Buzz Goodbody was the first female director at the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford where she was instrumental in setting up the venue The Other Place.

She died just 50 years ago at the age of 28, and her nephew, Adam Goodbody, has created a new theatre company, Buzz Studios, in her honour. The company's first production is Petty Men at London's Arcola Theatre.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Adam and his co-writer and fellow performer, John Chisham about the play and its creation, adapting Shakespeare's Julius Caesar to create a modern piece, the importance of theatre and Shakespeare education and of course the legacy of Adam's aunt, Buzz Goodbody.

Petty Men runs at the Arcola Theatre in London from 19 November to 20 December 2025.

(Petty Men image of John Chisham and Adam Goodbody, photography by Tom Dixon.)

Steve Marmion is currently in his second season as Chief Executive and Director of Programming for Watford Palace Theatre, but he also ran Soho Theatre in London for eight years and founded PantoCo Ltd.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Steve about the upcoming panto production of Jack and the Beanstalk with the voice of Stephen Fry as the Giant, but he also spoke at some length about the value of panto in general, the challenges of running and programming theatres for diverse communities, why theatres need to conquer TIkTok and how his social media reels resemble Sunday Night at the London Palladium.

Jack and the Beanstalk will run at Watford Palace Theatre from 29 November 2025 to 4 January 2026. Steve also mentioned Werewolf, which will run at the same theatre from 22 November to 24 December 2025, and The Mesmerist, running from 2 to 21 March 2026.

This episode features two very different solo shows, which can both be seen at the 2025 Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Thom Tuck is playing the titular 100-year-old clown, whose life story takes audiences though some of the major events of the 20th century, in Justin Butcher's Scaramouche Jones, which he performed in Edinburgh in 2005, then again in 2015.

His partner, Jenny Ryan, best-known as The Vixen on TV quiz programme The Chase, is performing her musical comedy show Björn Yesterday that unpacks her theory that ABBA never existed.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to them both together almost halfway through the 2025 Edinburgh Fringe about their shows, the current state of the Fringe, remembering lines and quiz answers, philosophy, the music they grew up listening to and lots more.

Björn Yesterday runs every day at 5:30PM in the Cabaret Bar at Pleasance Courtyard from 30 July to 17 August. Thom Tuck is appearing in Scaramouche Jones at Hoots at Potterow at 2:45PM from 1 to 25 August 2025.

In common with most of the UK's theatres and other arts venues, HOME Manchester announced it would close soon after Prime Minister Boris Johnson's statement on 16 March 2020 appealing to the public to stay away from public places to reduce the spread of the coronavirus.

A week later, HOME announced a series of commissions, titled Homemakers, from artists asking them to devise new works in their homes for audiences who will also be at home.

The initiative was created by HOME's Associate Director Jude Christian who spoke to BTG Editor David Chadderton online, both in their own homes, a few days after the announcement. Jude explained about the project and the commissioning process and about some wider issues relating to the impact on theatre of the country's current shutdown.

Homemakers aims to launch its first works online in early April 2020.

For the second successive year, Derby Theatre is producing a major show featuring fully integrated British Sign Language and captioning.

In 2019, the theatre presented Neil Duffield's adaptation of Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book; in 2020 Treasure Island will get similar treatment.

For this episode, BTG Midlands editor Steve Orme chats to Derby Theatre's artistic director Sarah Brigham about the show and what the theatre is doing regarding the coronavirus outbreak.

He also interviews Beth Hinton-Lever who plays Long John Silver and T J Holmes, taking the role of Israel Hands.

Treasure Island runs at Derby Theatre from 28 March until 11 April 2020.

(Photo of Sarah Brigham, Beth Hinton-Lever and T J Holmes, credit Steve Orme)

Amy Leach is a theatre director and Associate Director at Leeds Playhouse, currently working on a new version of Oliver Twist.

This new adaption is by Bryony Lavery, and it's being staged by Leeds Playhouse in collaboration with the Ramps on the Moon consortium, a partnership between six National Portfolio Organisation theatres and Graeae Theatre. Ramps on the Moon aims to create change within the UK theatre industry in terms of the inclusion and integration of deaf and disabled audiences and theatre-makers.

Benjamin Wilson is one of Ramps on the Moon's Agents for Change. He's a cast member in this latest production, and has had a key role in developing creative approaches to audio description for this and a number of other shows he's worked on at Leeds Playhouse and Sheffield Theatres.

Amy and Ben joined Mark Smith towards the end of their rehearsal period to discuss the Ramps on the Moon initiative, the opportunities opened up by creative approaches to access for D/deaf and visually impaired audiences and performers, and the reasons behind Amy's choice of Dickens's work for her latest project.

