SHAKESPEARE is back at Bedminster’s Tobacco Factory, in a stunning new production by Heidi Vaughan, the venue’s artistic director and CEO. It seems a long time since the company Shakespeare at the Tobacco Factory was last performing on the cigar packing room floor of the former Wills Factory. Andrew Hilton’s company ran for 20 years…
JODIE Comer is coming to Bath Theatre Royal in February 2026, reprising her BAFTA, Emmy, Tony and Olivier Award-winning solo performance in Suzie Miller’s powerful play Prima Facie. Bath is one of nine destinations on the UK and Ireland tour, with the world-famous production appearing at the Theatre Royal from Tuesday 24th to Saturday 28th…
THE multi-talented and super-versatile members of Yeovil Amateur Operatic Society have scored another triumph with their latest show at Westlands. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is Roald Dahl’s enduring, darkly-funny tale of a poor boy who proves his passion for chocolate to the very peculiar owner of the chocolate factory. And the Yeovil group has…
ONE of the country’s most scenically beautiful visual arts venues, Sculpture by the Lakes, at Pallington near Dorchester, hosts an exhibition by The Arborealists, from 22nd March to 19th April, the first time the group has exhibited in Dorset. The Arborealists group, which was founded in 2013, comprises 50 professional artists, who celebrate trees in…
WHEN, in the novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Topsy is asked by Miss Ophelia “Do you know who made you”, she replies “Nobody as I knows on. I s’pect I growed”. That quotation would be a good reply to anyone who wondered how a 15-minute “pop cantata” composed for a school and telling the story of…
ALFRED Hitchcock, the master of spine-tingling tension and thrills, famously said: “There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it.” So expect plenty of terror and nail-biting anticipation as Bath Theatre Royal stages the world premiere production of Alfred Hitchcock presents – The Musical, from Saturday 22nd March to Saturday 12th…
HISTORY, it is often said, is written by men about men. It is also said, with equal truth that history is written by the victors. A group of creative women in Dorchester and the surrounding area are confronting these sexist tropes with an exciting new community play project – Women of Dorset. The play, which…
CONOR McPherson’s extraordinarily atmospheric play The Weir, set in a small bar in remote community in County Leitrim, is the next production by the Street Theatre Company, on stage at Strode Theatre from 19th to 22nd March. Directed by Dennis Barwell, it runs for around two hours without an interval – to keep the tension…
STUDENTS from Arts University Bournemouth are heading for the Palace Court Theatre from 20th to 22nd March for the first production of 2025. Director David O’Shea has chosen Friedrich Durrenmatt’s The Visit, but updated its setting from the original post War German to a post Brexit Britain drowning under the cost of living crisis. Set…
DORSET-based writer Ed Viney’s play Pot Licker is on a tour of Dorset, with dates in Exeter and Bath. After its premiere at Poole’s Lighthouse arts centre, where it was first seen at a new writing event, it continues at Weymouth College Bay Theatre on 18th March, The Royal Manor Theatre on Portland on 19th,…
MILBORNE Port Opera’s witty and delightful production of The Drowsy Chaperone took two awards at the recent Somerset Fellowship of Drama David Beach Awards. Lloyd Davies took the award for Best Male Lead for his performance as the Man in the Chair, the wry narrator of the hilarious story. The second award was for props….
A PLAY that began life at the 2024 Edinburgh Fringe, where it won awards and critical acclaim, comes to Bath Theatre Royal’s Ustinov Studio from Thursday 20th to Saturday 22nd March. Described as “folk horror”, Birdwatching is a drama about the female experience. Black Bright Theatre Company present Madeleine Farnhill’s play which places female, queer…
The three largest theatres in the south-west region, Southampton Mayflower (seating 2,300) Bristol Hippodrome (1,951), and Plymouth Theatre Royal (1,320), are the places to see the big touring musicals, and their 2025 schedule includes major national tours. The Mayflower will stage Lin-Manuel Miranda’s hip-hop American history musical Hamilton (pictured below) , from 18th March to…
JACK Dickson, a member of the art department at Bryanston School, Blandford, was featured on a recent edition of Bill Bailey’s BBC series Extraordinary Portraits. The programme featured Jack’s portrait of a remarkable, life-saving, railway worker, Rizwan Javed. East Londoner Rizwan, who works for London Underground, has saved 29 people from taking their own lives…
THE Marine Theatre at Lyme Regis welcomes Jamaican DJ and MC Congo Natty on Friday 21st March, folk rockers Mad Dog Mcrea return on 22nd and Oisin Leech, the Irish folk singer and songwriter (pictured) will be introducing his music to Dorset fans on Wednesday 26th. Brit pop singer songwriter John Power is at Lyme…
A FILM which has already garnered many awards and is expected to win more at the Oscars suddenly feels uncannily topical as well. Conclave, the drama surrounding the selection of a new Pope, could hardly be more timely as one of the most in-demand films for March with Moviola audiences. Based on Robert Harris’s gripping…
CONCEPTUAL artist Ben Oakley is bringing a collection of work by ten artists, From The City To The Sea, to the gallery at Poole’s Lighthouse arts centre, opening on 7th March and running to 19th April. Ben explains: “After creating the Ben Oakley Gallery in 2010 as a platform for emerging artists, we have now…
THE priceless 13th century Sarum Master Bible is going go on public display for the first time at Salisbury Cathedral, from 28th February to 20th March, following a successful fundraising campaign by Friends of the Nations’ Libraries. The Bible is a manuscript of exceptional artistic value with great significance to Salisbury. It is just 17cm…
FOR the second year running, Folde nature bookshop at Shaftesbury has been named as a regional and country finalists in the British Book Awards. Last year the shop, at the top of Gold Hill, got through to the finals of the awards, which are known as the NIBBIEs. The awards are organised by The Bookseller…
HOWARD Phipps, the distinguished wood engraver, who lives near Salisbury, is the featured artist in the 87th annual exhibition of the Society of Wood Engravers, which opened at London’s Bankside Gallery, and comes to Make South West in Bovey Tracey from 1st March to 21st April and later at galleries on Merseyside, in Oxford and…
VISITORS to the National Trust’s world-famous Stourhead landscape gardens, near Mere in Wiltshire, can now discover the history of the property as they walk around the gardens. A new audio introduction brings the history of this masterpiece of 18th century landscape creation to life through narration and storytelling, with professional actors and an original score….
