REVIEW: Drowning On Dry Land, New Wimbledon Theatre Studio ✭✭✭✭✭

Drowning on Dry Land by Bournyack Theatre Company

Drowning On Dry Land is one of Ayckbourn’s most tonally surprising and unstable works; technically it is also one of his most sparingly and yet also elaborately written, combining apparent thinness of dialogue with intricately complex plotting, where motivation and reactions are typically merely suggested with the most delicate of shading, with hints, or shadows of meaning.

First Look: Consuming Passions, Stephen Joseph Theatre

Alan Ayckbourn's Consuming Passions at the Stephen Joseph Theatre

BritishTheatre.com is pleased to bring you these production images from Alan Ayckbourn’s Consuming Passions which is currently playing in rep at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough. Consuming Passions is two linked single-act plays, Premonitions and Repercussions, with east lasting 45 to 50 minutes in length. Consuming Passions is performed by members of the Stephen Joseph Theatre’s Summer Festival Rep Company – Rachel Caffrey, Andy Cryer, Louise Shuttleworth and Leigh Symonds. Melanie believes she has forseen the future – but has she really? Or is it all in her mind? True or false, she has seen events which threaten the life of one she secretly loves, and whose life is in terrible danger. What can she do or say to prevent things happening – and who on earth will believe her? Consuming Passions is written and directed by Alan Ayckbourn and runs until 8 October 2016 BOOK NOW FOR CONSUMING PASSIONS … Read more

Celebrate spring with Ayckbourn’s comedy of matrimonial mishaps

How The Other Half Loves at Theatre Royal Haymarket by Alan Ayckbourn. Tickets Now On Sale

Alan Ayckbourn’s farcical tale of marital manners, How The Other Half Loves will appear in the West End this spring. The 1969 classic – the first of Ayckbourn’s plays to be staged on Broadway – returns to London to play the Theatre Royal Haymarket from 23 March – 25 June and is produced by Bill Kenwright. Ayckbourn’s tale of social graces and personal misunderstanding remains one of the celebrated writer’s most famous comedies. An extraordinary success on opening in the West End in 1970 at the Lyric Theatre, How The Other Half Loves ran for a staggering 869 performances, delighting critics and audiences alike. How The Other Half Loves is directed by theatre director and biographer Alan Strachan. Alan has directed plays in New York, Copenhagen and Amsterdam, but the majority of his work has been in London. He was Artistic Director of the Greenwich Theatre in London for over … Read more

REVIEW: Joking Apart, Theatre Royal Windsor ✭✭✭✭

Joking Apart by Alan Ayckbourn at Theatre Royal Windsor

As with so many theatres of a certain age, the bar at the Theatre Royal is proudly lined with photos of bygone productions from the golden age of repertory theatre; and there, sure enough, were the production shots of a 1986 production of this very play, Joking Apart – all duffle coats, cravats and tweed jackets, floral print dresses, and big, frizzy hair-dos, taking you straight back to the 1970s. But the lesson of this fine production is that this is a timeless play that holds up as true a mirror to our foibles now as ever it did before.

Menier Revives Ayckbourn’s Communicating Doors

Alan Ayckbourn's Communicating Doors is to be revived at the Menier Chocolate Factory in May 2015

The Menier Chocolate Factory have today announced that they will stage the first London revival of Alan Ayckbourn’s comedy thriller Communicating Doors from the 7th May to the 27 June 2015. A hired dominatrix flees for her life through a hotel communicating door only to find herself 20 years in the past…. Communicating Doors won Ayckbourn the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain Best West End Play Award and the prestigious Molière Award in France. It was also nominated for an Olivier Award for Best Comedy. Communicating Doors will be directed by Lindsay Posner. Casting will be announced shortly. For further information visit the Menier Chocolate Factory website.

London Classic Theatre Announce UK Tour Of Absent Friends

London Classic Theatre present the UK tour of Absent Friends by Alan Ayckbourn.

Artistic Director of London Classic Theatre, Michael Cabot announced today that they would tour a production of Absent Friends by Alan Ayckbourn as part of their 15th anniversary season. Summer 1974. A well-intentioned tea party descends into chaos. Wealthy, unfulfilled housewife Diana arranges a gathering of old friends to cheer up bereaved Colin, whose fiancée drowned two months earlier. Paul, her bullying, self-absorbed husband, has recently had a dalliance with Evelyn, the glamorous wife of his friend and incompetent business associate, John. The party is completed by long-suffering Marge, who has left Gordon, her hypochondriac spouse, ailing at home. Preparations for the party spark tensions and open old wounds. As lingering resentments and deep-rooted jealousies surface, an unexpectedly cheerful Colin strolls into the mayhem. Acerbic and painfully funny, Absent Friends explores friendship, marriage and what it ultimately means to be happy. In one of his finest plays, Ayckbourn’s craftsmanship and … Read more