Oliver Twist plays Leeds Playhouse's Quarry Theatre from 28 February to 21 March 2020, ahead of a UK tour to Birmingham Repertory Theatre, Nottingham Playhouse, Sheffield Theatres, New Wolsey Theatre Ipswich and Theatre Royal Stratford East, which are all part of the Ramps on the Moon consortium alongside Graeae, the UK's leading disabled-led theatre company.

(Oliver Twist rehearsal images of director Amy Leach and of Brooklyn Melvin and Benjamin Wilson, credit Anthony Robling.)

Ben Brantley is the co-chief theatre critic for The New York Times. He has been a staff critic since 1996, filing reviews regularly from London as well as New York.

In this episode, BTG's London Editor Philip Fisher speaks with Ben about his career, as well as about plays in London and New York, past, present and future.

(Photo credit: Tony Cenicola/The New York Times)

Laurie Sansom has been Artistic Director at the National Theatre of Scotland and Royal and Derngate in Northampton, but he has more recently taken over at Northern Broadsides in Halifax.

His first production there as director is a revival of Quality Street by J M Barrie, the title of which has a special connection with the company's home town. BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to him a couple of weeks into rehearsals about the play and the 'forgotten' Barrie canon and about his plans for this well-known touring theatre company, and he also looked back briefly on his time at National Theatre of Scotland.

Quality Street opens at The Viaduct Theatre in Halifax from 14 to 22 February 2020 before touring to

• The Lowry, Salford, 25–29 February
• The Dukes, Lancaster, 3–7 March
• Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmunds, 10–14 March
• Liverpool Playhouse, 17–21 March
• Northern Stage, Newcastle upon Tyne, 24–28 March
• Yvonne Arnaud Theatre, Guildford, 7–11 April
• Derby Theatre, 14–18 April
• Leeds Playhouse, 21–25 April
• New Vic Theatre, Newcastle-under-Lyme, 28 April–9 May
• Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, 12–16 May
• Harrogate Theatre, 19–23 May
• Hull Truck Theatre, 2–6 June
• York Theatre Royal, 9–13 June

Pitlochry Festival Theatre in Perthshire, Scotland announced its summer rep season for 2020 in December.

In 2018, Elizabeth Newman joined the theatre as Artistic Director from the Octagon Theatre in Bolton.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Elizabeth in January about the new season and about how she had developed the theatre's programme over the last eighteen months, as well as how she had coped with settling in an unfamiliar region after ten years in Bolton.

The summer season at Pitlochry Festival Theatre runs from 22 May to 3 October 2020.

(Photo: Elizabeth Newman and David Greig)

Pilot Theatre is to tour the UK with Crongton Knights by Alex Wheatle in an adaptation by Emteaz Hussain co-directed by Pilot's Artistic Director, Esther Richardson, and Corey Campbell, Artistic Director of Strictly Arts Theatre Company, with music by beatbox champion Conrad Murray.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Esther and Corey during rehearsals for the production at the Belgrade Theatre in Coventry about the play's story and themes, and also about the financial implications of producing new work, creating work for young audiences and getting them to come and see it when schools are struggling for funds, the challenges of touring and about getting actors to beatbox.

Crongton Knights will run at the Belgrade Theatre from 8 to 22 February 2020 before touring to York Theatre Royal, Brighton Theatre Royal, The Lowry in Salford, Derby Theatre, Lawrence Batley Theatre in Huddersfield and ending at Theatre Peckham in May.

(Image of Esther Richardson and Corey Campbell: Sharron Wallace Photography)

imitating the dog has been making theatre work fusing live performance with digital technology and projection for 21 years.

Their past productions have included original devised work as well as adaptations from other forms, such as A Farewell to Arms and Heart of Darkness.

Their new show, Night of The Living Dead™ – Remix, is being co-produced with Leeds Playhouse. It's described as a 'shot-for-shot stage recreation' of George A Romero's classic 1968 zombie movie Night of the Living Dead.

Mark Smith spoke to co-director Andrew Quick and performer Morven Macbeth, taking time out from rehearsals to discuss the show and the company's work in general. Morven is one of the actors in Night of The Living Dead™ - Remix and a regular core member of imitating the dog. She has been working with the company since 2005, and most recently appeared in Heart of Darkness.

• Perfection? We will never achieve it, because it's impossible. But that's part of the game.
• The energy comes from the attempt.

Photograph credit: Ed Warring

In 2019, the inaugural Visionary Honours, founded by Thriller Live creator Adrian Grant, celebrated work that inspired social change in or debate about equality, diversity, inclusion, mental health, anti-social behaviour or environmental change.

For its second year, there will be a Visionary Awards ceremony in March and ten bursaries of up to £5,000 each for young creative artists.

This year's panel includes the writer of hit West End musical Everybody's Talking About Jamie, Tom MacRae, who spoke to us about the awards and his involvement, as well as about how Jamie, soon to go on a world tour and be released as a film starring Richard E Grant, initially came about.

