Lottie Unwin: Drama Queen

Dearest readers, stay calm.  I am back.  Back from smoking shisha and supping cocktails in the Egyptian sun, though come to think of it I am not really sure why.  Week 4 is upon us with more theatre than Shaftsbury Avenue has ever seen, as if there is a general consensus that now is the time we want to be cultured rather than using all our free minutes begging for parcels from home and searching internet for the criteria of alcoholism.   There is a lot to live up to with four star acclaim going to I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change, Cigarettes and Chocolate, Pale Horse, rogue choice Medea and The Chinese State Circus last week.  Maybe we are going soft.

This week’s line up is as follows (take a deep breath, it’s a long list):

Present Laughter – 7.45 (2.30 matinees on Saturday and Thursday) – Monday 8th – Saturday 13th at the Cambridge Arts Theatre. £10-£27.

“Set in the glamorous world of theatre, Present Laughter is a gloriously witty portrait of the life that whirled round Nöel Coward in his heyday, sparkling from start to finish with cut-glass humour and spectacular repartee.”  And for the negligible proportion of you who aren’t die-hard Noel Coward fans the cast is all quite glitzy.

Wolfson Howler – 8.00 – Monday 8th at Wolfson College.  £5 or free for Wolfson students (lucky bastards).

With guest compere Simon Brodkin there is all the potential for this to be as good as the last, leaving reviewer Sophie Bauer “on a kind of hilarious cloud nine”.

Macbeth – 7.00– Tuesday 9th – Saturday 13th at Corpus Playrooms. £5-6.

“As Scotland spirals further and further into wild degradation, where force fights force and purity is weak, Macbeth battles with himself, his friends, and what goodness remains around him while his world spins ever further into a chaos of bloodshed and madness” apparently all in the Playrooms’ ten square meters.  A cast of dwarfs?

The Final Countdown – 7.30– Tuesday 9th – Saturday 13th at Fitzpatrick Hall, Queens' College. £5-8.

“A hilarious new musical comedy – at times fantastical, at times close to the bone”.  While Richard Whiteley’s death was close to the bone, even loyal supporter Colin Brown has to admit on his memorial site that ‘Des is doing a great job’.  Fantastical?  That is high praise for Carol Vorderman.

The Crucible – 7.45 – Tuesday 9th – Saturday 13th at the ADC.  £6-9.

“This production will take place in a shadowy world of judgment and fear, never allowing the audience to escape the mounting intensity of the play right up until its harrowing conclusion.”  Are we not allowed to giggle even a little bit when Abigail goes mad?  Surely a snigger in that speech about her and Proctor behind the barn?

Presto – 9.30 – Tuesday 9th – Saturday 13th at the Corpus Playrooms. £5-6.

Written and directed by student Adam Lawrence this could be exciting.  The promise “Will is a man. And a magician. A professional magician; an amateur man” has already touched my heart; someone else who is wandering through this business of being a grown up feeling unqualified.  Thank heavens.

Smoker – 11.00 at the ADC – Tuesday 9th.  It has already sold out.

Even though Ben Blyth wasn’t blown away last time the success of ‘the Smoker’ is indistinguishable.

Silent Canonfire – 8.00 – Wednesday 10th – Saturday 13th at the Larkum Studio, ADC.  £4-6.

“Behold! A COMPLETELY SILENT SWASHBUCKLING PIRATICAL ADVENTURE, live! Never has such a thing been attempted by humankind!”  Am I the only one not at all surprised that this claim is true?  And very impressed someone is trying it?

The Vagina Monologues – 11.00 – Wednesday 10th – Saturday 13th at Fitzpatrick Hall in Queen’s College.  £5-8.

“If your vagina could speak, what would it say? What would it wear?”  …If my vagina could speak?  What a terrifying prospect and I will certainly not tell you what it would say.  Listening to the monologues of other vaginas though? That sounds like my kind of theatre.

Alcock Improv – 11.00– Wednesday 10th – Saturday 13th at the ADC.  £4-6.

Have you drawn penises all over the flyers already?  Go along to do the same thing out loud then see how they cope.  With guest improvisers every night you could justify going four times, if you really wanted to.

The Dawn of Man – 7.00 – Friday 12th – Sunday 14th at the Homerton Auditorium. £5.

I am on a personal quest to prove that Homerton is not that far.  And where else are you going to take your thespy beau on the 14th than all the way down Hills Road and over the bridge to see “the two conflicting theories of creationism and Darwinian evolution” merged “with a comic slant”.

The Heartbreaks You Embrace – 8.00 – Thursday 11th – Friday 12th at Michaelmas House Café.  £5.

Feeling particularly edgy?  This touring caberet “story of two lovers torn apart, and the two continents that divide and envelop them” will definitely be a conversation starter and put all those ‘I see absolutely everything’ types to shame.

Woyzeck! – 8.00 on Friday 12th and 3.00 on Saturday 13th at the Judith E. Wilson Studio.  £3.

“There is nothing half-hearted about Georg Büchner’s hard-hitting classic “Woyzeck” – it’s power is in its simplicity.” Already I would disagree – with a name that makes no sense to me, no facebook group I can discover and only the wrong details on wordpress this production is a right enigma.  The use of an exclamation mark adds to my confusion.  It's in the original German.  Hard core.  

Black Tie Smoker – 8.30 – Friday 12th at Pembroke Old Library.  Sold out already.

Oh I wish I had a ticket so I could wear a pretty dress.

The Velvet Onion Comedy Night – 8.30 – Friday 12th at Henry’s Bar and Café (Quayside).  £12.

My advice after the first of these is pre-drink, pre-drink, pre-drink and you will have a great night.  This time the line up includes Doc Brown, who the Guardian critic reckoned was ‘so funny that I slightly wet myself’.

New Hall Comedy in Aid of Amnesty – 9.00 – Friday 12th at New Hall Bar. £3 to Amnesty.

It's for a good cause and Ollie Kay is performing who apparently was described by Vanessa Feltz as "a bit like Russell Brand". 

Involved in a Cambridge event you would like mentioned?  Email me at [email protected].