Playhouse Creatures

By April De Angelis

The year is 1669: a bawdy and troublesome time. 

Theatres have just reopened after seventeen years of Puritan suppression. There is a surge in dramatic writing and  English actresses appear on stage ​- the first time female actors have been allowed to perform in ​public.

Playhouse Creatures focuses on five of the most famous (Nell Gwyn, Elizabeth Farley, Rebecca Marshall, Doll Common and Mary Betterton) to provide a moving and often comic account of the precarious lives of Restoration actresses.

Directed by Mark Carroll

Fri 5th - Sun 7th April 2024

ACT Diploma Yr2 Public Show

7.30pm £12 /£10

The Lantern Theatre Brighton,
77 St James's Street, BN21PA

Wed 13 Dec 2023, 8:00PM
Thu 14 Dec 2023, 8:00PM
Fri 15 Dec 2023, 8:00PM

Tickets: £12.00 / £10.00

The Caucasian Chalk Circle
by Bertolt Brecht

Handbag

by Mark Ravenhill

Twenty-eight years before The Importance of Being Earnest, a young woman gives birth to a baby boy. Is it an accident when Nanny places him in a handbag and her unpublished novel into the pram? In 1998 a new baby is stolen and an academic discovers an unpublished novel of more than usual revolting sentimentality. From Victorian wet nurses to 90s sperm banks, Mark Ravenhill's play examines the role of parenting in an age of diverse sexualities, biological engineering and Tinky Winky's handbag.

Trigger Warning - contains explicit sexual references and scenes of a distressing nature. Suitable for 16+

"In Shopping and Fucking, Mark Ravenhill made theatre relevant to the Thatcher generation. Now he's put videos and Net-surfing in Faust. And it's no less stunning" (Guardian)

"There are few stage authors writing more interestingly than Mark Ravenhill. He is - it is now yet more evident - a searing, intelligent, disturbing sociologist with a talent for satirical dialogue and a flair for sexual sensationalism" (Financial Times)

Mark Ravenhill is one of the most distinctive contemporary UK playwrights. He burst on to the theatre scene in 1996 with the huge hit Shopping and Fucking. He has continued to garner critical acclaim for plays that include Some Explicit Polaroids, Mother Clap's Molly House, Shoot/Get Treasure/Repeat, Ten Plagues (A Song Cycle), The Cane and The Boy in the Dress.

ACT Diploma in Acting present
Terrorism
by The Presnyakov Brothers

ACT Diploma present the extraordinary debut play from the Royal Court by two brothers from Siberia. A series of seemingly unrelated scenes portray the ordinary frustrations of everyday life: office workers bickering, a couple committing adultery, grannies complaining about their husbands. But the scenes unfold to reveal the mistrust and dysfunction that have become the norm, in Russia and elsewhere.Terrorism by the Presnyakov Brothers was first performed, in this English translation by Sasha Dugdale, at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in 2003.

'A bitter, funny, penetrating look at the toxic effects of living with fear... Terrorism shrugs off more ideas in quarter of an hour's wit than most political debating plays do in an evening'. Observer.

ACT Foundation in Acting present
Great Expectations
By Charles Dickens, Adapted by Neil Bartlett

Neil Bartlett's powerful stage version of this much-loved story brings its settings and characters to thrilling theatrical life. From its opening image of little Pip, alone on the windswept marshes, to the haunted darkness of mad Miss Havisham's cobweb-strewn lair, this brand-new adaptation takes its audience on a journey right to the heart of Dickens' great exploration of childhood terrors and hopes - and of adult dreams and regrets

Directed by William Ellis

ACT Diploma In Acting present
The Cherry Orchard
by Anton Chekhov translation by Michael Frayn

"Frayn's translation, which strikes me as splendidly lucid and alive...will be acted again and again" (New Statesman).

In Chekhov's tragi-comedy - perhaps his most popular play - the Gayev family is torn by powerful forces deeply rooted in history and the society in which they live. Their estate is hopelessly in debt and when urged to cut down their beautiful cherry orchard and sell the land for holiday cottages, they are confronted by an impossible decision.

"At the time when The Cherry Orchard was written, the years before the revolution of 1905, Chekhov considered revolution in Russia irreversible and desirable."

Directed by Sian Webber.

ACT Foundation In Acting present
Two
By Jim Cartwright

Set in a local northern pub - Two tells the story of the The Landlord and Landlady, their cheery greeting and friendly banter barely disguises their contempt for each other. They met outside the pub when they were kids and now they own the place. During the course of the evening assorted customers pass through, and we get a small snapshot into each of their lives.

From the award-winning writer of Little Voice and Road - Jim Cartwright's third play Two, was first performed in 1989 at the Octagon Theatre in Bolton, then transferred to the Young Vic Theatre. It won the Manchester Evening News Theatre Award for Best New Play.

Directed by Jules Craig.