The Visionary Honours 2020 recipients will be announced on 18 March, with the shortlist to be announced on 4 February.

For our 200th episode of the British Theatre Guide podcast, we decided to turn the microphone onto some of our longest serving reviewers to find out about how they joined BTG and some of their highlights from their time as reviewers.

However this isn't all about us, as we also asked them about the current state of theatre in their areas, how it has changed during their time reviewing and how they think it will change in the future. As our reviewers are scattered around the country, it gives an interesting picture of theatre around the UK.

There are contributions from BTG Editor and North West Editor David Chadderton, London Editor Philip Fisher, North East Editor and BTG founder Peter Lathan, National News Editor and South East London reviewer Sandra Giorgetti, Midlands Editor Steve Orme, Yorkshire Editor Mark Smith, Sheffield reviewer Velda Harris and Panto Editor and London reviewer Simon Sladen.

For almost 40 years, the Classic Thriller Season has been held during the summer at the Theatre Royal, Nottingham. It's one of the few rep seasons left in the country.

In 2025, the season has been reduced to three weeks instead of four and will feature plays by Peter Gordon, Ira Levin and Richard Harris.
 
BTG Midlands editor Steve Orme spoke to Karen Henson from the producers Tabs Productions as well as Mark Pearce, who's taking part in his first Thriller Season as the incomparable Inspector Pratt, and Sarah Wynne Kordas, who will be appearing in all three plays.
 
The Classic Thriller Season will run at the Theatre Royal from 12 until 30 August.
 
PICTURE: Sarah Wynne Kordas, Mark Pearce and Karen Henson.

Derby Theatre is bringing back a show it produced in 2014, Neil Duffield's adaptation of Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol.

For this episode, BTG Midlands editor Steve Orme chats to Oliver O'Shea who was associate director on the theatre's last two Christmas productions, former Flying Pickets singer Gareth Williams who plays Scrooge and Aimée Kwan, taking her first professional roles as Belle and Beth.

A Christmas Carol will run at Derby Theatre from 29 November until 4 January 2020.

(Photo of Oliver O'Shea, Aimée Kwan and Gareth Williams, credit Steve Orme)

Hope Mill Theatre in Manchester is continuing its run of revivals of musicals with the Jerry Herman show Mame, starring Tracie Bennett, Tim Flavin and Harriet Thorpe.

During the Manchester run, BTG editor David Chadderton sat in the theatre with Harriet—well known to TV audiences for her comedy roles such as Carole The Brittas Empire and Fleur in Absolutely Fabulous, but with stage musical credits including Mamma Mia and Wicked—and spoke about her role as Mame's bitchy actress friend Vera in the show, about working at Hope Mill and about her background in TV comedy and theatre.

Mame runs at Hope Mill Theatre in Manchester from 28 September until 9 November 2019. It can also be seen at Royal and Derngate Theatre in Northampton from 7 to 11 January and Salisbury Playhouse from 21 to 25 January 2020.

(Production photo of Harriet Thorpe, credit: Pamela Raith)

The next production from Bolton's Octagon Theatre is a version of Chekhov's The Seagull rewritten by Beth Hyland as a gig musical about four aspiring young musicians in a rock band in 2019, performed in a small theatre space in Bolton Library.

In this episode, BTG Editor David Chadderton speaks to half of the cast, Tomi Ogbaro and Lauryn Redding, together with director Lotte Wakeham about this première production, plus Lotte gives an update on the reopening of the Octagon Theatre next spring after undergoing a major refurbishment.

You can also hear two of the songs from the show: "Remember" and "Muse".

Seagulls by Beth Hyland runs at Bolton Library Theatre from 24 October to 16 November 2019.

In 2017, Javaad Alipoor's The Believers Are But Brothers opened at Transform Festival in Leeds before transferring to Summerhall for the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, where it won a Scotsman Fringe First, and later was adapted for television and shown on BBC4.

This was the first play in a trilogy, the second part of which, Rich Kids: A History of Shopping Malls in Tehran, premièred at the Traverse Theatre during the 2019 Edinburgh Fringe and is about to open at HOME Manchester.

A week before it opened, BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Javaad at HOME about his work, his creative process and about the form of political theatre in today's technological age.

Rich Kids: A History of Shopping Malls in Tehran opens at HOME Manchester on Wednesday 23 October and runs until Saturday 2 November 2019.

In this episode, BTG London Editor Philip Fisher speaks with Henry Shields of Mischief Theatre, the company behind The Play that Goes Wrong, Peter Pan Goes Wrong and The Comedy About A Bank Robbery, on the eve of Groan Ups, the first play in the company's Vaudeville Theatre residency.

