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Threes To See 19-25 Mar: Opening This Week, Short Runs, Homegrown Festival – Occupy, Comical Treats

By | Published on Friday 15 March 2019

THREE OPENING THIS WEEK

Little Miss Sunshine | Arcola Theatre | 21 Mar-11 May (pictured)
“The Hoover family has more than a few troubles, but young Olive has her heart set on winning the Little Miss Sunshine beauty contest. When an invitation to compete comes out of the blue, the Hoovers must pile in to their rickety yellow camper van. Will it survive the 800-mile trip from New Mexico to California – and more importantly, will they?” Yep, you read it right, it’s a new musical comedy version of the Oscar Winning 2006 film of the same name. Crikey, 2006? Has it been that long? Anyway, info right about here.

Mary’s Babies | Jermyn Street Theatre | 20 Mar-13 Apr
A new drama by Maud Dromgoole, inspired by a true story, directed by the only-recently-featured-by-us Tatty Hennessy. “Mary Barton, a pioneer of fertility treatment, thought her husband was perfect. And doesn’t every child deserve the perfect father? So Mary used her husband’s sperm to impregnate up to a thousand women, and then burnt all the records. A thousand resulting children, the ‘Barton Brood’, with no idea about their shared father. Meeting each other. Making friends. Having babies.” Head this way for more.

King Lear | Jack Studio | 19-30 Mar
“Lear is retiring. He cannot stand in the way of progress. But dividing his vast empire between his daughters comes at a cost. Now he must navigate a treacherous path leading to refuge or madness.” New company Yard Players promise to deliver a new and fresh interpretation of the Shakespeare classic, set “in a criminal world where family ties are stretched thin and business brings blood.” See the venue website here for details.


THREE SHORT RUNS

How Am I Looking Now? | New Diorama Theatre | 24-26 Mar
“In 1979 Clair Chapwell placed an advert in ‘Time Out’ saying, ‘Women interested in putting together a play based on Susie’s Orbach’s book ‘FAT IS A FEMINIST ISSUE’ write to Clair’. She received 80 replies, and with some of those women created that first show. Despite the self-acceptance encouraged by the book, have the pressures placed upon women increased in the past 40 years? Sadly the answer is all too obvious.” This double bill revives the original show, and follow up looking at how things are now. See this page here for more info.

Small Change | Arcola Theatre | 25-28 Mar
Another show from Arcola’s Creative/Disruption strand (we tipped something from it a couple of weeks back, I think), this time from Arcola Youth Theatre Companies, and it sounds like it offers a really interesting collection of pieces, two per night. “From living portraits to stolen gerbils, disposable fashion to Lynx-fuelled bonfires, AYT explores the power of art, or absence from it, in our daily lives.” For more information, see the venue website here.

Glory | The Albany | 19-20 Mar (pictured)
“Jim ‘Glorious’ Glory used to be somebody. In the heyday of British wrestling, he was a colossus. Now his empire has crumbled. Through Dan, Ben and Sami, Jim glimpses a chance to resurrect his name and his decaying gym. But do they want to wrestle and restore Jim’s glory? Or do they have a different fight in mind?” A new play from Nick Ahad, the writer of ‘Partition’ and ‘The Chef Show’. Head this way for more.


THREE AT HOMEGROWN FESTIVAL: OCCUPY

Post | Battersea Arts Centre | 18-22 Mar
Loads of great stuff going on over at Battersea Arts Centre over the next few weeks as part of Homegrown Festival: Occupy, which seeks to magnify young and underrepresented voices through theatre, music, live games, virtual experiences, rap, poetry and installations. Please have a look at the full list of events here, but we’ve picked three happening this week, and this is the first, a new theatre show by Xavier de Sousa. “You are invited to join us at the table for some delicious Portuguese food and potent cachaça as we make merry, make new friends and challenge what exactly makes a ‘nation’.” Details here.

High Rise State Of Mind | Battersea Arts Centre | 20-30 Mar
“We all need homes…it needs to be fair. We all need safe, clean homes, it needs to be fair. We all need to be housed.” Performer/beatboxer Conrad Murray, spoken word author Paul Cree, rapper Gambit Ace and spoken word artist Lakeisha Lynch Stevens use grime, beatboxing, hip-hop, looping and MCing to tell a story about class and housing, frustrations, and inequalities. “Will we ever be able to afford to live somewhere clean and safe? Is it a fair race, or is the system fundamentally f****d and a home is just a modern-day pipe dream?” See the website here for more.

Four Women | Battersea Arts Centre | 21-23 Mar (pictured)
And so to a final selection from this excellent looking line up: “The Great Magician Dylema casts a spell and takes you into a coming of age story told through spoken word, poetry and music. On this journey of migration, assimilation and diaspora you’ll meet four different women with one thing in common: Black Girl Magic.” For info and to book tickets, head right this way.


THREE COMICAL TREATS

Heidi Regan – Heidi vs Sharks | Soho Theatre | 18-20 Mar
Heidi Regan rather took the old Edinburgh Fringe by storm with this highly successful debut hour, which was staged up at the Festival last summer. She was already courting acclaim by the time that show ran, of course, as she won the BBC New Comedy Award in 2017 and the So You Think You’re Funny competition in 2016. Great CV, there, so why wouldn’t you want to roll up and hear this talented up and comer talk about sharks? Also, she’ll talk about things other than sharks, see the venue website here for clarification.

Encore Encore | Camden People’s Theatre | 24 Mar (pictured)
The brilliant Sprint Festival is coming to an end but you’ve still got time to see stuff all this week, and you can see all of what’s on right here. But this one is my personal pick for the week, as I feel the need for the “glamour, laughter, and mayhem” the show promises. “A drag-queen, a clown, a fish, and a Frenchman walk into a theatre, which is also a gay bar, which is also a circus, which is also a secret lair, which is also a film set- and it’s always a riot.” Expect a “ joke-filled jaunt told through lip-synch and satire” and revel in it, see this page here for all the details.

WOLF | Soho Theatre | 21-25 Mar
This is another show that was a bit of a success at edfringe, and was given a great review by one of our team. If you’re someone who was lucky enough to see Joe Bone’s ‘Bane’ trilogy at the Festival earlier this century (yikes!), then you will probably like this as well, because it’s similar, though, as our writer pointed out, it’s also different. He also described it as “rollicking entertainment” so that should definitely be you completely sold. Head this way to book your tickets.



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