April update

Theatre Group

Contact Chris Farleigh 8086 2882 to book your ticket

Group meeting at 16 Greenfields Ave 2.45pm 6^th May

Nuffield Theatre Tonight at 8.30pm 9 one-act plays by Noel Coward

Saturday 10^th May 1pm, 4.30pm & 8.30pm Tickets £24. Performed as three trios in repertory.

Nuffield and English Touring Theatre present the first major revival in the UK of all nine one-act plays by Noël Coward.

Tonight at 8.30 is a collection of nine one-act plays by the inimitable Noël Coward, performed together for the first time in the UK, since Coward starred in them in 1936. From vaudeville to satire, from broad farce to intricate comedy of manners, from melodrama to romance, these plays span the full, glorious range of Coward’s writing.

You can peep through your fingers at the Red Peppers chaotic music-hall show, witness a bankrupt couple use all Ways and Means to scheme their way out of debt, and break your heart along with Laura in the famous Still Life, the original version of the film Brief Encounter.

This is a unique opportunity to see a stellar ensemble perform all nine of these plays. 

Make a day of it On the days featuring all three trios, Nuffield Kitchen invites you to a 1930s dinner party in between each show. Lunch will be served before the 1pm performance

Salberg - Salisbury Playhouse The Ballard of Martha Brown

Friday 16^th May 7.30pm Tickets £13

“I remember what a fine figure she showed against the sky as she hung in the misty rain and how the tight black silk gown set off her shape as she wheeled half round and back” – Thomas Hardy recalling Martha Brown’s public hanging 70 years after the event.

Expect the unexpected in Angel Exit’s latest original drama based on the life and times of Martha Brown; the last woman, in Dorset, to be publicly hanged.

A tale of jealousy and passion, an ordinary woman and her ordinary husband, a hatchet grabbed in haste, a murder, a wrongly accused horse, a black silk dress, the hangman from London and the mob at the hang-fair who gawp in glee.

Presented in the company’s rich visual style, blending storytelling and striking physicality, the show is spliced through with wicked humour and macabre songs.

Antony & Cleopatra The Globe Theatre London

Thursday June 5^th 2. pm Tickets £39.00, plus travel

Two lovers are blown apart by love and war

Cleopatra, the alluring and fascinatingly ambiguous Queen of Egypt, has bewitched the great Mark Antony, soldier, campaigner and now one of the three rulers of the Roman Empire. When Antony quarrels with his fellow leaders and throws in his lot with Cleopatra, his infatuation threatens to split the Empire in two.

Roman virtue and Eastern vice, transcendent love and realpolitik combine in Antony and Cleopatra, Shakespeare’s greatest exploration of the conflicting claims of sex and power, all expressed in a tragic poetry of breathtaking beauty and magnificence.

Plaza Theatre, Romsey The Accrington Pals by Peter Whelan

Thursday 17^th July 7.30pm

The play looks at both the terrifying experiences of the men at the front in the first world war and the women who were left behind to face social changes, deprivation and the lies of propaganda. While often comic vignettes portray the everyday life of a town denuded of men, the men face the terror that is the Battle of the Somme. This compassionate play portrays the devastating effects of war on a typical Lancashire mill town and the suffering of everyday people

Royal Albert Hall John Rutter Christmas Concert

Thursday 11^th December 3pm Tickets £17.50 plus travel

AWAYDAYS

Guided Tour of the Brookwood Cemetery, Surrey

Monday May 19^th leaving Totton 9.15am. Cost £4 plus travel

Brookwood Cemetery is the largest cemetery in Britain and one of the largest in the world. It: was established in 1851, it covers 500 acres and has lovely grounds and unique monuments many of which are Grade II listed.

The cemetery is considered a site of extreme importance, not only as a cemetery, but as a cultural, architectural and historical record for many nations. The finest works of many stonemasons are contained within, as well as a wealth of history.

It is a working cemetery for all denominations and nationalities from all over the world.

As well as having the, often elaborate, graves of residents it also has military cemeteries. Amongst the graves is the final resting places of Dame Rebecca West, writer, and Edith Thompson who was hanged for adultery on the 9th January 1923. It has several graves connected with Titanic disaster .

There are many war graves including138 Commonwealth burials of the 1914-18 war, 1 being an unidentified Indian soldier. There are a further 50 Commonwealth burials of the 1939-45 war. There are also 5 Foreign National war burials in C.W.G.C. care here.

Imperial War Museum- First World War Exhibition

Monday 14^h July

Approx cost including coach £15.00

Leaving Totton at 9.15am

The Manor House Hotel

Fowley Cross, Nr Okehampton, Devon, EX20 4NA

3 nights 3^rd – 6^th Nov or 7^th – 10^th Nov

A grade rooms £216, B grade rooms £196pp before discounts.

All Year Sport, Craft, Leisure & Spa Breaks - Whatever the Weather!

The Manor House and Ashbury hotels are situated on the foothills of the Dartmoor National Park in West Devon. Set in over 600 acres of beautiful countryside, we believe the hotels have the highest level of facilities in the UK. With all our breaks exclusively FULL BOARD you are guaranteed great value.

Golf is included FREE on 99 holes, giving the option of 7 eighteen hole golf courses which vary in length from Kigbeare at 6528 yards Par 72 to the Willows Par3 course at 1939 yards.

Some of the other facilities available FREE of charge to all residents include 5 indoor and 5 outdoor tennis courts, 13 indoor bowls rinks, 8 badminton courts, 5 table tennis tables, curling, 3 swimming pools with spa facilities, 10 lanes of 10 pin bowling, 28 snooker tables, and 5 target ranges featuring archery, air pistols and air rifles. Guided walks across the moors, water slides include 2 mini-slides, 2 midi-slides and 4 flume slides - perfect for the whole family to enjoy!