, ...

... Night fever! BLUES In The Night star Miquel Brown had to take sick leave after a bout of 'spring flu' robbed her of her voice. The bug struck less than 24 hours after co-star Stephanie Lawrence was forced to quit the stage in mid- performance after complaining of throat problems. Nina Grant, the show's only under study, stepped in to fill the role. But disaster struck the next day when Brown ...

... Sick minds MAUREEN PATON on a healthy play which depicts a trashy society RIVERSIDE STUDIOS Blood, Sweat & Fears FANS OF Lenny Henry will be well aware ot his numerous campaigns on behalf of sufferers from Sickle Cell Anaemia. Now Maria Oshodi has written a play about this debilitating Afro-Caribbean blood condition that can lead to a very early death. The problem for the dramatist is to ...

... HAMMERSMITH Crux LYRIC STUDIO, THE FAUX-NAIF dialogue of April Dc Angelis's new play for Paines Plough takes a long time to reveal its buried treasures. This is an intriguing glimpse of hidden history with obvious modern parallels in the story of a women's refuge from medieval society; but there is a distinct whiff of indulgence about the non-naturalistic writing. True, hunger makes people ...

... As You Like It BARBICAN IF A LARGE part of the audience did, I suspect that their response to this mediocre production directed by John Caird and designed by Ultz, is due to the fact that during the past few years the RSC has educated many into accepting its declining standards. This superb comedy, shot through with its obsessive parent-child theme and its contrasts between pastoral Arden and ...

... Proposal for Welsh leisure DETAILS OF a proposed £4m leisure centre for Welshpool have been unveiled by Montgomery shire District Council. General purposes committee chair man John Corfield said he hoped Common Market money would be available to help get the scheme off the ground. The council expects to hear within a month if its application for a 50 per cent grant from the European ...

... Get street-wise WHERE can you catch a glimpse of jugglers on seven foot unicycles; caged Frenchmen buried in foam; Arctic explorers bivouacked in the streets; green, blue, orange and purple and pitched battles be tween insects on stilts and fire people? Not surprisingly this year, the answer is Glasgow to which the tag European City of Culture has meant a vast invasion by many of the wierder ...

... In search of the King sized entertainer AUDITIONS are now under way to find the 1990 Entertainer of the Year, which is staged annually at the New Kings Cabaret Theatre in Birmingham. 1 he last three years tne snows were flown under the banner of the Daily News Talent Contest, but this year the management have decided to stage the competition under their own steam. Since the talent shows were ...

... Palladium gets star treatment for hospital CAROL CHANNING, the ori ginal and most enduring of all the Dolly Levis, is coming to London again to appear in Barry J. Mis- hon's concert presentation of Hel lo Dolly at the London Palladium on June 10, in aid of Great Ormond Street Children's Hos pital. Other American visitors taking part are the composer, Jerry Herman, Kaye Ballard, Lee Roy Reams, ...

... Cheaper, but cheerful new opera set-up DESPERATE young musicians, forced out of work by arts cuts, are dodging the dole queue by forming their own professional opera company, writes Helen Gould. New London Opera, set up by nine music school graduates aged between 24 and 30, aims to provide the capital with low budget versions of the most popular shows, for less than £5 a seat. Among the cast ...

... Win a pair of tickets in our ice competition FANS OF champion Olympic skating duo Torvill and Dean have the chance to scoop a pair of free tickets to their ice dance show at London Earls Court before it sells out. The twosome, appearing with Soviet skating troupe, the Russian Allstars, have already outsold the Rolling Stones during their Glas gow season and are well on the way to breaking the ...

... Swing-on-sister STEPHANIE LAWRENCE, dynamic West End star of the smash-hit musical Blues In The Night breezed into Scarborough to check out the resort's 2,200-seat Futurist Theatre a week before the show opened there during its 16 week provincial tour. She not only received a blue skies welcome but met a local tenor sax jazzman BARRY (BAZ) HAMPSHIRE (above) for an impromtu 'busking' send-up ...