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Three To See and Stream 8-14 Aug: Camden Fringe, Theatre, Opera, more…

By TW Editorial | Published on Monday 7 August 2023

CAMDEN FRINGE

Phrases | Hen & Chickens Theatre | 11-13 Aug
So much Fringe, so little time. For yes, the old edfringe has begun and meanwhile the lovely Camden Fringe continues. We have three picks from the latter for you this week, starting with someone we first met up at the aforementioned Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Creator Lewys Holt presents this one-man dance, multimedia and spoken word performance, and he spoke to us about it last August: read our Q&A here and book your tickets here.

Juliet Meyers: This Flipping Rescue Dog Has Ruined My Life | Camden Comedy Club | 10 Aug
Here’s someone else I first heard about up in Edinburgh, probably when my reviewers said things like “Meyers’ personal anecdotes were endowed with insightful twists that demonstrated her sharp mind” and “jumping from one anecdotal punchline to another, the comedian is easily distracted, but this only leads to more laughs”. So, I think you can definitely expect an anecdotal style and a very entertaining show. Info here.

Brown Girl Noise | The Hope Theatre | 13-16 Aug (pictured)
“What if we could just be happy figuring out who we were so we could grow up with that person, instead of growing up and then figuring it out?” A coming of age story, a rebellion and celebration, told through dialogue and spoken word, and telling how “four brown girls find their feet on British streets”. Promises to be both heartwarming and funny, see the Camden Fringe website here for details.

LONGER RUNS

The Garden Of Words | Park Theatre | 10 Aug-9 Sep (pictured)
Now for some longer runs to get your teeth into. Not sure quite how you can better get your teeth into a longer run than a shorter run, to be honest, but somehow the imagery works in my head. Anyway, here’s a great show to see! It’s about an unlikely connection between a grown woman and an “offbeat” teen, who meet by chance in a Japanese garden and bond over classical poetry, shoe-making and bad cooking. More here.

Makeshifts And Realities | Finborough Theatre | 8 Aug-2 Sep
You know that as well as being fans of new and innovative stuff here at TW Towers, we are also very big fans of seeing new work continuing to be developed, and not only that but also – which is the relevant thing here – when long neglected, older works are staged anew. And that’s exactly what we have here: A triple bill, two plays by Gertrude Robins and one by HM Harwood. All sound fab, read more here.

Trouble In Tahiti/Loyola | Arcola Theatre | 9-12 Aug/11-12 Aug
No, you’re right, this isn’t really a long run, but it’s two events tacked together by me, so it feels longer. They’re both on at Arcola’s Grimeborn fest and I decided that I couldn’t choose between them so please can you go and see both of them? There’s Leonard Bernstein’s ‘Trouble In Tahiti’, and a UK premiere for long lost 1720 Latin American baroque opera ‘Loyola’ by Domenico Zipolo. See at least one, promise?

SHORT STOPS

Teacher Of The Year | The Space | 8-12 Aug (pictured)
And now for the short stops – and yes, these really are genuinely short ones. We start over at The Space with ‘Teacher Of The Year’, a gritty new play by Lauren Page. “Liverpool, 1989-90, a time of rising unemployment and pent-up anger against Margaret Thatcher and the Tories. Kayleigh runs away from home on a coach heading for the anti-poll tax demonstrations in London”. What happens next? Click here.

Paved With Gold And Ashes | Old Red Lion Theatre | 9-10 Aug
I kinda maybe thought it was all over for Edinburgh previews, but no, here’s another one, and it looks great. ‘Paved With Gold And Ashes’ is on at Edinburgh’s Greenside @ Infirmary Street venue from 14 Aug, but if you can’t see it there, maybe you can see it in London instead. It’s set against the backdrop of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire in New York, an incident in which many perished, and which inspired workplace reform. See the venue website here.

The S Is Silent – on demand | The Space | until 9 Aug
It’s been a while since we recommended anything digital – and we used to do it loads during and even post the lockdowns. But venues like The Space and Orange Tree Theatre have continued to offer streaming shows, which I think is a great thing for those of us who can’t make it to the theatre. And I really want to see this – a performance featuring spoken word visual poetry and flamenco dance that retells the most important events of the Spanish civil war from a woman’s perspective. Details here.