Plays –Past

This warm, witty, funny play is an ideal alternative to the usual Christmas fare. Mizzis Horrocks’ class is about to perform their nativity play at Flint Street Junior School for the proud mums and dads – and the occasional social worker. Squabbles and ego’s arise and liven up the traditional script

Bernard (Andy Duncan) is planning a romantic weekend with his chic Parisian mistress (Amanda Duffin), in his charming converted French farmhouse, whilst his wife Jacqueline (Natasha Gray), is away. He has arranged for a Cordon Bleu cook (Tracy Bridgeman) to prepare gourmet delights, and has invited his best friend, Robert (James White), along too to provide the alibi. It’s foolproof; what could possibly go wrong? An unexpected husband (Fozz Ellis) perhaps? When Jacqueline changes her plans, Bernard has to think on his feet… a superb comedy of confusion ensues with mistaken identities, cover ups, dresses off and truly appalling cooking It’s a real “who’s who” of who’s-whose-lover, full of twists and turns. Naughty and sublimely silly the clever cast pile on the comic chaos.

The Athelstan Players entered the Hj1Act Play Festival in Pewsey on Friday 23rd March with their one act play Dig for the Diggers by Lynn Brittney. It is a WW1 play about the the first Australians that were DNA tested from the battle of Fromelles on the 19th and 29th July 1916.  The characters in the play are fictitious but the historical facts are all true.

An evening of mystery and intrigue with a play in 3 short acts giving you a chance to solve the murder.

You and your team will witness the unfolding drama set in the fictional Footlight’s Theatre, in the quiet village of Finkleton Fold. The ‘Powder Keg Players’, led by their dynamic director Ralph Valentine, are rehearsing their own murder play called ‘A Stab in the Dark’. Rehearsals are not going well and the company are under pressure. Tensions are running high. There is a death in the actors’ production, yet rehearsals come to an abrupt halt when Ralph is stabbed for real onstage. But who switched knives? Who holds a grudge bitter enough to engineer his murder?

Act 1: Something Old, Something New. Jet, an ageing rocker, finally accepts his hell-raising days are over  when he learns some home truths, and his sham marriage to his long suffering PA, Pat, becomes something more.

Act 2: Something Borrowed. Gaynor, a northern lass, takes control of the situation when her new husband Sam, a cockney lad, loses all his money and his business on a horse.

Act 3: Something Blue. Enrico gets more than he bargained for, as Paula seeks revenge during a dirty weekend. 

Frances, the genial, Irish hotel porter passes through all three plays with her homespun philosophy.

Act 1 won Best Play at the 2015 Harold Jolliffe 1 Act Play festival (Best Director for Jackie Morris and Best Actress for Natasha Gray), then won the All England Play festival Quarter Final at Wootton Bassett (Best Director for Jackie Morris, Best Actor for Bob Charman) and the Semi-Final at Ferndown, Dorset. This play was one of the 4 finalists in the English Finals in Harrogate on 6th June.

The play is about the plague that came to Eyam in Derbyshire in 1665 - to contain it the villagers cut themselves off from the outside world until the plague was over.

Athelstan Players won the Betty Peck Rosebowl at Swindon Harold Jolliffe One Act Play festival for the Winning Play in April 2014.  Amanda Duffin won a cup for best adult performance by an actress and the group won the BBC Wiltshire Audience award.

 Sue Poole, Jackie Peel and Val Chapman made all the authentic costumes and this was highly praised by the adjudicator.

This 'comedy of detection', as Priestley called it, is set in the 1938 in the Greenfingers Palace Hotel on the edge of the Peak District. A small advance party of staff arrive a fortnight early to prepare the hotel for the opening season and find themselves snowbound as the weather takes a turn for the worse, roads become impassable and telephone lines go down. This, however, does not prevent surprise visitors arriving at the hotel, the first of whom is Mr. Crowther, the hotel company’s detective.

Unusual events leave Detective Crowther with a cartload of mysteries to solve. Never one to shy away from the task, he immediately sets to work, interrogating and accusing staff members one by one, ingeniously discovering clues, and coming to audaciously clever conclusions – or, at least, so he thinks.

Daisy Pulls it Off by Denise Deegan is a tongue-in-cheek look at the world of the girls' private school. It is about the attempts of superachiever Daisy Meridith to hide her poor elementary school background, and be accepted into the snobby confines of Grangewood School for Young Ladies.

The plucky girl undergoes many tribulations, but comes right in the end with Daisy saving the lives of snobby Sybil and toady Monica, discovering hidden family treasure, scoring the winning goal at hockey and finding her long-lost father!

Elsie and Norm have decided to have a bit of a bash at culture by staging a production of Macbeth in their living-room. After a spot of judicious re-writing by Norm to make it snappier and more punchy, and undaunted by the large cast, Elsie and Norm set out to act "one of the greatest pieces of literature what has ever been wrote in the English language", playing all the characters between them. The hilarious results set Shakespeare spinning in his grave!

Idle chat, romantic delusions and licentious gossip give us a comical insight into six ladies of various dispositions waiting for that elusive Number 165 bus, in this one-act modern play.

A naïve young couple’s offer to treat their servants to a trip to the theatre causes chaos in this light-hearted one act comedy

See a review that was published in Swindon Advertiser.

It is 1930 and in a roadside inn outside Berlin Pavel Alexandrovich sits reading - keeping very much to himself. A salesman, Liszt, arrives in search of lodgings. He engages Pavel in conversation about the war period. Reluctant at first, Pavel eventually recounts how he assisted in the execution of Tsar Nicholas.

It has haunted him ever since. His story leads to the perennial mystery of Anastasia’s fate. Surprisingly, Pavel suspects that a prostitute at the inn could be the Russian princess. The denouement is even more surprising - but by then Pavel is too sunk in alcoholic oblivion to realize it.

Winner of the One Act Play Festival, Swindon 2006 including Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Best Director, Best Technical Achievement.