They discuss the company's inception, its ongoing success and future projects on stage and screen, including Magic Goes Wrong, created with world famous magicians Penn and Teller, and The Goes Wrong Show, a new TV series that will be broadcast later this year (2019).

Nottingham Playhouse's latest production is a new adaptation of Henrik Ibsen's An Enemy of the People. It features Alex Kingston in the lead role of Dr Teresa Stockman.

For this episode, BTG Midlands editor Steve Orme spoke to two of the actors in the play, Deka Walmsley and Donna Banya, about working with Alex Kingston, the effect gender-swapping has had on the play and how the theatre has been revitalised since Adam Penford took over as artistic director.

(Photo of Deka Walmsley and Donna Banya, credit Steve Orme)

Birmingham REP has made three major appointments and they've all taken up their new positions at a theatre recognised as one of the most important in the country. They're Artistic Director Sean Foley, Deputy Artistic Director Amit Sharma and Executive Director Rachael Thomas.

For this episode, BTG Midlands Editor Steve Orme spoke to the three of them about their aim to enhance the REP's reputation as a theatre that's relevant to all of its local communities but with a national and international outlook.

(Image of Sean Foley, Rachael Thomas and Amit Sharma by Kris Askey)

The latest production from Manchester-based new writing theatre company Box of Tricks is Under Three Moons by Daniel Kanaber, a play about a close male friendship across three decades, described to us by the director as a "platonic love story".

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Danny and director Adam Quayle during the early stages of rehearsals about the play, the development process and how this relationship fits into the current debate about masculinity.

Under Three Moons will open at The Lowry in Salford from 24 to 28 September 2019 before touring to Lawrence Batley Theatre in Huddersfield, Unity Theatre in Liverpool, Crewe Lyceum Theatre, Hull Truck Theatre, Carriageworks Theatre in Leeds, The Arts Centre at Edge Hill University in Ormskirk, York Theatre Royal, Live Theatre in Newcastle, Theatr Clwyd in Mold, finishing at Rosehill Theatre in Whitehaven on 2 November.

Derby Theatre and Queen's Theatre Hornchurch are collaborating for the second time on their major autumn show and in 2019 they've chosen to stage Richard Bean's One Man, Two Guvnors.

For this episode, BTG Midlands Editor Steve Orme spoke to Derby Theatre's artistic director Sarah Brigham about why she wanted to direct the farce, David O'Reilly who's playing Francis Henshall, the part played initially by James Corden at the National Theatre in 2011, and Samantha Hull, who takes the role of Pauline Clinch.

One Man, Two Guvnors will be at Derby Theatre from 7 until 28 September and Queen's Theatre Hornchurch from 2 until 19 October 2019.

In this episode from the final week of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe for 2019, we hear from the current director of a production that has become, after 28 years, an Edinburgh Fringe and C venues institution, Shakespeare for Breakfast. Damian Sandys has directed the production since 2006, as well as its younger brother, Dickens for Dinner, and he explains what audiences can expect from both, as well as how the shows are devised each year.

In a previous BTG podcast episode from the Edinburgh Fringe in 2014, Paines Plough's artistic director James Grieve told us about the company's new pop-up theatre, Roundabout.

This year, we spoke to director Steph O'Driscoll, who has directed three productions to be performed by the same company of actors in Roundabout this year: Daughterhood by Charley Miles, On the Other Hand, We're Happy by Daf James and Dexter and Winter's Detective Agency by Nathan Bryon. Steph explains about the process of creating productions for this unusual performance space for Edinburgh and for a subsequent tour.

(Image of Stef O'Driscoll, credit: Rebecca Need-Menear)

While the various Edinburgh festivals are running, one of the many publications providing extensive coverage of them is The List magazine, which this year celebrates its 40th anniversary.

The List publishes year-round free print publications and online content on arts and entertainment in Scotland, but it will be producing seven print publications in six weeks dedicated to the festivals, as well as bringing back its cross-festival awards, which it inaugurated last year and this year has expanded with new categories.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to List Publishing Ltd's CEO, Sheri Friers, about how The List started, how it kept going after lockdown nearly closed it down, expanding into Australia, the challenges of journalism in the 21st century and covering the Edinburgh festivals.

To find out more and to read the magazine online, including back issues going back to 1985, see list.co.uk, or if you are in Edinburgh during August, you will be able to pick up a current issue in print from many different locations around the city.

Owen O'Neill is an Irish writer, actor and stand-up comedian who has become known particularly on the Edinburgh Fringe for his one-man plays.

This year, he has written a two-hander called Shaving the Dead in which he does not perform but it is directed by Fringe regular Guy Masterson, with whom he has previously collaborated on a number of major projects. Between them, Owen and Guy have clocked up 49 visits to the Edinburgh Fringe.

