Theatre Guide Dog: Week 6

Who let the plays out? It certainly wasn’t the Theatre Guide Dog, but he’ll help chase them back in. Again. Thanklessly.

Amazing puns byron Cabaret Duck Fantasmagoriana footlights smoker Lily Cole Mexican Standoff Seagull Simon Haines Six Characters In Search Of An Author The Descent of Bot The House We Grew Up In


The remotely perceptive among you will have noticed in the above image a visual pun about this week’s theatre. No need to thank me. If the glories of its wit are yet to pierce your brain membranes, read on for some clues.

The Seagull (feat. Lily Cole) 1st- 5th March

The only ADC show this term to make it into the Daily Mail (thanks to a Tab tip-off), Chekhov’s comedy is reborn in a new version by Simon Haines. I assume the reason this is sold-out already is due to the insatiable hunger of Cambridge audiences for the subtleties of Chekhovian dramaturgy rather than the opportunity to gawk at a supermodel, but, as you well know, I am an incorrigible optimist.

ADC at 7.45  £6-10

Fantasmagoriana 2nd-5th March

See some Romantics get romanticised as this play pretends writing a novel, even Frankenstein, involves something more exciting than sitting at a desk perplexedly for months on end. That said, any chance to see Byron get lusty on-stage should probably be taken. It will presumably (and hopefully) look something like this.

ADC at 11  £4-5

Duck 1st-5th March

The week’s other mainshow named after a bird. According to The Evening Standard this play ‘hurls its audience into the heart of ladette culture’. There are probably more participatory ways of accessing ladette culture on a Tuesday-Saturday night in Cambridge, but theatre doesn’t usually give you a hangover, so there are pros and cons. It’s ‘relevant to today’s society’ – whether this is a pro or con is up to you.

Corpus at 7  £5-6

If Molière Walked in the MOMA 1st-5th March

For those of you who’ve ever wondered how modern art and French Neoclassicism go together. Or don’t. This intriguing (I don’t say that often) piece of new writing is effectively an update of Les Precieuses Ridicules, with the business end of the satire applied to the wanky pretensions of ‘arty’ people today, rather than the lot the piece was originally aimed at, whom we only remember because Molière wrote bitchy jokes about them. I hope for pristine Alexandrine couplets, but will probably have to settle for prose.

Corpus at 9.30  £5-6

The House We Grew Up In 4th-5th March

New writing. In the ’60s an evacuee visits the place he got evacuated to before it gets swallowed up by water to make a reservoir. Ain’t progress grand? He reminisces about The War, which I’m reliably informed the youth of today can’t get enough of. On the plus side it’s free, so you only have your time to lose.

Judith E. Wilson Studio – English Faculty at 7.30 pm  Free

Cabaret 2nd-5th March

‘Includes… scantily-clad cabaret girls’. For many, this is all ye know, and all ye need to know. If you failed to get your salubrious digits on a ticket to see Miss Cole, this is the week’s second-best voyeur territory. Of course, despite putting on a show set in Weimar Berlin, Magdalene Musical Society have more to offer than just sleaze; go for deft instrumentation and catchy numbers and characters with names prefixed by ‘Fräulein’. Go for the sleaze too.

Cripps Court Auditorium – Magdalene at 7.45  £5-8

Six Characters in Search of an Author 4th-5th March

Plays about plays are ten-a-penny (this says a lot about Thespians) – here’s another. The first ever performance made an angry mob of its audience. Cambridge theatre-goers are are far too genteel for that, but anything which can seriously upset ’20s Italians en masse is probably worth a look.

Howard Theatre – Downing at 7.30  £5-£6

Mexican Standoff 27th February – 1st March

If any of you have been wondering who TheMexican InCambridge is, and why he has added/neglected to add you on Facebook, turns out he’s just a VIRAL TOOL to advertise this thing. It deploys the traditional vaunt of being ‘unlike anything… in Cambridge before’ – at best this can only be true of the first performance.

Newnham Old Labs at 7.45  £4

Footlights Smoker 1st March

Jokes will be there. If you haven’t bought a ticket already, you won’t be.

ADC at 11  £6-7

The Descent of Bot 2nd-5th March (except 4th)

New sci-fi writing from the optimistically-named ‘Making Good Theatre’ company. Featuring robots and scientists in space. To my knowledge there aren’t an awful lot of science-fiction plays about. There are probably good reasons for this. Given the price, you can afford to be curious. Curiosity may kill cats, but unsurprisingly this doesn’t bother me overmuch.

…because I’m a dog.

Judith E. Wilson Studio – English Faculty at 7.30 (at 10 on 5th March)  Free

If your contemptible little show has been overlooked and you would like it included, e-mail [email protected] and we’ll give you what you want. Maybe.