ACT Diploma In Acting present
A Chorus of Disapproval
By Alan Ayckbourn

The Pendon Amateur Light Operatic Society's production of The Beggar's Opera is going off the rails, that is until a shy young widower Guy joins the group.
An instant hit with the company's ferociously zealous director Dafydd and the show's leading ladies, including Dafydd's wife Hannah, Guy soon gets more than he bargained for as he discovers that all the best action happens off-stage.
Parallels are skilfully drawn between The Beggar's Opera and the day to day activities of the society which is performing it.

Directed by Paul Tripp.

ACT Diploma In Acting present
An Experiment with an Air Pump
By Shelagh Stephenson

1799 - On the eve of a new century, the house buzzes with scientific experiments, furtive romance and farcical amateur dramatics. 1999 - In a world of scientific chaos, cloning and genetic engineering, the cellar of the same house reveals a dark secret buried for 200 years.

An Experiment with an Air Pump was joint recipient of the 1997 Margaret Ramsay Award and premiered at The Royal Exchange Theatre Company, Manchester in February 1997. Her previous play The Memory of Water won the 1996 Writers' Guild Award for Best Original Radio Play and the 1997 Sony Award for Best Original Drama.

Directed by Daniel Finlay.

ACT Foundation In Acting present
Terrorism
by The Presnyakov Brothers
translated by Sasha Dugdale

The extraordinary debut play from the Royal Court by two brothers from Siberia. A series of seemingly unrelated scenes portray the ordinary frustrations of everyday life: office workers bickering, a couple committing adultery, grannies complaining about their husbands. But the scenes unfold to reveal the mistrust and dysfunction that have become the norm, in Russia and elsewhere.

'A play with this title has an obvious resonance right now. But the extraordinary thing about this deft and brilliant piece by Siberia's Presnyakov Brothers is the way it extends... This is a play about the breakdown of society in contemporary Russia. What astonishes is the cool, sardonic wit that the Presnyakov brothers bring to their task... beautifully realised in Sasha Dugdale's translation'. Guardian

Directed by Daniel Finlay.

ACT Diploma In Acting present
A Flea In Her Ear
by Georges Feydeau
adapted by John Mortimer

A Flea in her Ear is a classic French farce hilariously written by Georges Feydeau and adapted by John Mortimer.

A suspicious wife sets a trap to expose her cheating husband who bears an uncanny resemblance to a drunken hotel porter. When circumstances conspire to bring the two men together at the Frisky Puss Hotel on the Avenue Coq d'Or... all hell breaks loose.

This bawdy romp of sexual manners promises an evening of rib-tickling hilarity, hi-jinx a-plenty and a satisfying denoument.

Directed by Paul Tripp.

ACT Diploma In Acting present
Love and Information
by Caryl Churchill

Someone sneezes. Someone can't get a signal. Someone won't answer the door. Someone put an elephant on the stairs. Someone's not ready to talk. Someone is her brother's mother. Someone hates irrational numbers. Someone told the police. Someone got a message from the traffic light. Someone's never felt like this before.

In this fast moving kaleidoscope, more than a hundred characters try to make sense of what they know.

Directed by Janette Eddisford.

ACT Foundation In Acting present
The Winter's Tale
by William Shakespeare

When King Leontes suspects his wife Hermione of adultery his jealousy tears the kingdom apart. The queen is banished and believed dead, while their daughter Perdita is abandoned among simple shepherd folk. Passionate tragedy interweaves with pastoral comedy, leading to one of Shakespeare's most magical and moving denouements.

Directed by John Link.

ACT Youth Theatre present
Task 67

You have been invited to witness the culmination of months of testing and research, to view the final phase of our experiment wherein you are the final stage. The tests you will witness are all necessary to bring back the power of our once great nation, so we may combat the threats to our home. With the use of artificially induced psychogenic amnesia, sustained by a small computer matrix planted in the neck, we can ensure your safety, and if the test goes well - the safety of our people, long may we stand.

Task 67 see's 18 strangers with their memories stolen waking up in a small chamber with complete strangers.

An Introduction to Playwriting: Staged Readings

5 new plays from the students of ACT's Introduction To Playwriting Course. Each student has developed a new short play during the course and these will be performed (script in hand) by professional actors.

Mr Pickton's Lunch - Louise Lee, Nostalgia for Lost Futures - Ian Lawton, Persephone Rising - Paul Stoyle, Samir mere lal (A Crisis) - Vandana Joshi, This is not an act - James Pemberton, Unnatural Selection - Emma Donaghy

Directed by Franklyn McCabe.

ATCL Diploma In Acting Showcase 2016

The best and the brightest of Brighton's new acting talent

Our 2016 graduates have already acquired substantial stage and film experience and are an extremely diverse and highly castable group in terms of age, type and ethnicity.

The academy positively encourages students who have had considerable life experience, having already pursued other careers and life ambitions. Having rigorously applied themselves to their actor training; these graduate actors now bring humanity, depth and understanding to their performances.

We guarantee you an entertaining event with actors of potential and promise.

Industry Professionals - for complimentary tickets to the London or Brighton Showcase please contact the school on 01273 818266 or email info@actbrighton.org

General Public - Tickets are available for the Brighton Showcase only and are £10.00. These are available online - see link below - or via the school 01273 818266 or email info@actbrighton.org or online.