In this episode, BTG editor David Chadderton spoke to Owen just after the play had opened in Edinburgh, and he explained about the origins of the play, spoke a little about the differences between his stand-up and his one-man shows and said that, just occasionally, critics will write some things that he actually finds useful.

Shaving the Dead from Theatre Tours International will be at Assembly George Square Studio Two at the Edinburgh Fringe until 25 August 2019.

(Owen O'Neill photo by Steve Ullathorne)

As the 2019 Edinburgh Festival Fringe was about to start, we spoke to two people whose work will be featured in this year's festival.

Jesse Jones is co-director of the latest devised theatre piece from Bristol-based The Wardrobe Ensemble, produced in collaboration with Complicite and Royal and Derngate Theatre in Northampton, called The Last of the Pelican Daughters. He spoke to us about the themes of the show, their devising process and about working with a company that was one of their greatest inspirations when they started working in theatre.

The Last of the Pelican Daughters is at Pleasance Beyond until 25 August 2019.

Daniel Bye's previous solo shows at the Fringe and elsewhere have always been quite interactive, but for his latest piece, he will be coming to the homes of his audiences to perform his show Arthur, which is named after his a co-star, the four-and-a-half-month-old son of Daniel and director Sarah Punshon.

(Images, The Last of the Pelican Daughters cast; Daniel Bye and Arthur, photo by Jonathan Ackley)

The Colin McIntyre Classic Thriller Season has been a regular feature at Nottingham's Theatre Royal since 1989. An ensemble performs four plays over the space of four weeks, a short rehearsal period proving quite a challenge. In 2019, the season features plays by Frederic Knott, Francis Durbridge, Brian Clemens and Dennis Spooner and N J Crisp.

In this episode, BTG Midlands editor Steve Orme speaks to Thriller Season regulars Anna Mitcham and David Martin about their experiences and what audiences can expect from the different plays.

The Classic Thriller Season 2019 runs at the Theatre Royal from 30 July until 24 August.

Lotte Wakeham, who took over as Artistic Director of Bolton's Octagon Theatre in February 2019, spoke to us after three months in the job about launching her first season in the post, her background as a director and an Associate Artistic Director of Scarborough's Stephen Joseph Theatre and her plans for the future at the Octagon, which remains closed for refurbishment until spring 2020.

The autumn 2019 season starts with Beryl on 19 September, continuing with Seagulls starting on 24 October and I Wanna Be Yours from 11 November, all at Bolton's Library Theatre, and then the Christmas production of Treasure Island will run from 8 December in the Premier Suite of University of Bolton Stadium.

Jackie Kay is the current Makar, the Scottish national poet, whose 2010 memoir, Red Dust Road, is to be adapted for the stage by Tanika Gupta for a co-production between the National Theatre of Scotland and HOME Manchester, which will open at the Edinburgh International Festival in August 2019.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Jackie at HOME Manchester about the subject of her book, her quest to find her birth parents (she was adopted as a baby and brought up in Glasgow), one in Scotland and the other in Nigeria, and what she is hoping for from the adaptation.

Red Dust Road is published by Picador. The production will open at Edinburgh's Royal Lyceum Theatre from 14 to 18 August 2019 before touring to Macrobert Arts Centre in Stirling, Eden Court Theatre in Inverness and finishing at HOME Manchester from 11 to 21 September.

Playwright Andrea Dunbar from Bradford in Yorkshire, most famous for Rita, Sue and Bob Too, died in 1990 at the age of 29. Her story was retold in Adelle Stripe's award-winning debut novel Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile, which is about to be brought to the stage by Bradford-based Freedom Studios.

The book will be adapted by Yorkshire writer Lisa Holdsworth, who has written extensively for prime time TV, including episodes of Fat Friends, New Tricks, Midsummer Murders and Call the Midwife. BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Lisa about her adaptation, about Dunbar and her struggles as a working class female writer and also about the current report by the Writers Guild of Great Britain, of which Lisa is Deputy Chair, into the diversity of writers for TV and film.

Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile adapted by Lisa Holdsworth from the novel by Adelle Stripe opens at The Ambassador in Bradford on 30 May 2019 before touring until 30 June to venues in Farsley, Barnsley, Horbury, Bradford, Leeds Doncaster, Wakefield, Harrogate, Oldham and South Kirby.

Braham Murray OBE arrived in Manchester in the 1960s as the youngest artistic director in the country, of the travelling Century Theatre, remaining in the city to co-found the 69 Theatre Company which went on to become the Royal Exchange Theatre, still one of the UK's leading regional theatres.

Murray died in 2018 at the age of 75, but BTG editor David Chadderton spoke to him in 2011 when he had just announced that he would leave the theatre he co-founded 35 years earlier. He spoke about working with Century Theatre's travelling auditorium, forming the 69 Theatre Company at the University Theatre (now Contact) and the process of designing the unique Royal Exchange Theatre module, as well as the rebuilding of the theatre after the 1996 IRA bomb.

