Midlands productions

Published: 10 May 2015
Reporter: Steve Orme

The Ghost Train at the Belgrade Theatre, Coventry
David Suchet in The Importance of Being Earnest at the Theatre Royal, Nottingham
Chewing the Fat in The Door at Birmingham REP

“Some of Spain’s finest musicians and dancers” can be seen when Jaleo Flamenco visits the New Vic, Newcastle-under-Lyme on Monday.

Cole Porter’s award-winning musical comedy Anything Goes sails into Northampton’s Royal and Derngate from Monday until Saturday.

Drawing inspiration from “the 2011 England riots, Arab Spring, Iceland’s crowd-sourced constitution and the rise (and fall) of Occupy”, Early Days is a presentation by interactive theatre makers Coney in the Helen Martin Studio at Warwick Arts Centre, Coventry from Tuesday until Thursday.

House of Ghosts by Alma Cullen, an Inspector Morse mystery inspired by the novels of Colin Dexter and the only Inspector Morse play written for the stage, haunts the Pomegranate Theatre, Chesterfield on Tuesday and The Guildhall, Guildhall Lane, Leicester on Friday.

Armed with a Dictaphone and a pair of wellies, The Gramophones “set out in search of adventure but what they found instead was something better” in Wanderlust at Derby’s Guildhall Theatre on Tuesday, Belper School Theatre on Thursday, Lincoln Drill Hall on Friday and Holymoorside Village Hall, Chesterfield on Saturday.

West Midlands actor and a regular in the television sitcom Hi-de-Hi, Jeffrey Holland returns to his theatrical roots in a new production of Arnold Ridley’s comedy thriller The Ghost Train at the Belgrade Theatre, Coventry from Tuesday until Saturday.

Vamos Theatre’s Nursing Lives, “a love story set in the early 1980s of Thatcher’s Britain and the hard-working, heart-breaking, swing-dancing world of the UK’s wartime hospitals”, will be performed at the Royal Spa Centre and Town Hall, Leamington Spa on Wednesday.

David Suchet plays Lady Bracknell in Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest which visits the Theatre Royal, Nottingham from Wednesday until Saturday before a West End run.

Theatre sans Frontieres celebrates “Spain’s greatest writer of the 20th century” Federico Garcia Lorca by presenting Amor en el Jardin (Love in the Garden) in Spanish with English surtitles in the Djanogly Theatre at Lakeside Arts, Nottingham on Thursday.

Cardboard Citizens will stage Sarah Woods’s Benefit, “three interwoven stories unlocking the frustrations and passions of characters struggling with their bank balances, their addictions, their histories and their own sense of self”, which use forum theatre techniques to allow the audience to change the action, at mac birmingham on Thursday and Friday.

Mansfield Palace Youth Theatre presents In the Wild, Wild World of Wickey, Wickey Woo, based on a poem by Sam Murray and created for stage by Marie Wragg, in the Old Library Theatre, Mansfield on Thursday and Friday.

Selina Thompson invites you to her own version of a midnight feast “where she infuses discussion of life-long weight issues with laughter” in Chewing the Fat in The Door at Birmingham REP from Thursday until Saturday.

English Touring Opera returns to Buxton Opera House with a season of Italian operas, Puccini’s La Boheme on Thursday and Saturday, and The Wild Man of the West Indies by Donizetti on Friday.

University of Derby Theatre Arts students perform George Orwell’s A Clockwork Orange in the Studio at Derby Theatre from Thursday until Saturday.

Northampton’s Royal and Derngate and Shakespeare’s Globe continue to stage King John in the candlelit knave of the Holy Sepulchre Church, Northampton, marking the 800th anniversary of the Magna Carta, until Saturday.

Claire Sweeney, co-writer of a new comedy about dating, men and finding Mr Right, also performs Sex in Suburbia at Lichfield Garrick on Saturday and Sunday.

Ballet Theatre UK presents Aladdin at Mansfield Palace Theatre on Sunday.

The Octagon Theatre Bolton and Newcastle-under-Lyme New Vic production of Noel Coward’s Private Lives continues at the New Vic until Saturday 23 May.

Jessie Hart, originally from Wall Heath near Dudley, continues as Baby Houseman in the tour of Dirty Dancing – The Classic Story on Stage at Birmingham Hippodrome until Saturday 23 May.

The Royal Shakespeare Company continues to stage in the Swan Theatre, Stratford John Ford’s rarely performed play Love's Sacrifice until Wednesday 24 June and Christopher Marlowe’s The Jew of Malta until Tuesday 8 September.

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