2022-23 Season
JEEVES AND WOOSTER in Perfect Nonsense
by P.G. Wodehouse. Adapted by David and Robert Goodale
2 – 10 September 2022 and Online 17 - 18 September
Bertie Wooster is staging a one-man show about his recent experiences at the country house, Totleigh Towers, but soon discovers he needs help to tell the story...
Ably helped by his valet, Jeeves, and Aunt Dahlia's butler, Seppings, watch as the events of the weekend unfold:
- Who will end up with the silver cow creamer?
- Will Madeline and Gussie call off the wedding?
- Does Constable Oates find his Policeman's helmet?
THE PRIDE, by Alexi Kaye Campbell
10 – 15 October 2022
How do sex, love and relationships intertwine when external pressures conflict with your core feelings?
Alternating between 1958 & 2008, The Pride features three people living similar but radically different lives. It examines, with humour and some sympathy, the changing attitudes to gay men over a period of 50 years, looking at intimacy, identity, and the courage it takes to be who you really are.
Some things may change but the complexities of the human heart remain eternal.
Suitable for 15+. This play contains nudity, discriminatory language, adult themes, brief scenes of a sexual nature and assault.
16th ANNUAL WRITEFEST
2 – 5 November 2022
6 new short plays - one evening of varied entertainment
- Airborne by David Salisbury
- Albatross by David Pearson
- An Angel with One Wing by Paul Gallantry
- Heart of Lightness by Robert Kibble
- How Gentle is the Rain by Phillip Mannion
- Missing by D J Wilson
LIAR'S TEETH, by Emily Goode
16 – 19 November 2022
In a world where fact has become indistinguishable from lies, two inmates while away an evening in prison. Both have been imprisoned for telling stories: in an effort to tackle misinformation, their society has criminalised fiction. A darkly humorous and fast-paced exploration of truth, disinformation, misinformation, friendship and hidden agendas.
LIFE IS A DREAM
by Pedro Calderón de la Barca, adapted by Rhys Lawton
Presented by Progress Youth Theatre
7 –10 December 2022
THE WELKIN by Lucy Kirkwood
20 – 28 January 2023
Rural Suffolk, 1759. As the countryside waits for Halley's Comet, Sally Poppy is sentenced to hang for a heinous murder. When she claims to be pregnant, a jury of twelve matrons are taken from their housework to decide whether she's telling the truth, or simply trying to escape the noose...
THE LONESOME WEST by Martin McDonagh
3 – 11 March
DINNER by Moira Buffini
14 – 22 April 2023
A macabre comedy serving, as our hostess, Paige, welcomes you to a dinner party straight from hell. The only thing she hasn't planned for? An uninvited guest.
SILVER LINING by Sandi Toksvig
19 – 27 May 2023
Trapped on the first floor of their retirement home in Gravesend by the rising floodwaters of Storm Vera, five extraordinary yet forgotten women share stories of their lives in this play by Sandi Toksvig, which is both endearing comedy and poignant social commentary.
THE SILENCE OF THE SEA
by Vercors, adapted by Peter Cheeseman
19 – 24 June 2023
Occupied France 1941. A German officer is billeted on a modest family somewhere in rural France. The uncle and his niece resolve to mark their resistance by refusing to speak to the officer, but things don’t turn out as they had expected.
TWELFTH NIGHT by William Shakespeare
12-22 July 2023 in the open air at Reading Abbey Ruins
It is the age of the privateer, and Viola is shipwrecked on the coast of Illyria. In grief for her lost brother, she joins Orsino's crew and carries his messages of love to the haughty Olivia. But while some people are falling in love with the wrong person, others brim with wit and trickery, until "the whirligig of time brings in his revenges".
Note the change from previously announced dates.