by Patrick Neylan English Literature A John Godber’s script is an ingenious take on how pupils view education and how teachers see it. We saw how a moment of inspiration can turn the most disaffected children into enthusiastic pupils. The play essentially follows a new drama teacher at a mediocre comprehensive through his first year, as he tries to turn theatre into a valid, eye-opening part of the curriculum rather than a doss subject. What could have been an inconsequential […]
Scene: A bar in a small community theatre in South East London. Two playwrights are discussing a performance of their play – a play they wrote for the opening of the Bridge Theatre in London. It is only the second staging of the play that has ever be performed, and an amateur premier. Richard Bean: How long into the play did it take you to relax? Clive Coleman: I knew they’d nailed it in the first 2 minutes And nailed […]
Review by Richard Stewart In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how boring I find Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. This is not for want of trying – I want to like it. It’s one of the most loved and well regarded books in English literature, full of wit, memorable characters and quotes that have become part of the culture of the nation. I’ve read […]
Directed by Paul Ackroyd Review by Patrick Neylan When a cold February blast blows up North Street, it’s comforting to snuggle into the BLT auditorium to witness the story of a group of men suffering in a considerably colder climate than you are. And a gratifyingly large number of people turned out to see Terra Nova, a dramatised account of Captain Robert Scott’s expedition to the South Pole in 1911. Those feelings are tempered by the knowledge that you’re watching […]
Directed by Patrick Neylan Hazel and Robin are retired nuclear scientists. They live just outside the exclusion zone of a nuclear reactor disaster – a nuclear reactor that they had some unspecified part in creating. Rationed electricity and a Geiger counter, on hand to check for signs of radiation, are the most noticeable outwards signs of its impact, but the disaster has also taken its toll on the psychology of each of the protagonists in other ways. But first the […]
I’m very sorry to interrupt 2019 everyone, but I’m going to have to drag you kicking and screaming back into 2018 for just a few hundred words. Do you remember that bygone era? Real-life spy drama in Salisbury, scorching summer temperatures, Brexit and President Trump still both (somehow) things that are actually happening? It is wonderful then that we have our cosy little Bromley theatre to provide blissful escapism from the harrowing politics of British constitutional crises. What a treat […]
Remotegoat have published their review on Jeeves and Wooster!! Click here to find out what they thought
William Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors was described by BLT as “Shakespeare as you have never seen it before” – a bold claim indeed, and one that certainly stood up to scrutiny, though the end result was not one for the Shakespeare purists. Hilary Cordery’s production gave us a vision of The Comedy of Errors as a bawdy restoration-style comedy; a cross between pantomime (apt as this was the last production before Christmas) and Benny Hill. The only thing missing […]
Double Dystopia presented us with two short plays in one evening about power and powerlessness. Those with power were either not seen or hardly seen: what we saw instead is what it is like to have little or no power. In the first play, Edgar and Annabel, a seemingly normal couple are preparing for some form of rebellion against an unseen, all-powerful state, but they are the ones who are really under threat. In a wonderfully theatrical ploy, the couple […]
“…an amazing production that could teach some of the best professional companies in the country a thing or two about comedy.” Read the 5-star review of our festive production of The Comedy of Errors… we are just a little bit proud of our director, cast and crew! Click here to read the review