An empty stage, curtained back wall, red lights. Enter dishevelled young man in too-short trousers and a floppy felt hat, wielding an invisible broom. Cue classic clown/mime sequence, in which a series of imaginary objects and actions are animated by live sound – the performer’s own squeaks, whistles and body-percussion. Ideas and images start simply […]

Liverpool’s queer arts festival Homotopia has been a regular feature of the city’s jam-packed calendar for nine years. A month ago Gary Everett, its founder and artistic director, was named by the Independent on Sunday’s Pink Power List as one of the country’s movers and shakers. The accolade is a long time coming. Homotopia has […]

In a cottage in a deep, dark, specifically Eastern European forest, a family suffer a bad, completely empty-cupboarded famine. It’s important that we understand that this famine is a serious problem, but also that the forest is very far away – and so we are worried for the family, but not too concerned that a […]

Shunt are innovators whose ambitious work has long worried at the definitions of audience, venue and performance, creating perfectly perplexing theatre experiences whose power to unsettle and surprise through sheer theatricality have far outstripped the company’s many aesthetic imitators. The long running and late-lamented enterprise of Shunt Vaults (lost to the murky foundations of the […]

Io Theatre have brought together a stunning ensemble of musicians and performers to stage Jenny Nimmo’s novel The Snow Queen. The seven-person cast use captivating vocals, all kinds of percussion, a recorder, two violins, a clarinet, and even a full-size concert harp to tell the fantastical story of a boy who has inherited the craft […]