Arts Centres

Spring/Summer Season at Stafford Gatehouse Theatre

The Pick of the Fringe ...

comes to Stafford Gatehouse Theatre this spring/summer season. Yes!! Hot from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2007 we bring you some 5* entertainment.  Kicking off the Fringe offerings in March is Moths Ate My Dr Who Scarf for those Whovians amongst us.  Lovers of another TV cult sci-fi classic, The X Files, will be in for a treat in May as Dean Haglund, original cast member from nine seasons of the programme, hosts his own X Files Improv show.  Completing the bill of Edinburgh Fringe offerings is the Hard Graft Theatre Company with Coast to Coast, a hilarious night of stand up recalling the memories of two men as they yomp across the UK, skint!!

Comedy goers can choose from an evening with stand up veterans Andy Parsons and Rich Hall or opt for The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged), where the Bard's complete works will be staged in under 100 minutes! Our commitment to good quality drama continues with the ever-popular Reform Theatre Company who return after their sell-out production of Like A Virgin with another Gordon Steel classic, Albert Nobbs. Opus are back Growing old Disgracefully, a new work about just that! Plested and Brown, who brought us the hilarious Hot Pursuit last year, return with Minor Spectacular and Bernie Nolan joins us for two nights with Mum's the Word, an intimate and comical look at motherhood.  From talented local theatre company, Stafford Players we also have An Experiment with An Air Pump and the timeless classic Hobson's Choice and from Stafford Operatics, The Yeoman of the Guard.

As you would expect to find in the Stafford Gatehouse Theatre programme, live music is very much a feature.  We see a welcome return to Elkie Brooks and Kate Rusby after their sell-out shows last year, as we do with Joe Brown who also joins us with a concert celebrating his fifty years in the business.  We are also joined by the likes of Fairport Convention, The Glenn Miller Orchestra and the hardest working band on the circuit, The Commitments.

Dance fans can look forward to the award winning production, Glacier, from choreographer Maresa von Stockert. The emotionally charged show will take the audience on a magical and thought-provoking journey through a world of ice and snow. For our younger audience we have an abundance of fun shows from the Mr Men and Little Miss to The Witches Bogey and even Harry with his bucket full of Dinosaurs! 

Following the Gatehouse's silver jubilee year, 2008 marks another exciting period in the venue's history.  The final three years of our Youth Theatre Programme will present the timeless classics Alice in Wonderland, Animal Farm and 1984 and our Summer School Production will see the venue's premiere of Honk! A delightful musical based on the Hans Christian Andersen fairytale, The Ugly Duckling.  The theatre also celebrates the eighteenth anniversary of the Open Air Stafford Festival Shakespeare Production at Stafford Castle, with the popular tragedy, Hamlet.  We do hope that you are able to join us and support the venue in what is set to be another twenty-five years of outstanding entertainment!

Derrick Gask
Artistic Programme Manager