Following the success of our production of Macbeth, our two youngest cast from that show, Mollie and Joe, were in a production of Little Shop of Horrors at their school in Torquay, Spires College. A number of us from the Macbeth team, attended to support them, and see their show.

  What a brilliant performance! Joe Northstone played the most incredible Seymour, and Mollie Pass was an amazing Ronette, while Ash Mackintosh was everywhere - chorus, stagehand and puppeteer at different times.
They were joined by a fantastic, talented teenage cast, and live band, whose characterisation, focus, and performance skills were more than worthy of a professional stage. The singing, dancing, choreography, everything was flawless.
On the whole, I am not a fan of comedy, but Alex Taylor also had me in uncontrolled stitches of laughter as the dentist Orin, and the journalist - the exuberant confidence in some quite challenging performance was more than many adults would manage! Stacey Glover played a wonderfully convincing anxious Audrey (and what a great American accent!!), Dylan Kellys voice-overs were so well done that we didnt realise they were being performed live, until we met him!

I pick these actors out but honestly everyone in that show was incredible. It was very easy to forget that you were watching pupils of the school, in their school production. It would grace any stage anywhere.

And it was also a joy to realise that in order to achieve such brilliant work, the school staff too, must be incredibly supportive of their students, and motivated to help them achieve excellence (which they did!) when so often the arts, and theatre, end up sidelined.

I hope that all of the young people I saw performing tonight, continue to pursue acting, dancing and/or singing. Whether as a hobby or as a profession, depending on their aspirations and preferred career choices. Because all of them were truly wonderful.

Thank you to all the performers, and the school, for a magical, and hilarious evening.

Laura

Our production of Macbeth at Torquay went as well as the Brixham shows did, with more excellent feedback. A local newspaper reporter, Bob Jope, attended to review the production - here is a link to his glowing review:
Macbeth in Torbay
while other audience feedback and reviews on social media was just as encouraging.

It was also an exciting first for us, as the actor/ technician Dorothy Laity Lombardi attended to run our lights. It was fantastic to work with her - and to meet her  theatre-trained service dog, Emma. Dorothy and Emma proved without a shadow of doubt just what an amazing team they were!
(photos below of rehearsals, and preparation for the Torquay performances - and featuring Emma!)

We would like to welcome to our Macbeth team, the French-Irish actor Christophe Lombardi, Actor, who has been a member of the Players for some time, along with his wife. Christophe trained at Les Cours Simon in Paris, and has since appeared in numerous TV programmes for the BBC, the Smithsonian, Universal and Netflix. He is also a living history performer and fight choreographer. There is some incredible work underway to prepare, and all is going smoothly and very well. He recently appeared in a production with Ivybridge Community Arts, The Armistice (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gGIc87LUmg), and is a regular actor with Trapdoor Entertainment.
Photos (not from Macbeth!) are by Roger Kenny, from the Irish TV programme Prisoners of the Tower, and Dorothy Grace Laity Lombardi and the montage is from various productions, all as supplied by Dorothy Grace Laity Lombardi.
We are thrilled to be working with this fantastic actor, and cant wait to introduce him to Brixham theatre audiences, hopefully the first of many times in future.

So, we have got 1307 at Brixham Theatre under our belt. It is a really excellent run, and the feedback funneled back to us by the Brixham Theatre front of house staff, has been that it has been our best show to date.
Appleton Event Photography has filmed the production and this will be made available online to everyone as soon as possible - meanwhile we still have one more performance on Thursday at the Barnfield theatre in Exeter. Our amazing composer will also be there from Grace Marie Hancock music

In the meantime, work is beginning on our plans for our next show; William Shakespeares Macbeth.
We are working from the original script, and in order to create not only the best show possible as well as  the best experience and skills building for our cast, we dropped a line to the Globe Theatre asking if they had any recommendations or links to material. They are being incredibly supportive and helpful, we can only say an enormous thank you for the materials being supplied which will be invaluable learning for every single one of our team!

And that is where the news stands at the moment.

Oh and if you are free on Saturday, do come and see us at our fundraising stand on Saturday at the Brixham Happenin at St Marys Park in Brixham. We will have our stocks as well as a stall selling a wonderful collection of CDs, and some newly made tote-bags, fundraising for our coming projects.

Laura

Many thanks to all of our lovely helpers at our fundraising stand at the Brixham Pirate Festival - we raised invaluable funds for our productions :) Also many thanks to Judi for allowing us to use the space, and to the local Brixham Police, and festival security, for coming along and volunteering to be in our stocks :)

On January 6th, our team embarked on what we hope will be a new and very excellent series of collaborations with a local radio station, starting, with recording a radio drama of Les Miserables, for broadcast over the next month or so (just needs editing and adding in sound effects etc!)  - watch our social media for shared links to the broadcast. :)
It was fantastic to have a team of both established performers and new performers who worked together like clockwork to record the drama!