This interview was originally recorded for TheatreVoice in 2011, but we are reissuing it as a tribute to a man who was very influential in helping to turn Manchester into a major theatrical centre.

For more information about the Royal Exchange Theatre, see www.royalexchange.co.uk.

(Photo of Braham Murray, credit: Mia Rose)

The 2019 Manchester International Festival will take place at various venues around the city in July. An edited version of the main presentation at the MIF launch on 7 March can be heard in a previous British Theatre Guide podcast episode, but we also spoke directly to some of the artists involved.

We asked MIF Artistic Director John McGrath for his highlights of the theatre programme and how Manchester has changed since he was head of the city's Contact Theatre.

We also spoke to Leo Warner of 59 Productions about his collaboration with choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, writer Lolita Chakrabarti and Rambert Dance on an adaptation of Italo Calvino's novel Invisible Cities.

Finally, we asked director Phelim McDermott about Tao of Glass, his collaboration with composer Philip Glass on a new stage performance featuring ten brand new pieces of music composed by Glass.

Invisible Cities will be performed at Mayfield beside Piccadilly Station in Manchester from 4 to 14 July. Tao of Glass will be at the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester from 11 to 20 July.

The Manchester International Festival 2019 will take place at various venues from 4 to 21 July.

Photos:

• John McGrath, MIF Artistic Director and Chief Executive introduces the MIF19 programme. Image credit Tarnish Vision.
• Leo Warner, Lolita Chakrabarti, Benoit Swan Pouffer—Invisible Cities. Image credit Joel Chester Fildes.
• Philip Glass and Phelim McDermott. Image credit Rod Morata.

Derby Theatre is preparing for a new adaptation of Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book, in an adaptation by Neil Duffield, which will be the theatre's first ever production to full integrate BSL signing into the production.

BTG's Midlands Editor Steve Orme speaks to director Sarah Brigham about the production, followed by Ivan Stott, who wrote the songs and will play Baloo, and Caroline Parker MBE, who will play Tabaqui and be signing for other characters in the play.

The Jungle Book runs from Friday 5 to Saturday 20 April 2019.

Photo: Caroline Parker (Tabaqui), Ivan Stott (Baloo and composer) and Sarah Brigham (director).

Highlights of the launch event for the Manchester International Festival 2019, held in Manchester on 7 March 2019.

Introduced by MIF artistic director John McGrath, this episode also features announcements from festival participants including Phelim McDermott of Improbable Theatre, Kwame Kwei-Armah of Young Vic Theatre, actors Maxine Peake and Juliet Stevenson, Leo Warner of 59 Productions, writer Lolita Chakrabarti, choreographer Claire Cunningham, Mary Anne Hobbs of BBC 6 Music and grime artist Skepta.

Other artists appearing at the festival include Philip Glass, Yoko Ono, Laurie Anderson and David Lynch.

Image from MIF launch:
Michael Symmons Roberts, Emily Howard, John McGrath, Maxine Peake, Grainne Flynn, Wesley Thistlewaite, Adam Ali, Kirsty Housley, Claire Cunningham, Leo Warner, Kwame Kwei-Armah, Isaiah Hull, Young identity poet, Reggie Gray, Animals of Manchester child-curators, Sibylle Peters, Karl Hyde, Lois Keidan, Adam Thirlwell, Danny Collins, Adania Shibli, Juliet Stevenson, Lolita Chakrabarti, Benoit Swan Pouffer, Christine Cort, Mark Ball

The winners of the biennial Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting, which this year celebrates its 20th anniversary, were announced at a ceremony at Manchester's Royal Exchange Theatre on Monday 21 July 2025.

Immediately after the awards were presented, BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to four of the five winners: Daisy Miles, who won the £10,000 North-West Original New Voice Award for her play R Lady's, Terri Jade Donovan, who won a special commendation of £5,000 for Dog Dog Dog, Silva Semerciyan, who won the Judges' Prize of £10,000 for her play Przewalski's Horses, and Tolu Okanlawon, who won the £20,000 overall prize for his play Shooters.

The winner of the International Award of £10,000, Jesús I Valles, for his play Spread was not able to attend the ceremony.

(Photo of winners Silva Semerciyan, Daisy Miles, Tolu Okanlawon and Terri Jade Donovan in the Royal Exchange Theatre following the ceremony, credit: Ellie Kurttz.)

From Shore to Shore is a play written by British playwright Mary Cooper in collaboration with M W Sun based on real migration stories from Chinese communities throughout the UK that will tour nationally to Chinese restaurants and Chinese community centres rather than theatres.

For this episode, BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to the play's director, David Tse, and veteran British Chinese actor Ozzie Yue, who leads the cast, about the play, the process of collecting stories, their own family connections with Chinese migrant stories and also how opportunities have changed for British Chinese actors over the last few decades.