London: Invited Industry Only
Thursday 30th June 1.00pm Jermyn Street Theatre, London.

Brighton: Public Show
Saturday 16th July 8.00pm The Old Market, Hove.

Act Foundation in Acting
Filumena
by Eduardo De Filippo

Filumena is Eduardo de Filippo's best-known work and arguably his finest comedy, drenched in Neapolitan atmosphere and full of entanglements at once romantic and cynical.

Set in the balmy heat of late 1940s Naples, Filumena Marturano lies on her deathbed waiting to marry Domenico Soriano, the man who has kept her as his mistress for twenty-five years. But no sooner has the priest completed the ceremony, than Filumena makes a miraculous recovery. As he reels in shock, Domenico discovers that this brilliant, iron-willed woman has a few more surprises for him.

Directed by Andrew Hoggarth

Act Foundation in Acting
Boys' Life
by Howard Korder

Boys' Life - An acerbically funny portrait of male behavior, Boys' Life tracks three young urbanites on the make. Howard Kissel of the New York Daily News proclaimed it 'utterly captivating,' and The New Yorker's Mimi Kramer called it 'the most balanced and intelligent comment on the battle of the sexes I've seen in a long time.'

Directed by Sarah Mann

Act Diploma in Acting
A Midsummer Night's Dream
by William Shakespeare

The course of true love never did run smooth...

Hermia loves Lysander & Helena loves Demetrius but Demetrius is about to marry Hermia... the Duke tries to force the marriage & so the entangled lovers flee to the forest & fly into the fallout of marital discord between the King and Queen of the Faeries. Frying pan, fire, lust, desire - all conspire to create a melee of mayhem & hilarity.

AKT Seniors
A Double Bill:
Immune by Oladipo Agboluaje &
Fugee by Abi Morgan

Immune
by Oladipo Agboluaje

It's an ordinary day in an ordinary school and they are ordinary kids. A bully, a crush, a fight behind the bike sheds, showcase rehearsals and double chemistry! Today the chemical reactions will change them forever. When the bell rings today there's no going home. The adults are all dead, where does that leave the kids?

Fugee
by Abi Morgan

Kojo is 14 but can't prove it. Ara's from Baghdad and still hears bombs. Cheung does back flips and is from a 1,000 yr old Chinese village. Orphans, abandoned in London, they are now each other's street family. Together, they tell Kojo's story of lost childhood, tall trees and a murder by a child that everyone says is a man

Intro to Playwriting: Staged Readings

Two nights of performed readings of 6 brand new plays created by students from the Inaugral ACT Playwriting Course. Introduced by Course Leader and Playwright, Franklyn McCabe, RADA graduate. In the last 18 months, he has had commissions from The Bush Theatre, Arts Council, The Nightingale and Hydrocracker. Recent work includes Red Sea Fish (Brighton Dome and 59E59 Theaters, New York), and Ten Men - The Lives of John Bindon (The Old Market, Hove and Rich Mix, London). Frank was one of the BBC WritersRoom 10 for 2014/15.

Friday 19th February @ 8pm: Comin' Thru The Rye by Jasper Kent, Dolphins by David Page and Houseplant by Kate Lloyd.

Saturday 20th February @ 8pm: Lif,Love & Nigella Lawson by Amanda Rose, The Local by Helen Colomb and Rivers by Alena Skalova

Act Diploma in Acting
Earthquakes In London
by Mike Bartlett

It's Cabaret, we've got our heads down and we're dancing and drinking as fast as we can. The enemy is on its way, but this time it doesn't have guns and gas, it has storms and earthquakes, fire and brimstone...You were the glimmer. At the end of the tunnel. And you went out.

An all-pervasive fear of the future and a guilty pleasure in the excesses of the present drive Mike Bartlett's epic rollercoaster of a play from 1968 to 2525 and back again. Earthquakes in London includes burlesque strip shows, bad dreams, social breakdown, population explosion, worldwide paranoia. It is a fast and furious metropolitan crash of people, scenes and decades, as three sisters attempt to navigate their dislocated lives and loves, while their dysfunctional father, a brilliant scientist, predicts global catastrophe.

Mike Bartlett's contemporary and directed dialogue combines a strong sense of humanity with epic ambition, as well as finely-aimed shafts of political comment embedded effortlessly into every scene.

Act Diploma in Acting
This May Hurt A Bit
by by Stella Feehily

A month after stating 'we will stop the top-down reorganisation of the NHS that has got in the way of patient care', the government launched the biggest top-down reorganisation the service had seen in its 65-year history.

With characteristic wit, tenderness, and dives into surrealism, Stella Feehily's new play explores one family's journey through the digestive system of the NHS, and asks: what is the prognosis for this much-loved, and fiercely debated, institution?

Act Foundation in Acting
13
by Mike Bartlett

Morning in London, Autumn 2011. Across the city, people wake up from an identical, terrifying dream. At the same moment, a young man named John returns home after years away to find economic gloom, ineffective protest, and a Prime Minister about to declare war. But John has a vision for the future and a way to make it happen.

