🎭October 24: Best Shows to See in Leeds

So, here we are, October and still waiting for summer. Never mind, it doesn’t rain inside theatres so let’s hit the shows.

Leeds Grand Theatre is occupied by Opera North for the entire month with their huge productions and, although I am really looking forward to them, I can’t wait to see the theatre’s refurb, from the photos I have seen it looks as though they have done a good job, I hope so, as it is a treasure.

The season begins on 27th September with The Magic Flute by Mozart. Although premiering in September, it continues on various dates until 11th October. It is one of the greatest operas of all time featuring a dashing prince, an evil sorcerer, an imprisoned young woman and The Queen of the Night, not to mention a bird catcher with a magic flute. The music is terrific as well. Rock me Amadeus!

From 12th to 31st October there is A Midsummer Night’s Dream with music by Benjamin Britten based on the comedy by William Shakespeare. When it comes to comedy he is no Peter Kay, but let’s give the lad a chance.

The month, and season, ends with Ruddigore, by Gilbert and Sullivan who were the Rice and Lloyd Webber of their day. This is another comedy which is about Sir Despard Murgatroyd who has inherited a curse that he must commit a crime a day or die in agony. I can’t see the problem myself, move to Wales and drive around the block at 25mph first thing every morning and the rest of your day is your own. You’ll see what Sir Des does between 26th October and 2nd November.

For more details and to book please visit Leeds Heritage Theatres or Open North.

Leeds Playhouse, meanwhile, has an eclectic mix of events beginning with Leeds International Festival of Ideas which takes up various spaces in the theatre complex from 2nd to 5th October. The participants include people as diverse as the chic Nile Rodgers, Kate Adie, Stacy Dooley, Carol Vorderman, Self Esteem. Tim Spector and Dr Amir Khan. For full details of the programme please click here.

From 10th to 12th October, Bramall Rock Void presents Danesha, ‘a coming-of-age story exploring black culture, queer joy and finding and loving your authentic self.’

For those awaiting their coming-of-age phase there is Peppa Pig’s Fun Day Out on 11th and 12th in Quarry. The times vary from 10.00am to 4.00pm so home in time for bed, and the little ones won’t be kept up too late either. There’s singing, dancing and muddy puddles with even more fun once you get to the theatre.

Emporium Curioso is open for business in Bramall Rock Void on 15th and 16th with all items on display having a story behind them, or provenance, as they would say on Antiques Road Show. The shop assistants are members of Bright Sparks, the Leeds based theatre company with a majority learning disability cast, hence the three showings are relaxed performances.

Running from 15th to 19th October in Courtyard is Please Right Back which is for those aged 8+ and is based on a true story combining fact, fantasy and science fiction. It’s amazing where your mind takes you when you are writing. It is presented by 1927 with the help of song, dance and animation.

Run, Rebel is an adaptation of Manjeet Mann’s novel by Pilot Theatre and aimed at those 11+ (I passed that!) It tells the story of Amber, who is trapped by her family’s rules, and the only place she feels free is on the running track. The faster she runs, the more the world slows down, enabling her to get her head straight. The play, which runs – see what I did there – from 22nd to 26th, combines ‘physical theatre, mesmerising visuals, and a talented ensemble cast.’

Bullring Techno Makeout Jamz is the name of the debut play from Nathan Queeley-Dennis and is described as a love letter to Birmingham. It explores Black masculinity through Beyonce lyrics, techno raves and a barber. It plays Bramall Rock Void from 23rd to 25th October.

I don’t want to burst anyone’s bubble, but the story of Cinderella is not really true, at least not according to Tutti Frutti Productions who tell it like it is to those of 3 years and upward in The Glass Slippers by Emma Reeves. It is performed twice on 26th October in Brammall Rock Void, with a BSL version at 11.00am and the standard one at 2.00pm. Should be a ball, or maybe not, if that bit isn’t true either.

The Bar at the Edge of Time is open for two sessions on both 29th and 30th at 11.00am and 1.30pm, obviously not a ’Spoons then. It is a multi-sensory spectacular for audiences with profound and multiple learning disabilities and their supporters, who get in free. The age guidance is 16+ and I recommend that you go to here, for more details and a couple of trailers outlining the show and the experience. It looks a lot jollier than my local.

