This week's intriguing selection includes French farce in Salisbury and an art deco drama in a Plymouth car park
A week that will see Arts Council England (ACE) making its announcement about who is and isn't getting National Portfolio Funding (around half of the 1,350 arts organisations who applied are likely to be disappointed) makes you wonder what the theatre landscape will look like in a few years time. But let's begin this week's theatrical grand tour of the country in Plymouth. Until tomorrow, at the Theatre Royal you can catch the devastating first world war drama Journey's End in the main house and Theatre Alibi's porky tale Goucher's War in the Drum. The latter moves to the lovely Brewhouse in Taunton and the Burrell in Truro later in the week. But the most intriguing Plymouth show of the week takes place not in a theatre but in the car park of a 1930s art deco former car showroom. You've been to drive-in movies but Hidden City: Drive In Deco, open from next Thursday, combines live performance with music, radio broadcasts, film and popcorn to tell the story of the building.
Staying south, Shakespeare at the Tobacco Factory's The Comedy of Errors opens to the press on Wednesday and I'll be taking in the Thursday matinee, so do say hello if you're there. The Brewery Theatre plays host to the comedy circus-theatre troupe Yalla Yalla. It's a big week all round for circus in Bristol, as the brilliant Circomedia celebrates 25 years of circus training in the city with a programme of events and workshops that continues into next weekend, which includes an Open Space event asking: What are we doing about circus in the UK?
Marivaux's 18th-century French farce The Game of Love and Chance is transposed to the 1960s in Neil Bartlett's version directed by Philip Wilson at Salisbury Playhouse. Forest Forge take Kaite O'Reilly's fine play, Peeling, about the choices women make and the things they hide, on a rural tour starting at Appleshaw Village Hall near Andover on Saturday night. Head for the south coast and Brighton offers Lone Twin's celebration of the triumph and absurdity of the human spirit, The Catastrophe Trilogy, at the Dome on Saturday. There are also good things happening at the increasingly important The Basement, which is shaking up performance in the city. Tomorrow, the Supper Club offers a chance to see bite-sized performances by artists from across the UK, and next Friday the remarkable Ivana M�ller performs a new solo, 60 Minutes of Opportunism, which questions codes of representation.
On to London: the Sprint Festival draws to a close with Michael Pinchbeck's The End on Saturday and Sunday. Rattigan's last play, Caus� Cel�bre, opens at the Old Vic on Tuesday, the same night as BAC's One-on-One festival. I love the way visitors to the latter are offered menus of shows to suit their mood. Clifford Odets's 1938 drama Rocket to the Moon (one of the few plays besides Little Shop of Horrors to feature a dentist as a main character) opens at the National on Wednesday, the same night that The Complete Works of William Shakespeare makes a comeback at the Old Red Lion's new space. But if I were you, I'd head to the original pub for a rare revival of Naomi Wallace's fantastic plague play, One Flea Spare, which was one of the jewels in the crown of Dominic Dromgoole's reign at the Bush. Bed and Sofa is an American musical at the Finborough, and Smash at the Menier, written by the late Jack Rosenthal, stars Tom Conti. If you've been trying to get into Ecstasy at Hampstead and have been unlucky, don't despair: it transfers immediately to the Duchess for 50 performances only from 12 April. Talking of Hampstead, that's a pretty nifty new season that's been lined up by Ed Hall featuring Richard Eyre, Nicholas Wright, Simon Stephens and Katie Mitchell, among others.
With a little detour east to the New Wolsey in Ipswich to recommend Guys and Dolls, let's head up the country. Polly Teale's fine exploration of creativity, Bront�, is wuthering at Oxford Playhouse during the week before eventually heading to the Tricycle in London. The Fierce festival continues to burn brightly in Birmingham over the weekend and includes some great debates, including one about children and artists, provocatively titled The Pram in the Hallway, as well as performances. If you can grab a ticket to Symphony of a Missing Room, you will not be disappointed. The Belgrade in Coventry has a new version of Uncle Vanya, directed by Helena Kaut-Howson, and Mike Bartlett's brilliant Love Love Love is at the Curve in Leicester until Saturday before heading to Live in Newcastle. Catch it where you can. The New Vic begins a four-play repertory season with The Rivals.
Erica Whyman's revival of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? delivers a knockout punch at the Sheffield Crucible before it heads to Northern Stage in Newcastle. Tomorrow is your last chance for the excellent revival of Yerma at West Yorkshire Playhouse. Philip Meeks's supernatural thriller, I Met a Man Who Wasn't There, is at the Pomegranate in Chesterfield. Steven Berkoff's eye-catching Oedipus is at Nottingham Playhouse. In Bradford, The Mill is a promenade production exploring the city's past and present. Takeover continues this weekend at York Theatre Royal, with work by young companies Belt-Up and Rashdash.
A few things of interest in Manchester: Matthew Warchus's London-bound musical staging of the movie Ghost previews at Manchester Opera House. The brilliant Search Party is at Contact with Growing Old With You, a 10-year performance project exploring age and accumulation. Private Lives continues at the Royal Exchange.
Moving into Scotland, look out for Age of Arousal at the Tron Glasgow until Saturday and then out on tour. It's a good week for family theatre, with Neil Duffield's The Firebird at Dundee Rep and Catherine Wheels's rewrite of Beauty and the Beast, Caged, at Brunton Theatre Musselburgh before going on tour. Iain Finlay Macleod's tale of language and identity, Somersaults, is at the Citizens in Glasgow until tomorrow and then heads for Ullapool and Stornoway. New Territories concludes in Glasgow, and The Hard Man, inspired by the life of Jimmy Boyle, gets a rare revival at the King's Theatre Edinburgh. Enjoy your theatregoing in the sunshine and share what you're seeing.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/stage/theatreblog/2011/mar/25/what-to-see-theatre-tips
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