Coincidences, omens and visions collide with political reality in this epic new play from the writer of Earthquakes in London. Set in a dark and magical landscape, it depicts a London both familiar and strange, a London staring into the void. In a year which has seen governments fall as the people take to the streets, 13 explores the meaning of personal responsibility, the hold that the past has over the future and the nature of belief itself.

Act Diploma in Acting
Three Sisters
By Anton Chekhov

In a remote Russian town, Olga, Masha and Irina yearn for the adrenaline rush of life in Moscow - but their plans go nowhere. Disaster, deception, meaningless self-sacrifice - in Chekhov's heartbreaking masterpiece, each new twist of fate sees the sisters' control over their destiny slip away.

Directed by John Link

Act Diploma in Acting
The Cherry Orchard
By Anton Chekhov

Russia at the turn of the 20th century. Madame Ranevskaya, a once wealthy landowner returns home almost impoverished after five years abroad. Her vast and beautiful cherry orchard is to be sold off against her crippling debts. Struggling with the uncomfortable reality of the present, Ranevskaya ignores the insistent warnings and advice of Lopakhin, a peasant's son turned wealthy businessman, and instead seeks solace in the past.

Directed by Viv Berry

ACT Youth Theatre Present
Hacktivists
by Ben Ockrent

When Eloise is tasked with showing new girl, Beth, around the school, she takes her to the "Hackerspace" where her and her gang of nerdy friends hang out - a disused portacabin they've turned into a student-run IT lab. Although the gang call themselves Hackers, their activities are entirely harmless... Until the gang's self-elected leader, Archie, is humiliated by the school bully and Beth inspires them to use their tech-savviness to avenge him. Revelling in their newfound power, the group allow Beth to lead them in an increasingly dangerous direction. With Archie usurped and everyone in Beth's thrall, just what kind of hackers will they become and what will it take to stop them?

Hacktivists appears as part of The National Theatre New Connections 2015- the UK's most exciting festival of Youth Theatre. NT Connections 2015

National Theatre Connections

Venue: Lantern Theatre @ ACT Brighton
Date: 19th - 21st February 2015
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £7 (£5 Cons)

Venue: The Capitol Theatre, Horsham
Date: Friday 8 May 2015
Time: 7pm
Tickets: TBC

ATCL Diploma In Acting Showcase 2014

The best and the brightest of Brighton's new acting talent

Our 2014 graduates have already acquired substantial stage and film experience and are an extremely diverse and highly castable group in terms of age, type and ethnicity.

The academy positively encourages students who have had considerable life experience, having already pursued other careers and life ambitions. Having rigorously applied themselves to their actor training; these graduate actors now bring humanity, depth and understanding to their performances.

We guarantee you an entertaining event with actors of potential and promise.

Industry Professionals - for complimentary tickets to the London or Brighton Showcase please contact the school on 01273 818266 or email info@actbrighton.org

General Public - Tickets are available for the Brighton Showcase only and are £8.50. These are available online - see link below - or via the school 01273 818266 or email info@actbrighton.org or online.

London: Invited Industry Only
Wednesday 2nd July 1.00pm Jermyn Street Theatre, London.

Brighton: Public Show
Saturday 12th July 8.00pm The Old Market, Hove.

ACT Foundation Present
Our Town
By Thornton Wilder

Set in the fictional American small town of Grover's Corners, Our Town tells the story of an average town's citizens in the early twentieth century as depicted through their everyday lives.

Imaginatively staged and directed by Julian Kerridge

7th - 10th July 2014
ACT Brighton
8-10 Rock Place, Brighton
8pm
£7.50 £6.00 (cons)

ACT Creative Playground
Separate Tables
By Terence Rattigan

Set in a run-down, South Coast hotel filled with genteel sadness, Separate Tables consists of two interlinked playlets. In the first, Table by the Window, a lonely divorcee tracks down her former husband, in order to resume a kind of half-life with him. In Table Number Seven, the second act, we witness the public exposure of a bogus Major accused of sexual assault in the local cinema.

20th - 22nd July 2014
The Marlborough Theatre
4 Princes Street, Brighton
8pm
Tickets £7.50 & £6.00 (Cons)

ACT Diploma in Acting
A Month In The Country
by Ivan Turgenev
Adapted by Brian Friel
Directed by Sean McLevy

Brian Friel's free adaptation of Turgenev's timeless comedy is elegant, ironic and has a nice, contemporary bite. Love triangles abound during the balmy days of summer and temperatures rise as requited and unrequited loves form a daisy chain of desire... Natalya loves the young tutor, who is loved by her pretty teenage ward, who has a marriage proposal from the creepy old neighbour. The husband is oblivious and his best mate fancies Natalya too. A month of passion, frustration and hilarity ensues. If you love Chekhov, you'll love this version.

Venue: The Old Market, Upper Market Street, Hove, BN3 1AS
Date: 3rd - 5th April 2014
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Saturday 5th April matinee at 2.30pm
Tickets: £12.50 (£10.50 Cons)

ACT Diploma in Acting
The Laramie Project
by Moisés Kaufman and members of the Tectonic Theatre Project
Directed by Janette Eddisford

The true-life re-enactment of a small American town reeling in the aftermath of the homophobic murder of Matthew Shepard.

