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Three To See 13-19 Jun: Festival Stuff, Theatre, More…

By | Published on Friday 9 June 2023

FESTIVAL EVENTS

Windrush 75 | Bernie Grant Arts Centre | 19-24 Jun
The festival stuff keeps on coming, yes, so much so that we have another two festival sections this week. Though, full disclosure, the second one is stretching it a bit. Anyway, this tip is for a whole festival, because it’s a relatively small one, and I think you should just go ahead and take in everything. As you will have gathered from the name, it’s a 75th anniversary thing, and celebrates the hopes and dreams of the Windrush generation through film, live performances and art. More here.

Improvised Opera | Holy Trinity Church Roehampton | 18 Jun
As you may know, not least because we mentioned it last week, the Wandsworth Fringe is up and running and there is lots and lots to choose from, so remember to have a look at the long list of events here. As for our pick for this week, well, we love an improv troupe here at TW Towers, and this one intrigued me because I’m not sure I have ever seen improvised opera. If you also haven’t, and would like to see such a thing, head to this listing here.

678 Mystic Nightingales | Camden People’s Theatre | 14 Jun (pictured)
Feminist fest Calm Down Dear is still taking place over at CPT, though it will, sadly, be over relatively soon. The good news, of course, is that you do still have time to see some stuff, including the show we’ve picked out here. This sees a collective of Iranian and Iranophile performers taking part in an evening of music, comedy, spoken word and film in support of protesters in Iran, who are demanding freedom and choices for women in the wake of the killing of Mahsa Amini. More here.

MORE FESTIVAL RELATED STUFF

Skin Deep Sonic Transmissions | Roundhouse | 16 Jun
This is the one event in this section that really is on as part of a festival – the much previously mentioned Last Word at Roundhouse. Our pick for this week is the latest instalment of ‘Skin Deep Sonic Transmissions’, which features Faisal Salah, aka FaceSoul, a London-based Somali artist who blends singing, poetry and storytelling rooted in his relationship to Islam. Find out more about the event and book tickets here.

Chloe Petts – Transience | Leicester Square Theatre | 17 Jun
So, not a festival event, but you’ll probably guess why this one is here, right? Yes, this is a highly acclaimed show that had a very well received run up at the old edfringe last year and elicited a complimentary review from our own team member. What to expect? “Petts uses her trademark cerebral ‘laddishness’ to examine her desperate attempts at living in the moment, the darts and her (strictly non-romantic) love for men”. More here.

these words that’ll linger like ghosts till the day i drop down dead | Pleasance Theatre | 13-24 Jun (pictured)
This one’s an even more tenuous connection to festival shenanigans, because it’s not a play we’ve seen before. It is, however, by a company – Chewboy Productions – who wowed us at last year’s edfringe with their 5/5 rated show ‘Caligari’. This brand new experimental play explores the things we wish we’d said to those who have left, the efficacy of art as a coping mechanism, how we manage grief and how we can’t change the past. Details here.

SHORT STOPS

Overtones | Bread & Roses Theatre | 13-17 Jun
A few shorter runs for you now, as ever, make sure you don’t miss them. First up is a staging of ‘Overtones’, a piece by early Twentieth Century actress, dramatist and activist Alice Gerstenberg that’s considered to be “one of the earliest examples of a play that dramatises the unconscious on stage”. It’s about Harriet, who has married for money and longs for the man she loves, and Margaret, who married for love and now longs for money. Click here.

Piaf To Pop | Greenwich Theatre | 14 Jun
And now for something a little musical, and to be honest, this one could have been at home in the second festival section too, as we first got to know its performer – Christine Bovill – up at the Edinburgh Festival a good long time ago, and this show was a bit of a smash there last year. It’s focused on French music and its evolution through the sixties, honouring the likes of Piaf, Brel and Gainsbourg. For more information and to book see this page here.

Tipsy | The Cockpit | 13-17 Jun (pictured)
“Maria, an overstretched, overworked young woman, walks into a nail salon to get a manicure after a stressful day at her full-time job. Sounds simple enough, but there’s just one problem. This nail salon serves booze. Consumed by her thoughts and plagued with a feeling that her nail technician hates her, she drinks and drinks and drinks. With disastrous consequences”. Yikes! Expect some dark comedy though, more on the venue website here.

LONGER RUNS

Tambo & Bones | Stratford East | 16 Jun-15 Jul
And now for some stuff that you probably don’t need to rush to see. Though to be fair, you probably will want to rush and see it, because it’s all looking so blooming good. This one sees the title characters’ “journey from comedy double-act, to hip-hop superstars, to activists in an America at the epicentre of the global Black Lives Matter movement” and promises “racially charged metatheatrical satire”. By slam poet turned playwright Dave Harris and directed by Matthew Xia. Click here.

Possession | Arcola Theatre | 15 Jun-15 Jul
“‘Possession’ is a tale about desire. About owning and being owned. About colonising and being colonised. And ultimately about the power of the spirit to escape oppression”. A story of mothers whose lives interweave across both continents and time, this intriguing play focuses on Kasambayi, an immigrant to the UK from the DRC, her daughter, and Alice Seeley-Harris, a Victorian missionary’s wife in Congo. Read more about it here.

To The Ocean | The Greenhouse at Canary Wharf | 19 Jun-14 Jul
Zero waste performance space The Greenhouse returns to Canary Wharf this month to stage a number of different events, but the flagship one is this, ‘To The Ocean’, a modern retelling of the Selkie myth that centres on Grace, who has lived in Dunwick with her father all her life, but on the eve of her sixteenth birthday finds out who she really is. For more on that show, and other performances at the venue over the next few weeks, see this page here.

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