From Shore to Shore, directed by David K S Tse for On the Wire and starring Ozzie Yue, will open at the Yang Sing Restaurant in Manchester from 9 to 16 March and will then tour until 6 April, with performances in Liverpool, Lancaster, Morecambe, Newcastle upon Tyne and Birmingham.

The latest production from Manchester-based new writing theatre company Box of Tricks is SparkPlug, written and performed by David Judge based on his own experiences being brought up as a mixed race child by a white stepfather in 1980s Manchester.

The production is directed by Box of Tricks Joint Artistic Director and co-founder Hannah Tyrrell-Pinder and begins its 9-week tour at HOME in Manchester, where BTG editor David Chadderton spoke to David and Hannah in a dressing room during a break from technical rehearsals.

SparkPlug runs at HOME in Manchester from 13 to 23 February 2019 before touring to Unity Theatre in Liverpool, Theatre Severn in Shrewsbury, Cheltenham Everyman Studio, Harrogate Theatre Studio, Live Theatre in Newcastle, York Theatre Royal, Hull Truck Theatre, Theatr Clwyd in Mold, Crewe Lyceum Studio, Spring Arts Centre in Havant, The Lighthouse in Poole, Marlowe Studio in Canterbury, Old Town Hall in Hemel Hempstead, The North Wall Arts Centre in Oxford, Square Chapel in Halifax, The Met in Bury and Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough, before finishing at Birmingham Rep from 10 to 13 April.

Conrad Nelson's production of Shakespeare's comedy Much Ado About Nothing for Northern Broadsides Theatre Company had a cast change on the first day of rehearsals when Reece Dinsdale had to drop out of the key role of Benedick due to a family illness and Robin Simpson took over the role.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Robin during the second week of rehearsals about the additional pressure that may have put on him and also about the production as a whole, playing Shakespeare, performing comedy and even a bit of panto.

The Northern Broadsides production of Much Ado About Nothing runs at the New Vic Theatre in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire from 8 February to 2 March 2019, before embarking on a national tour until the end of May to The Dukes Lancaster, Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough, Salisbury Playhouse, Derby Theatre, Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds, Lawrence Batley Theatre in Huddersfield, Viaduct Theatre in Halifax, The Lowry in Salford, York Theatre Royal and Harrogate Theatre.

A new consortium has been formed to produce new theatre for young audiences, including Pilot Theatre, Derby Theatre, Belgrade Theatre Coventry, Mercury Theatre Colchester and York Theatre Royal.

The first production to come out of this collaboration will be a new adaptation of former Children's Laureate Malorie Blackman's hard-hitting YA novel Noughts and Crosses, which raised issues or racism and forbidden love in an alternative version of our own world.

For this episode, director Esther Richardson of Pilot Theatre spoke to BTG Midlands Editor Steve Orme on the process of adapting this popular novel to the stage, and then actors Billy Harris and Heather Agyepong, who play the two leading roles, discussed their parts in the play.

The Honest Actors' Podcast was founded by Belfast-born actor Jonathan Harden in 2015 and is currently launching its third and final series, featuring long, frank discussions with experienced actors about the joys and torments of their chosen career.

As he was in the midst of launching new episodes in the days leading up to Christmas 2018, BTG Editor David Chadderton turned the tables on Jonathan, asking him about his life and career as an actor, as well as what he has learned from the last three years of interviews with other actors.

The Honest Actors' Podcast is available for free on Apple Podcasts, Acast, Stitcher, Spotify and other podcast directories and aggregators.

(Photo: Jonathan Harden in Children of the Sun at the National Theatre, directed by Howard Davies. Image: Richard Hubert Smyth)

Lichfield Garrick is presenting an alternative show as well as its panto this Christmas as New Old Friends will be staging the latest in its "Crimes of..." series: Crimes of the Christmas Pudding.

BTG Midlands editor Steve Orme speaks to director Nel Crouch and Jill Myers who plays Belgian detective Artemis Arinae.

Crimes of the Christmas Pudding runs at Lichfield Garrick from Wednesday 5 December 2018 until Saturday 5 January 2019.

2018 marks the second time Evolution Productions has produced Cinderella at the Marlowe Theatre, Canterbury after the venue re-opened in 2011.

Simon Sladen speaks to the theatre's resident Dame Ben Roddy and Marlowe regulars Lloyd Hollett and Phil Gallagher as they star in their fourth panto together.

Simon, Ben, Lloyd and Phil discuss this year's show, their approach to playing the Ugly Sisters and Buttons, the trio's affinity with the Marlowe as well as some top tips for those starting out in the industry.

Derby Theatre's Christmas show for 2018 is Mike Kenny's adaptation of Hansel and Gretel from the tales collected by the Brothers Grimm.