THE National Trust is restoring areas of wood pasture on Purbeck, as part of a project to amplify nature’s chorus. Wood pasture is a prime habitat for our much-loved songbirds, like this beautiful thrush. One of the UK’s most biodiverse habitats, wood pasture is a mosaic of grassland, scrub, hedges and trees. It provides important…
THE last pitched battle fought on English soil took place at Sedgemoor – the aftermath, which included the infamous “Bloody Assuzes” of Judge Jeffreys, is the subject of the major spring exhibition at the Museum of Somerset. Remembering the Monmouth Rebellion will be on show from 29th March to 6th July. The exhibition is part…
HOW do you react when someone you love has a terminal diagnosis? Shock, grief, anger, silence, sympathy … humour? Myra Bradley (Rachel Butcher) is diagnosed with bone cancer and told she has about six months to live. She wants to make the most of her time; she wants to choose where she will be buried;…
Old English roses and a menu of local food – a new team at the Walled Garden, Mells ONE of the most beautiful “secret” gardens in our area, The Walled Garden at Mells re-opens on 2nd April with a Somerset menu, a focus on old English roses, a new chef cooking local produce and the…
THE Verwood-based Fireside Theatre has chosen Robert Thomas’s thriller Trap for a Lonely Man for its next reading, on at the home of Margaret and Tony Wilson on Wednesday 19th March. Set in an isolated chalet in the French alps, it starts when Daniel reports to the police that his wife has gone missing. Then…
A STORY inspired by Sir Michael Morpurgo’s own family history is brought to the stage by adapter Simon Reade and the adventurous team at Cirencester’s Barn Theatre, from Friday 28th March to Saturday 10th May. In the Mouth of the Wolf is the true story of Morpurgo’s uncles in the Second World War. That war…
BONFIRE Radicals, described as a “proper folk melting pot,” bring their blend of Balkan, African, French, Scandinavian, Irish and British musical influences to the Somerset Take Art circuit. coming to Roadwater village hall on Friday 28th March and Caryford Community Hall at Castle Cary on Saturday 29th. With a front line of recorders, fiddle, clarinet…
A STARRY film adaptation of Raynor Winn’s best-selling memoir The Salt Path is to open at Poole’s Lighthouse arts centre as part of its national release on Friday 30th May. The film stars Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs as Raynor and her husband Moth who, following his terminal diagnosis and the devastating loss of their…
LAURA Wade’s first published play, Colder than Here, was first produced 20 years ago. It was championed in the south west by the Sturminster Newton-based Taboo Theatre, with tours from 2006. Laura and her partner Sam West came to see a Taboo show in an open sided, and very cold, tent. Now the versatile Swan…
DORSET Opera Festival celebrates its 20th anniversary at Bryanston School’s Coade Hall this year, following its move to Blandford from its original home at Sherborne School. This year’s festival will run from 22nd to 26th July, and will include two formal dinners in Bryanston House. The opera programme is thrilling, with Verdi’s cruel but musically…
ASK many people which is their favourite English city … the answer will often be Bath. It’s hardly surprising – a pearl of fine Georgian stone houses, terraces, circuses, crescents and streets, set in a spectacular valley, with some of the country’s finest Roman remains and a history of art, culture and literature. A roll call…
DORSET’s Artsreach rural touring charity is working on a unique collaboration with the Anglo-Chilean band Quimantú and community singers from several Dorset choirs to perform Misa de los Mineros, The Miners’ Mass, in a series of concerts across the county, starting in April. The first Dorset concert takes place in Blandford Parish Church on Friday…
OVER the last quarter of a century, performance poet Luke Wright has built up a reputation as one of Britain’s most popular and entertaining performers, winning a host of awards along the way. His 2025 tour continues at Salisbury Arts Centre on 17th April, Theatre Shop at Clevedon on 24th April, Poole Lighthouse on 15th…
THE big spring exhibition at the Somerset Rural Life Museum at Glastonbury, on until 8th June, is Strength and Resilience: Somerset Women in the Second World War, marking the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, by focusing on the lives of four women who played their part during the conflict and…