What's on in the North East

Published: 8 July 2018
Reporter: Peter Lathan

Quentin Crisp: Naked Hope (Alphabetti)
An Evening with Ella Mesma: Ladylike (Dance City)
Carousel (Town Moor, Sunderland)
Withering Looks (Harrogate Theatre)

Little Baby Bum, the stage version of the world's largest educational YouTube channel, comes to Newcastle Theatre Royal on Tuesday (1:30 and 3:30) and Wednesday (10:30, 1:30 and 3:30).

Quentin Crisp: Naked Hope, written and performed by Mark Farrelly, comes to Northern Stage (Stage 2) on Tuesday at 7:30.

From Tuesday to Saturday, Alphabetti Theatre presents Trolley Boy by David Raynor, a new two-hander developed over 2 years through the theatre’s Write Longer Literary Scheme. It was first shown as a script-in-hand performance in 2016. The initial concept for Trolley Boy was featured at Live Theatre as part of their 10 Minutes To... programme.
Update: because of the World Cup semi-final on Wednesday, that evening's performance will now begin at 6:00. Trolley Boy runs for about 60 minutes and the theatre will show the match after the performance.

The Ella Mesma Company presents An Evening with Ella Mesma: Ladylike, a dance piece which fuses hip hop and rumba, looking at the potential and the limitations of gender roles in today’s society. At Dance City on Thursday at 7:30.

On Thursday at The Quayside Exchange, Sunderland and Friday at Arts Centre Washington, four professional actors and the members of Washington Youth Theatre present The Secret Earl of Biddick, a new play with music, written and composed by Neil Armstrong as part of the Tall Ships Sunderland event and based on a real-life mystery from the pit village of South Biddick, Washington in 1746.

Also as part of the Tall Ships, Southpaw Dance Company presents Carousel, a story of the enigmatic characters who inhabit the fairground. As the fair shuts down for the night, its public face gives way to the exhilarating private celebrations and personal tragedies of an intensely close-knit group of people. Performed on a real carousel on the Town Moor, Sunderland.

Tmesis Theatre’s Happy Hour comes to the Gala in Durham on Wednesday at 8:00. The workers on Level 3 are racing against the clock to reach their quota of Smiley Faces, but are they really happy enough?

At ARC Stockton on Tuesday (7:00), Proto-type presents The Audit (or Iceland, a modern myth), a play about finding strength, overcoming a world designed to keep us docile and how collective power can move a mountain—even if only a little.

Lullalub—two shows, one for age 0 to 12 months and one for age 13 to 30 months—runs at the Hullabaloo in Darlington until Sunday.

At Harrogate Theatre on Friday, LipService presents Brontë spoof Withering Looks, in celebration of Emily Brontë’s 200th anniversary.

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