LATEST NEWS:
Our Next Production:
The Fifteen Streets
a play, adapted by Rob Bettinson, from the novel by Catherine Cookson
Wednesday 23rd until Saturday 26th November 2011
Set in 1910, this tells the story of one family's fight for physical and moral survival in the poverty and squalor of the dockland slums of Tyneside. At the centre is the apparently impossible love affair between rugged docker John O'Brien and Mary Llewellyn, the educated daughter of a wealthy family. Despite the differences in class and upbringing, Mary steadfastly refuses to let their love be hampered by social pressures...
Our Programme for 2012:
Maskerade
by Terry Pratchett, adapted for the stage by Stephen Briggs
Wednesday 29th February until Saturday 3rd March 2012
All is not well in the Ankh-Morpork Opera House... a ghost stalks in the dark corridors, leaving strange letters for the management and... killing people (none worth bothering about, though). Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg, two Lancre witches (See your Discworld Biography!), investigate and are soon involved in all kinds of skulduggery and mayhem...
Production TBC
Wednesday 16th until Saturday 19th May 2012
First Act Showcase
Our annual production showcasing all the work of our members
Friday 6th and Saturday 7th July 2012
Whistle Down the Wind
Wednesday 10th until Saturday 13th October 2012
In a small village in 1950s Lancashire, Cathy, a schoolgirl, hurrying to a barn with three rescued kittens, discovers a stranger hiding there. She recognises him immediately as Jesus Christ...
Adapted from the famous film and novel, this is a powerfull and moving musical.
For further information about any of the above and for tickets for all forthcoming shows, please contact:
Box Office on (0191) 266 2506 or
e-mail tickets@firstacttheatre.com
New Dance Workshops
We are delighted to announce the new arrival of the First Act family - Interval Dance.
Interval dance is the new weekly dance workshop for both male and female pupils aged between 8 and 17. With two sessions a week (beginners and intermediate) students will be able to enhance their skills, no matter what their level, and all work towards a performance to be shown to friends and family at the end of each term.
The beginner’s class will run on a Wednesday evening between 5:15pm and 6:45 and intermediate will run on a Monday evening between 7:00pm and 9:00pm.
The shows and workshops will be comprised of a wide variety of songs including popular music but also smash hits from musicals that are known and much loved.
If you are interested and wish to sign up or want to find out further information with regards to levels and prices then please contact Kate Okello to guarantee a place or for further enquiries:
Kate Okello
Dance Coordinator
First Act Theatre
Mobile: 0754-055-0102
Email: kateokello@hotmail.com
PREVIOUS PRODUCTIONS AND OTHER ACTIVITIES:
April 2011 - Bugsy Malone
Words and Music by Paul Williams
Libretto by Alan Parker; based on the film of the same name.
A slapstick musical comedy, Bugsy Malone follows the rivalry between two half-witted street gangs and the washed up, well-intentioned, one-time boxer who steps in to take control of Fat Sam's gang and give Dandy Dan and his boys what they've got coming. In this film noir spoof, the message is one of good, clean fun. The characters are wonderful cartoon cutouts and the weapons of choice are "splurge" whip cream guns, flour bombs, and custard pies...
To open a photo album of pictures from the show, click
here »
September 2010 - Filming at Bamburgh Castle, Northumberland
We were invited by Avison Ensemble to join them on the 3rd and 4th September 2010 as they prepared for their Rebellion concert of Jacobite music by Handel and Avison in the Great Hall at Bamburgh Castle. Our part was to create a film about the most daring escape from the Tower of London - that of the Jacobite William Maxwell, Lord Nithsdale.
Filming "Lady Nithsdale" at Bamburgh Castle
Lord Nithsdale was imprisoned in the Devereux Tower for his support for the 'Old Pretender' in the Jacobite rebellion of 1715. He was placed under sentence of death, but his distraught young wife rode to St. James' Palace where she threw herself at the feet of George I, to plead for her husband's life, grasping the skirt of his coat. He remained unmoved but Lady Nithsdale devised a plan to engineer her husband's escape.
Acquiring the help of a friend, Mrs Morgan and that of her landlady, Mrs Mills, Lady Nithsdale visited her husband the day before his intended execution. The rules allowed only two visitors at a time to enter a cell. Lord Nithsdale quickly put on a dress identical to that worn by Mrs. Mills. Lady Nithsdale called out to her friend, loud enough for the guards to hear, to bring her maid, whom she required to carry a last minute plea for mercy to the King. Mrs. Mills was then brought into the cell, suitably distraught and with her face buried in her handkerchief. Lord Nithsdale then donned her hood and was lead out by his wife, also clutching the handkerchief to his eyes.
She then returned to the cell and continued in a long pretended conversation with her husband. On leaving, they bid a compassionate goodbye to the empty cell walls and were escorted weeping from the fortress. Lord Nithsdale reached Rome in safety, where he was later joined by his wife.
If you want to open the photo album of the filming at Bamburgh Castle, click
here »
To see more pictures of the filming at Bamburgh Castle, click
here » (@ flikr.com))