On October 7th 1998, a young gay man was discovered bound to a fence in the hills outside Laramie, Wyoming, savagely beaten and left to die in an act of brutality and hate that shocked the nation. Matthew Shepard's death provoked extreme reactions - from the GOD HATES FAGS preaching of Rev Fred Phelps to national outpouring of revulsion against hate - but for the people of Laramie the event was deeply personal and it's their voices we hear in this stunningly effective theatre piece.

Moises Kaufman and his New York Tectonic Theatre Project travelled to Laramie four weeks after the murder. Over the following eighteen months, they interviewed more than 200 people affected by the death, thus bearing witness to the massive impact on that all-American town and its search for truth and reconciliation, while all America and the whole world was watching.

ACT's revival of this astonishing piece comes 15 years after the original events.

Matthew Shepard would have celebrated his 37th Birthday on December 1st - this year's World AIDS day - so we are raising money for the Terrence Higgins Trust in his memory - watch out for our 'ANGEL ACTION' on the streets of Brighton and Hove on Sunday 1st December.

"We tried to tell the story of the town of Laramie. As opposed to telling the story of Matthew Shepard"
Moises Kaufman

Directed for the Academy of Creative Training by Janette Eddisford, this challenging piece, sensitively interpreted by the company, will be performed in the round at the Nightingale Theatre.

"Deeply moving.... this play is Our Town with a question mark, as in could this be our town?" New York Times

"You should not miss a theatrical and human event that deserves standing up for with applause, or better, silently, taking an important lesson profoundly to heart." New York Magazine

The Nightingale Theatre
Surrey Street, Brighton
14th - 18th December 2013
8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £10.00 (£8.00 Cons)

With donation: Tickets: £12.50 (£9.50 Cons)

A donation of £2.50 full price or £1.50 concession will be passed on to The Terrence Higgins Trust. Terrence Higgins Trust is the UK's leading HIV and sexual health charity, providing a wide range of services to over 50,000 people a year. Visit us at www.tht.org.uk.

ACT Foundation in Acting
Habeas Corpus
By Alan Bennett
Directed by Sarah Mann and Dylan Brown

Habeas Corpus A comedy set in Brighton in the 1970s. The lust and longing of the permissive society has well and truly taken hold of the apparently respectable Wicksteed family. With a succession of characters ranging from a rampant doctor and a randy vicar to a frustrated flat-chested spinster and a baffled domestic cleaner, this rollicking farce is as saucy and English as a seaside postcard...

Venue: The Nightingale Theatre, Surrey Street, Brighton
Date: 9th - 12th July 2013
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £8.00 (£6.00 Cons)

The best and the brightest of brighton's new acting talent

Our 2013 graduates have already acquired substantial stage and film experience and are an extremely diverse and highly castable group in terms of age, type and ethnicity.

The academy positively encourages students who have had considerable life experience, having already pursued other careers and life ambitions. Having rigorously applied themselves to their actor training; these graduate actors now bring humanity, depth and understanding to their performances.

We guarantee you an entertaining event with actors of potential and promise.

Industry Professionals - for complimentary tickets to the London or Brighton Showcase please contact the school on 01273 818266 or email info@actbrighton.org

General Public - Tickets are available for the Brighton Showcase only and are £8.00. These are available online - see link below - or via the school 01273 818266 or email info@actbrighton.org or online.

London:
Thursday 4th July 1.30pm
Tristan Bates Theatre
1A Tower St, Covent Garden WC2H 9NP
Brighton:
Saturday 13th July 8.00pm
The Old Market
11a Upper Market Street, Hove BN3 1AS

Confusions is a collection of four short, interlinked but self-contained, comedy plays; 'Mother Figure' demonstrates how detachment from the outside world can affect adult responses, with comic results. 'Between Mouthfuls' - two couples eat at the same restaurant, the waiter is not the only thing the couples have in common. 'Gosforth's Fete' takes the premise that despite meticulous planning, anything that can go wrong, will... and examines with hilarious results the inevitable impact it has on the fete's organisers and their tenuous relationships. 'A Talk in the Park' turns out to be anything but a talk in the park for each of the characters involved. Ayckbourn is the master at finding the comedy in every situation.

Venue: The Nightingale Theatre, Surrey Street, Brighton
Date: 18th - 20th July 2013
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £7.00 (£5.00 Cons)

Brighton Theatre Collective
Road
by Jim Cartwright

3rd May to 1st June 2013
@ The Academy Of Creative Training, Brighton

Award-winning Brighton Theatre Collective present this modern classic - 'Road' by Jim Cartwright.

It is 1987 and Margaret Thatcher has just been re-elected for a third term, bringing with her the hugely unpopular community charge. Unemployment rises above three million again. Race riots break out in Leeds. On Black Monday the Wall Street crash leads to 50 Million pounds being wiped off the London Stock Exchange. For the first time Acid house raves are held in the UK.

At the Royal Court Theatre in London a brutal eloquent, angry play about life in a row of terraced houses in Lancashire is taking audiences and critics by storm.

