... Show of Hands Royal Albert Hall There is a popular myth that folk music equals amateur music-that it should not be taken seriously. Show of Hands might have dispelled that myth at the Royal Albert Hall, but for one thing: they were preaching to the converted. Fans turned up by the coach-load and the resulting atmosphere was just as you would expect in any folk club or folk festival venue ...

... Razor-tongued Blackpool The Lily Savage Show After a couple of weekend warm- up performances, the Lily Savage Show received its official opening and It was obvious a sizeable section of the audience was not quite sure what to expect. This was not Lily in the full flight her solo show followers know her for and it was certainly not the Lily given early breaks in Blackpool's gay clubs a dozen or ...

... What a wow Pasquale is Great Yarmouth Joe Pasquale As a hush descended on a packed auditorium at the Britannia Theatre, I just knew this show was going to be a cracker. Joe Pasquale, a funny man who combines a squeaky voice with juvenile 'prop' jokes and bit ing one-liners, had kicked off his summer season show. And the anticipation and excitement front of house harked back to the good old ...

... Jim's Short, Sharp Shock Great Yarmouth Basic Instinct, the alt-girl song and dance troupe, took centre stage as the strains of Jerusalem resounded around Jim Davidson's revamped Wellington Theatre. Led by Karen Noble, they turned in an impressive 15 minute set. ZZ Top's Give Me All Your Lovin' and Robert Palmer's Addicted to Love were belted out with excellent harmonies and appropriately ...

... Alabama Showboat Summer Spectacular Blackpool Housed in a former pub and situated just off the resort's main tourist track, it has taken this Cocker Square venue a while to establish its own identity. But now, into its third summer and with a year-round entertainments policy--albeit weekends only in winter the intimate Alabama is now a major player on the cabaret scene. Hardly large enough ...

... Nederiands Dans Theater (Programme Two) Edinburgh Playhouse Michael Simon's dreamlike set is the evocative context for Jin Kytian's fascinating Whereabouts Unknown. Dancers explore the origins of human existence in movements like fragments of ancient rituals. Past calls to present in a series of superbly crafted move ments, to a haunting musical col lage including Arvo Part, Charles Ives and ...

... TV Dinner Rifle Lodge TV Dinner's blurb invites audi ences to join the high gloss excitement of a video reality, but the main problem with this show is that the snippets of video are not exciting (or glossy). It is a clever experiment, and it is cer tainly multimedia, but it does not make the most of either theatre or video. The show features four televi sion sets and one woman, Cath (Helen ...

... Spellbinding intensity Edinburgh International Festival Lyceum Orlando After novels such as To the Lighthouse, delicate internalised explorations of femininity. Orlando. Virginia Woolfs long hymn to Vita Sackville West, comes with a shout of celebration, of cross gendering, of the lusciousness of landscape and colour and with a kaleidoscopic play of time and space. That is why Robert ...

... Genesis Carrubbers Christian Centre i As told by Max McLean, me taie or f Genesis is a lively famNy saga, and i could almost appeal to sceptics. There's murder, bigamy, sibling i rtvaky, women fighting for their man, and attempted homosexual rape i (the men of Sodom, foolishly mak- mg advances to a couple of angels.) i McLean recounts the best part i of a book of the Bible off the top of i his ...

... Hollywood Screams The Honeycomb Michael Roberts is an accom plished actor with a gift for hilari ous caricature. His Hollywood Screams is an illustrated history of movie comedy where the funni est moments of cinematic fact and fiction are re-created from the screen to the stage. In 60 spellbinding minutes, Roberts effortlessly conjures leg end after legend including James Stewart, Jimmy Cagney ...

... The Double Bass Assembly Rooms Patrick Suskind's brilliant mono logue about the loneliness of the long distance double bass player is portrayed warmly by Ron Berglas. All the intensity of the career musician who has prostituted whatever talent he might have possessed for the weekly pay cheque, the 'civil servant' posi tion, the music-less journeyman's post at the back of the orchestra is ...

... The Interview Assembly Rooms Desiree Martin Is a famous author in the middle of her latest novel. How Long Have You Been Seeing My Husband? She is also in the middle of a severe case of writers block, so Rosalind Seeley, a resting actress, thinks nothing of an interview for the job of writer's flush. That this is going to be no ordinary interview is obvious from the start as Martin, played ...