Finally, in Courtyard on 31st October, there is the Arthur Miller classic The Crucible. It is presented by Leeds Conservatoire and Leeds Playhouse and set in the time of the Salem witch trials in Massachusetts. The performers are graduating actors and musicians from the Conservatoire with two shows, one at 2.00pm and the other at 7.30pm.

For details of all the above, complete with trailers, and to book please click here, or, better still, visit the theatre itself.

Carriageworks kicks off the month with Sheila’s Island, a play about four out-of-condition middle-aged businesswomen on a team building exercise. They have to overcome inclement weather, recriminations and shipwreck, all this whilst only being in the Lake District. If the cast can manage to get to the theatre it runs from 2nd to 5th October.

From 8th to 10th there is a double header entitled A Night of Crime Theatre – Stakeout and Death in Character. Stakeout is a thrilling two-hander in which a Detective Sergeant, on the verge of retirement, is paired with a rookie in order to catch the Kilburn Killer. Death in Character is a comedic whodunnit, concerning a double death at the Limelight Theatre Company’s last meeting in their theatre.

In total contrast we have Othello on 7th October. I think that Shakespeare’s classic will be familiar to a lot of people, as will the characters, Desdemona, Iago, The Duke of Venice and Othello the Moor. I am not sure if he is one of the Yorkshire Moors, we can but hope.

12th October sees, or rather hears, Adam Z Robinson, who was at Leeds Playhouse in March presenting Unhomely, tell three classic ghost stories on stage in a piece entitled Nightmares. There is The Judge’s House by Bram Stoker, The Kit-Bag by Algernon Blackwood and E Nesbit’s John Charrington’s Wedding. The age guidance is 14+

At the other end of the dramatic spectrum, even if you find the mere mention of the term health and fitness club terrifying, we have Waiting for Gateaux. It is a satire set in the worst such establishment in the North of Engand, where people gather out of loneliness rather than the desire to lose weight. Age guidance 18+. The thought has given me a business idea though. How about a Peloton sofa where the video is of someone urging you to eat that cake and drink that pint. Calories are served from 17th to19th October, Lycra optional.

Saturday, 19th October takes us back to the Swinging Sixties, and the year I could drive legally, with 68 The Musical. It takes on all aspects of the year with the glamour of fashionable London as well as the less flippant violent anti-Vietnam War protest in Grosvenor Square. One thing is for sure, the music will be good.

On Saturday 26th and Sunday 27th we have a show for those who are 6+ in The Chronicles of Atom and Luna. It is an epic fairytale about the eponymous twins who must adapt to a change of all the rules they live by and enter the dark wood to find Old Mother Redbeard and rescue their larger than life visitor, Iffy Sney.

Windrush Secret is a play set in 2018 about the plight of the Windrush Generation and centres on three characters, a young, white far right racist party leader, a black Caribbean diplomat and a white Oxford educated Home Office official, who are all giving speeches on the same day, but at different times and venues. One of them has a dark secret which he struggles to come to terms with during his oration. The play is on 29th October at 7.30pm.

The final show of the month is on Halloween, 31st October, but is for those 5 years and over and performed at 11.00am and 2.00pm. It is Shivers and Shadows, about Craig, who has just inherited a creepy mansion from his Great Uncle Vladimir where spooky stuff is going on amongst its strange inhabitants. There will be comedy, stories, live music and songs along with slapstick, silliness and surprises with loud noises which might make you jump! Sleep well children – woahhh.

Full programme is here.

Just the one theatrical event at Leeds City Varieties this month, who obviously don’t want to be left out of the scary stuff, because from 29th to 31st October, there is a presentation of Most Haunted – The Stage Show. It is obviously based on the world-wide paranormal investigation series. The presenters are Yvette Fielding and Karl Beattie with the Most Haunted team. Leeds City Varietis really does have its own resident ghosts, one of a man who hanged himself from the roof beams whilst a show was in progress, another in a bowler hat who occasionally plays the piano and the Lady in White, who patrols the building, making it cold as she passes by. Go see this show on Halloween, I dare you!

Here’s to next month – if we survive!