The Man Called Monkhouse
Saturday 3 October, 8.00, £12
The Owl and the Pussycat’s Treasury of Nonsense
Saturday 10 October, 11.00, 2.00, £7
She Called Me Mother
Thursday 15, Friday 16 October, 8.00, £12
What Do You Do When You Find A Dinosaur?
Saturday 24 October, 11.00, 2.00, £7
Wet Picnic: Suitcases
Thursday 29, Friday 30 October, 8.00, £12
Tony & Mike – The Country Owl and the City Squirrel
Saturday 31 October, 11.00, 2.00, £7
All My Sons
Wednesday 11 – Saturday 14 November, 8.00 (Thurs, Sat mats 2.00), £12
Otto and the Robin
Wednesday 24 November – Thursday 24 December, various times, £7.50
A Pleasing Terror
Thursday 17, Friday 18 December, 8.00 (Fri mat 2.00), £12
Tickets & information 0844 406 8666 www.lighthousepoole.co.uk
A characteristically diverse season of high quality drama gets underway on 3 October in the Studio at Lighthouse, Poole’s centre for the arts, with the eagerly anticipated one-man show, The Man Called Monkhouse. Written by comedian Alex Lowe and directed by Bob Golding, who starred in the Olivier-winning Morecambe, actor Simon Cartwright, who knew Bob Monkhouse well, creates an “incarnation” of his friend wrestling at a crossroads in his career.
Cathy Tyson, best known for her part in Neil Jordan’s 1986 film Mona Lisa and TV roles in Grange Hill and Emmerdale stars in Michelle Inniss’ new play She Called Me Mother on 15 and 16 October. The play, which invites the audience into the life of a homeless, 70-year-old Afro-Caribbean woman living on the streets where she longs to be reunited with her estranged daughter, is the second production from Black Theatre Live, a pioneering consortium of eight regional theatres, including Lighthouse, committed to touring inventive Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic theatre.
The season also includes a rich vein of shows aimed at younger audiences. Soap Soup Theatre’s The Owl and the Pussycat’s Treasury of Nonsense (10 October) fuses puppetry, performance and contemporary music to produce a feast for the eyes, ears and imagination inspired by the runcible works of Edward Lear. What Do You Do When You Find a Dinosaur? (24 October) is a bone-shaking, music-making, silly show that aims to make history come alive for the over 4s and Tony & Mike’s The Country Owl and the City Squirrel is a charming story for the over 3s about making friends, being different and why that’s OK.
Created in its trademark style, utilising movement-led theatre, bouffant clowning and dark comedy, Suitcases (29, 30 October) is a new work by theatre ensemble Wet Picnic that questions what keeps us human as we increasing live in the virtual world; and following its acclaimed production of The History Boys last year, Arena Theatre returns with a new take on Arthur Miller’s poignant and powerful classic All My Sons from 11 to 14 November.
Two shows from opposite ends of the spectrum bring the season to a suitably festive close. Otto and the Robin, commissioned by Lighthouse from its Associate Artists, Angel Exit Theatre, is an invitation to the under 8s and their families to join in the Piddle under Puddle Christmas party. Filled with good cheer, fun songs and gorgeous puppetry, find out what happens when a robin flies in through Otto’s window and changes his life forever.
The Studio season takes its final bow of 2015 with some fine old Christmas ghost stories from the pen of the Victorian master of the art, M R James. A Pleasing Terror finds actor R M Lloyd Parry recounting Canon Alberic’s Scrap-book, in which a young Cambridge antiquary discovers the devil in the details of an old book in a medieval town in the French Pyrenees; and The Mezzotint about a ghoulish revenge that is enacted within a work of art, before the helpless eyes of a museum curator in Oxford.