In the course of one wild night, the drunken guide Scullery conducts a tour of his road. A surreal vision of the contemporary urban landscape - uncomfortable and magical, funny and bitter. It is a northern Under Milk Wood, high on pills and booze.

Voted Third best play of the decade - Time Out
Voted in the top fifty plays of all time - National Theatre

Directed by Julian Kerridge whose debut film Seamonsters starring Rita Tushingham was nominated Best Film at the Raindance Film Festival 2012 and won the Grand Jury Prize at the Nantes Film 2012.

Academy Of Creative Training
8-10 Rock Place
Brighton BN2 1PF
Date: 3rd May to 1st June 2013
Wed-Fri 7.30pm
Sat 2pm & 7.30pm
Sun 5pm
Tickets: £9.50 (£7.50 Cons)
Box Office 01273 818266

ACT Diploma in Acting
Measure For Measure
By William Shakespeare
Directed by Sian Webber

"Some Rise by Sin & Some by Virtue Fall."

Sex... Death..... A corrupt ruler.....An immoral city.... A tale for our times - has sexual freedom gone too far? Should the state legislate for people's private sexual behaviour?

When the Duke takes a mysterious leave of absence & leaves sexually repressed Angelo in charge, Vienna becomes a draconian state complete with endless surveillance, prison beatings, rigged trials & arbitrary punishments.

This is a production about the abuse, manipulation & exploitation of power. From low-life porn- brokers to well-heeled state functionaries, from innocent virgins to raddled old whores - it's every man or woman for themselves in this riveting production set in the seedy cabaret underworld of 1930's Berlin and Vienna.

Venue: TOM The Old Market,
11a Upper Market Street,
Hove BN3 1AS
Date: 6th - 8th April 2013
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £12.50 (£10.00 Cons)

ACT Diploma in Acting
Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme
By Moliere
Directed by Franklyn McCabe

The play is a sharp satire on the social pretensions of Parisian nouveaux-riches. Monsieur Jourdain wishes to acquire the social skills commensurate with his wealth; he employs a number of tutors for this purpose. In his efforts to obtain the favour of a marquise he enlists the help of Dorante, an unscrupulous aristocratic parasite.

Venue: The Nightingale Theatre, Surrey Street, Brighton
Date: 16th - 19th December 2012
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £8.00 (£6.00 Cons)
16th, 17th, 18th, 19th SOLD OUT - contact office 01273 818266 for preview tickets

ACT Foundation in Acting
Confusions
By Alan Ayckbourn
Directed by Dylan Brown

Confusions is a collection of five short, interlinked but self-contained, comedy plays; 'Mother Figure' demonstrates how detachment from the outside world can affect adult responses, with comic results. 'Drinking Companions' - a meeting in a hotel bar where the husband has more than just drink in mind. 'Between Mouthfuls' - two couples eat at the same restaurant, the waiter is not the only thing the couples have in common. 'Gosforth's Fete' takes the premise that despite meticulous planning, anything that can go wrong, will... and examines with hilarious results the inevitable impact it has on the fete's organisers and their tenuous relationships. 'A Talk in the Park' turns out to be anything but a talk in the park for each of the characters involved. Ayckbourn is the master at finding the comedy in every situation.

Venue: The Nightingale Theatre, Surrey Street, Brighton
Date: 3rd - 5th July 2012
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £8.00 (£6.00 Cons)

ACT Creative Playground
Absent Friends
by Alan Ayckbourn
Directed by Elaine Heath

Absent Friends - Perhaps the darkest of Ayckbourn's comedies, Absent Friends, sees Donna, a stay at home housewife and domestic goddess organising a tea party to cheer up a recently bereaved old friend, Colin. Nothing quite goes to plan, Colin is relentlessly cheerful, her husband Paul wants to "work upstairs", their old friend Gordon is sick and Evelyn, the young wife of one of their number is not in the best of moods....

Venue: The Nightingale Theatre, Surrey Street, Brighton
Date: 6th - 7th July 2012
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £8.00 (£6.00 Cons)

AKT Youth Theatre
Journey To X
By Nancy Harris
Directed by Tegen Hitchens

A group of friends have formed a new band. Now all they have to do is raise the money to get to London to audition for the world's biggest talent contest.

Costumes, songs and fundraising techniques may divide opinion but one girl has a far more important choice to make. Their journey for fame and fortune is really a journey for something far less glamorous. Something their country doesn't approve of, something their parents wouldn't condone. In a culture of instant fame and talent-show 'stories', the importance of life and friendship come to the fore.

A tale about friendship, a journey and the risks that teenagers take when plunged into an adult world.