BTG Midlands Editor Steve Orme talks about the show to Derby Theatre Artistic Director Sarah Brigham, who is directing the production, and actors Craig Anderson and Yana Penrose, who play the title roles of Hansel and Gretel.

Hansel and Gretel runs at Derby Theatre from Friday 30 November 2018 to Saturday 5 January 2019.

BTG panto editor Simon Sladen speaks to pantomime company Imagine Theatre's Managing Director Steve Boden and Robert Marsden, director of the Victoria Theatre, Halifax's pantomime and associate professor at Staffordshire University.

2018 will see Imagine Theatre present 14 pantomimes in venues across the United Kingdom having grown from 8 productions in 2009.

In this episode, Steve and Robert discuss Imagine Theatre's style of pantomime, the company and genre's recent evolution and the state of the industry today. Steve and Robert also reveal where in Pantoland they'd like to travel to if they had their very own magic wand.

The first in-house production in HOME Manchester's autumn and winter season for 2018 is a new production of French writer Jean Genet's 1947 play The Maids, in an English version by Martin Crimp.

The play will be directed in-the-round at HOME by Lily Sykes, an English-born director who has lived and worked in Germany for the last ten years and has recently become a German citizen.

In a break during rehearsals, BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Lily about the play, existentialism, polarisation of society, the differences between directing for British and German theatres and a great deal more.

The Maids will run at HOME Manchester from 16 November to 1 December 2018. For more information, see homemcr.org.

(Photo of Lily Sykes by Magnus Reed)

Greg Mosse was the founder of the Criterion New Writing programme based at the Criterion Theatre in London's West End in 2015 and has written and produced 25 plays and musicals at venues including Chichester Festival Theatre, Portsmouth Guildhall and Worthing Theatre.

Since lockdown, he has turned to writing novels, despite being married to best-selling novelist Kate Mosse, and his latest book, The Coming Fire, the third in a series that he began writing during lockdown, was published by Moonflower Books on 17 July 2025.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Greg just before the new book was released about the series and how he came to write it, as well as about the Criterion New Writing programme—for which he encourages mid-career theatre writers to apply—having two writers working in the same house and lots more about the process of writing and the current new writing scene in British theatre.

Applications for the 2026 Criterion New Writing programme will open on 1 September 2025.

Red Ladder, which bills itself as "Britain's leading radical theatre company", this year celebrates its fiftieth anniversary, tracing its roots back to the left-wing agitprop theatre of the 1960s.

To celebrate, instead of its usual fare of new political writing, it has turned to Brecht's Mother Courage and her Children, which artistic director Rod Dixon has staged as a promenade production in a warehouse in Leeds featuring Pauline McLynn (Mrs Doyle in classic sitcom Father Ted) in the title role.

BTG editor David Chadderton spoke to Rod when the production had been running for nearly a week about the production, the company's other work and philosophy and fifty years of creating political theatre.

Mother Courage and her Children by Bertolt Brecht, adapted by Lee Hall, opened at the Albion Electric Warehouse in Leeds on 28 September 2018 and runs until 20 October.

(Production photo of Pauline McLynn as Mother Courage by Anthony Robling)

Mark Smith talks to Conrad Nelson and Deborah McAndrew about their brand new version of Dario Fo's classic They Don't Pay? We Won't Pay! (also known as Can't Pay? Won't Pay!).

The show is a co-production between York Theatre Royal and Halifax-based company Northern Broadsides, where Conrad Nelson is the Artistic Director. They discuss the company's past and future, the process of adapting and translating theatrical language "from Milan to Middlesborough", and the careful precision required when staging farce - or any play.

"This is so much about being a theatre animal. This play was made by a theatre animal, and we're theatre animals, we're playhouse creatures."

They Don't Pay? We Won't Pay! will run at York Theatre Royal from 5 to 13 October 2018 before embarking on a national tour from 16 October to 2 December 2018.

(Photo of Conrad Nelson and Deborah McAndrew in rehearsal, credit: Nobby Clark)

The latest production from acclaimed theatre company RashDash, Future Bodies, has been produced in collaboration with Unlimited Theatre and HOME Manchester as a trailblazer event for the 2018 Manchester Science Festival.

What does it mean to have and to be a body? As we increasingly fuse our biological brains with technology, at what point do we stop being human? Does it even matter?

During rehearsals at HOME, BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to RashDash co-founder Helen Goalen, who is co-directing the production, about the show, how it was created and the ideas behind it.

Future Bodies will be at HOME Manchester from 28 September to 13 October 2018 before touring to Northern Stage in Newcastle from 16 to 18 October and the Lawrence Batley Theatre in Huddersfield on 19 October.

(Image: Helen Goalen (R) in rehearsals)