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Tickets are now on sale

We are planning on putting on a few evenings of 2 One-Act plays (each is about 40 minutes) in October – the week 13^th /14^th /15^th /16^th October. 

Lockdown in Little Grimley by David Tristram – directed by Tony Giddings

The latest in series of short plays about the hapless Little Grimley amateur dramatics group and its four surviving members. In a time of lockdown, the Chairman Gordon calls an emergency meeting, complete with social distancing, to discuss his idea for their next production when restrictions ease – a touching love story set in a hospital, with all profits destined for the NHS. But based on their previous efforts, will the NHS actually end up worse off?

2m, 2f

A Little Box of Oblivion by Stephen Beane – directed by Angela Giddings

A woman puts a box down next to a stranger in a park, giving strict instructions before she rushes off, not to move, knock, tilt or open it. A series of motley characters then begin to arrive each with a theory about the contents of the box! Is it a bomb, a packet of deadly anthrax or perhaps a severed head?

3m, 2f – or could be 1m 4f

We are again planning to perform 2 nights at Steeple Ashton Village Hall and 2 nights at the Town Hall Trowbridge.

Auditions will be on Monday 25th July and Friday 29th July at The Park Club, 7.30pm

With the loss of The Arc we are preparing to perform again in the Spring. We have decided to do two shorter plays, ‘Lockdown in Little Grimley’ by David Tristram – the latest chapter in the Little Grimley saga where the Little Grimley drama society start work on a new production after an unscheduled break due to Covid (sounds familiar!). The other play will be another comedy, ‘Community Spirit’ by David Muncaster, where members of the various societies that use the local village hall meet up to decide how to mark the opening of a new hall. Spirits of both kinds (Ghostly and Alcohol-y) come to the fore to cause chaos.

We will be reading ‘Community Spirit’ at Trowbridge Town Hall on Monday 7th February at 7.30pm with auditions due to take place on Monday 21st February, also at Trowbridge Town Hall at 730pm.

We are proposing to perform these plays on several nights in May at venues including The Tin Church, Trowbridge Town Hall and Steeple Ashton Village Hall – not all in the same week. We should have firmer dates and venues by the time of the auditions.

Tim Knott – Chairman

Unfortunately, we have had to cancel our Panto again for 2022. There were several issues for this. Uncertainty about Covid was one. The ARC also doubled their prices and withdrew all support, so we would have no bar, ushers or changing area. We had 3 council qualified chaperones in 2019 but the licences expired during lockdown. We have to have one chaperone per 6 under 16s, which meant no children would be allowed to perform. The council have now allowed chaperones to renew and restarted courses to allow new ones to qualify.

In the meanwhile, the ARC have cancelled all bookings for outside groups due to their technician leaving, which means we would have no-where to perform anyway.
We are looking for alternative venues for the Spring production but the Panto has been shelved until January 2023.

I am sorry to disappoint everyone but a lot of this is beyond our control. We are now an amateur theatre group who has not performed a full show for nearly 2 years. Now, without a home theatre available to us, we are looking for a suitable venue for our next show. We hope to be back on stage soon.

In the meanwhile we are currently meeting each Monday at The Tin Church in Horse Road, Trowbridge where we are reading various plays over coffee and biscuits. I hope to see as many of you as can attend.

Tim Knott – Chairman

The AGM will be on Monday 13th September 7.30pm at Trowbridge Town Hall and everyone is invited. We are planning to perform some short plays in November as well as our long-delayed pantomime ‘Sleeping Beauty’ in January 2022. All this and more will be discussed some come along to have your say. See you there !

We will have a reading of the Alan Ayckbourn comedy ‘Bedroom Farce’ at the Tesco Community room on Friday 11th May at 7.30pm.

Performance dates are Wednesday 10th to Saturday 13th October

Characters:

Ernest: A birdlike, bumbling man of about 60. Husband of Delia, father of Trevor.

Delia: A well preserved, talkative woman of about 60. Wife of Ernest, mother of Trevor.

Trevor: A self-obsessed, not too intelligent man who drives other men crazy but who women can find charming and funny. He can be in his mid to late 20’s – 30’s. Husband to Susannah, son of Ernest and Delia, ex-boyfriend of Jan.

Susannah: Also in her 20’s or 30’s, Susannah is Trevor’s (also self-obsessed) wife. She is slightly unbalanced and volatile.

Jan: Wife to Nick, ex-girlfriend of Trevor. Is happy with Nick, as theirs is a marriage of equal minds, but holds a lingering fascination with Trevor. Jan and Nick have a “point scoring” kind of relationship full of put downs and gentle insults, but ultimately it works for them. Also can be in her 20’s – 30’s.

Nick: Jan’s husband who spends the play complaining, as he in bed with an injured back. Insult is added to injury when Jan kisses Trevor at a party that Nick cannot attend. Also in his 20’s – 30’s.

Kate: Malcolm’s wife and hostess of the housewarming party taking place. A kind soul that offers Trevor a place to stay even when he ruins the party with an epic fight he has with Susannah. Also can be in her 20’s – 30’s.

Malcolm: Kate’s husband. Upset with Trevor for ruining his housewarming party, he vents his frustrations by spending the night putting together furniture. Kate and Malcolm have a lively relationship and are always playing pranks on each other. Also in his 20’s – 30’s.

This moving drama takes to the stage next week from Wednesday 25th to Saturday 28th April at The Arc Theatre. Move in is on Sunday 22nd April from 9am at The Arc.

We’ve cast our play (“Cash on Delivery”) and rehearsals are under way, with lots of laughs. We’d really like to hear form anybody who can help out with all those other essentials of a successful production, like stage management, prompting, set building and painting, costume and prop assembly or construction… All necessary and much appreciated by the cast (and of course the audience!), so if you can help, please do get in touch.

We are also aware that it’s a bit of a let-down if you want to get involved with the Players but don’t find that sitting through a lot of rehearsals by other people is very appealing. So we thought we’d get some regular club nights going. We had a couple of gatherings at The Lamb last year, with mixed success.  We’ll probably re-institute those if there’s strong demand, as it’s a convivial place to socialise. However, we thought a more ‘dramatic’ focus might be better received, and that the Tesco Community Space is a good place for that–so we are having a first club night on Monday 7th March 2017, primarily to explore what things people would most like.

Do come along!

We have decided on “Cash on Delivery” by Michael Cooney as our next production. We will be performing it at The Arc theatre at Wiltshire College, Trowbridge from Wednesday 26th to Saturday 29th April 2017. We are pleased to welcome Jamie Wright and Tirion Cowell  from Trowbridge College and The Arc as directors. They are keen to get involved with working with Trowbridge Players.

We’ve had a few readings of the play at the Tesco Community Space, and I think the general view is that it is very funny, with some good lines and some very ridiculous situations. It was written in the 1990s, and we’ll probably set it then — but that decision is obviously up to the directors.

We will be holding auditions for the parts (6 men and 5 women, ages mostly indeterminate) at The Arc from 19:30 on Friday 17th February and Monday 20th February 2017. We look forward to seeing lots of people there, and lots of people getting involved in putting on the production!