Journey To X appears as part of The National Theatre New Connections 2011 - the UK's most exciting festival of Youth Theatre. NT Connections 2012

Venue: The Old Market, Upper Market Street, Hove BN3 1AS
Date: 17th & 18th March 2012
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £7.00 (£5.00 Cons)

Venue: Chichester Festival Theatre
Date: 24th March 2012
Time: 7pm
Tickets: £5.00 (£4.00 Cons)

Venue: The Old Market, Upper Market Street, Hove BN3 1AS
Date: 17th & 18th March 2012
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £7.00 (£5.00 Cons)

Venue: Chichester Festival Theatre
Date: 24th March 2012
Time: 7pm
Tickets: £5.00 (£4.00 Cons)

ACT Diploma in Acting
Cranford
by Elizabeth Gaskell
Adapted and Directed by Franklyn McCabe

In the 1840s, Cranford is ruled by the ladies. They adore good gossip; and romance and change is in the air, as the unwelcome grasp of the Industrial Revolution rapidly approaches their beloved rural market-town.

A new and hilarious adaptation of this classic comic novel.

Venue: The Old Market, Upper Market Street, Hove BN3 1AS
Date: 30th March - 1st April 2012
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £8.00 (£6.00 Cons)

ACT Diploma in Acting
How To Disappear Completely and Never Be Found
by Fin Kennedy
Directed by Daniel Finlay

"What makes you who you are, Charlie? A name? An address? A random collection of experiences, a few memories? You are who you can prove you are. You are what people think. And that's the easiest thing in the world to change."

When a young executive reaches breaking point and decides to disappear, she pays a visit to a master of the craft in a seafront fortune teller's in Southend. Haunted by visitations from a pathologist who swears she is already lying flat out on her slab, she begins to re-live the nightmarish final hours that see her body retrieved from the Thames, stripped of everything that made her who she was.

With echoes of Camus and Kafka, this extraordinary new play follows one persons desperate attempts to buck the system, and asks what really makes us who we are in the 21st century.

8th December - 12th December SOLD OUT

Venue: The Nightingale Theatre, 29-30 Surrey Street, BN1 3PA
Date: 8th - 12th December 2011
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £8.00 (£6.00 Cons)

ACT Two Year Diploma Graduate Showcase 2011

London:
Thursday 14th July 1.00pm
Jermyn Street Theatre
16b Jermyn Street, London SW1Y 6ST

Brighton:
Sunday 24th July 8.00pm
Sallis Benney Theatre
University of Brighton, Grand Parade BN2 OJY

AKT Youth Theatre - Fright Night

AKT Youth Theatre presents scenes from 'Scary Play' by Judith Johnson and 'A Vampire Story' by Moira Buffini as well as other devised pieces.

Sat 9 July 2011 7.00pm (doors 6.15pm)
Tickets: £7 each or £24 for a family ticket (4 people).
Corn Exchange (Brighton Dome Complex), Church Street, Brighton BN1 1UE

AKT Youth Theatre - Fright Night

AKT Youth Theatre presents scenes from 'Scary Play' by Judith Johnson and 'A Vampire Story' by Moira Buffini as well as other devised pieces.

Sat 9 July 2011 7.00pm (doors 6.15pm)
Tickets: £7 each or £24 for a family ticket (4 people).
Corn Exchange (Brighton Dome Complex), Church Street, Brighton BN1 1UE

ACT Two Year Diploma
Dying For It
by Moira Buffini

Directed by Julian Kerridge

A brilliant and penetrating comedy about a man in the depths of despair

Semyon Semyonovich is going to shoot himself. As the news filters through the coffee shops and drinking dens of Soviet Russia, Semyon's poverty driven demise is suddenly interrupted by flocks of admirers desperate for a piece of the action.

Idolized equally by everyone from aristocrats, artists, priests, the peasants and the downright horny, Semyon has become everything to all men. Now that he has finally made it, all he has to do is die.

This fast paced satirical comedy, originally banned by Stalin before a single performance, was freely adapted by Moira Buffini and premiered at the Almeida Theatre in March 2007 to rave reviews.

"A gloriously frenzied evening" ***** (5 stars) Time Out

Venue: The Sallis Benney Theatre, 58-67 Grand Parade, Brighton BN2 0JY
Date: 8th - 10th April 2011
Time: 8pm (doors 7.15pm)
Tickets: £8.50 (£6.50 Cons)

AKT Youth Theatre
Bassett
by James Graham

Directed by Janette Eddisford & Daniel Finlay

Citizenship class at Wootton Bassett School and the supply teacher has gone a bit nuts, doing a runner and locking the pupils in. That's bad enough, but tensions are higher today than normal, a day when only yards from their confinement a repatriation of fallen British soldiers is happening along the high street - as it has over a hundred times before through this quiet Wiltshire town. And this one is more personal than most ...

Dean needs the toilet, Aimee needs a coffee, Amid needs to pray, and Leo ... well, Leo really, really wants to be at the repat, and is determined to escape. As factions form and secrets are revealed, maybe he's not the only one who'll want to get away.

Bassett is a pacy, funny and exhausting look at young people who have inherited a world at war; who, as they grow older, are starting to ask questions about these conflicts, their country, and themselves.

Bassett appears as part of The National Theatre New Connections 2011 - the UK's most exciting festival of Youth Theatre. NT Connections 2011

Venue: Chichester Festival Theatre
Date: 25th March 2011
Time: 7pm
Tickets: £5.00 (£4.00 Cons)

ACT Two Year Diploma Public Show Friday 10th & Saturday 11th December
Don Juan In Soho
by Patrick Marber (after Moliere)

Directed by Philip Ayckbourn

The Academy Of Creative Training Productions are proud to present Patrick Marber's awfully hilarious, shamelessly outrageous and disturbingly dark 2006 hit 'Don Juan in Soho'. Inspired by Moliere's 1665 classic, Marber throws us 400 years ahead to meet Don Juan, the infamous, amoral hedonist in a society entranced by sensation. The World Premiere was commissioned by and first presented at the Donmar Warehouse in 2006 and won rav...e reviews:

"Savagely funny and disgracefully sexy. Absolute cracker" DAILY TELEGRAPH.

"Thoroughly modern make-over for the worst sex-addict in theatrical history" EVENING STANDARD.

Unashamedly proud of his sexual conquests, Don Juan barely ends one liaison when he is in pursuit of the next. From Croatian supermodels to saintly virgins, the 5000 numbers in his Blackberry are constantly juggled by his minder Stan. He is a lovable rogue who given the chance would shag a hole in the ozone layer.

Venue: The Nightingale Theatre, 29-30 Surrey Street, BN1 3PA
Date: 10th - 14th December 2010
Time: 8pm (doors 7.30pm)
Tickets: £8.50 (£6.50 Cons)

ACT Creative Playground Public Show
Lysistrata
by Aristophanes Translation by Patric Dickinson

Directed by Elaine Heath

It's Lysistrata - but not as you know it!

Best friends Lysis and Strata are fed up with their men being constantly away from home, fighting, whoring and spending money recklessly. So they call a meeting with their friends, Lampito, an Aussie Rock chick, Kalonike, Italian wag and fashion goddess and Myrrhinne a newly married sexpot behind the Acropolis Nightclub to propose a solution to all their problems.

Venue: The Nightingale Theatre, 29-30 Surrey Street, BN1 3PA
Date: Friday 23rd & Saturday 24th July 2010
Time: 7.30pm (doors 7pm)
Tickets: £7 (£5 Cons)

ACT Creative Playground Public Show
Lysistrata
by Aristophanes Translation by Patric Dickinson

Directed by Elaine Heath

It's Lysistrata - but not as you know it!

Best friends Lysis and Strata are fed up with their men being constantly away from home, fighting, whoring and spending money recklessly. So they call a meeting with their friends, Lampito, an Aussie Rock chick, Kalonike, Italian wag and fashion goddess and Myrrhinne a newly married sexpot behind the Acropolis Nightclub to propose a solution to all their problems.

Venue: The Nightingale Theatre, 29-30 Surrey Street, BN1 3PA
Date: Friday 23rd & Saturday 24th July 2010
Time: 7.30pm (doors 7pm)
Tickets: £7 (£5 Cons)

Graduate Showcase 2010

London:
Thursday 8th July 1.00pm
Jermyn Street Theatre
168 Jermyn Street, London W1
Brighton:
Friday 16th July 8.00pm
The Old Market
Upper Market Street, Hove BN3 1AS

See Showcase 2010 page for details and to book tickets

Fugee
by Abi Morgan

The Old Market, Upper Market Street, Hove, BN3 1AS
2nd & 3rd May 2010

Directed by Elaine Heath

Fugee: Slang for refugee of political oppression or natural disaster.
Fugeed: Something that has been lived in, soiled, stained or damaged.

Kojo is 14 but no one believes him; he's just one of the unaccompanied minors arriving in London, abandoned on the streets of the UK. Ara's from Baghdad and still hears the bombs at night. Cheung can do back flips and is from village in China that is more than a thousand years old. Orphans in London, they are the only family they have now. Together they tell Kojo's story: a story of lost childhood, tall trees and a murder in motion; a murder by a child that everyone says is a man.

AKT Youth Theatre are the oldest of our AKT - Act Kids Theatre groups which meet during term time on a Saturday morning. AKT Youth won 1st Place in 'Group Acted Scene' at this year's Springboard Brighton and Hove Youth Performing Arts Festival with an extract from Fugee. For more details please visit our AKT pages.

Part of the Brighton Fringe Festival
Fringe venue: 145

DATES: 2nd & 3rd May 2010
TIME: 7.30 pm (Doors 6.30pm)
VENUE: The Old Market, Upper Market Street, Hove, BN3 1AS
TICKETS: £7.00 (£5.00 concessions)
AVAILABLE FROM: Fringe Festival/Dome Box Office 01273 709 Old Market 01273 736222 ACT 01273 818266

Contact Jo or Janette on 01273 818266 or info@actbrighton.org for interviews/production photos.

Acting Workshops

AKT are running Acting Workshops for 13-18 year olds interested in FUGEE or in becoming a member of AKT Youth Theatre on Mon 3rd May.

Workshops will be lead by experienced members of the AKT staff and include members of the cast. All our AKT staff are fully CRB checked.

Workshops will take place at The Old Market, Hove. Places are limited and must be booked in advance.
10.30 - 12.30pm & 2.30 - 4.30pm

£6 (workshop only) £8 (workshop & ticket for the show)
To book a place please email info@actbrighton.org or call 01273 818266