by The Lions Part

28 June - 7 July 2012

These are several inter-linked stories – and they are all based on real events. They are about Land Girls, some of the thousands of young women who were conscripted during World War Two to serve as labourers on the nation’s farms. With all the young men from the land being called into the armed forces and the paramount need to aim for self sufficiency in food, young women were sent to help the farmers. Some loved it: some hated it. Some had a tolerable time with reasonable hosts: others were treated as slave labour. From out of this experience come four girls with stories to tell – some funny, some sad but most merely illustrating life on the farm in that long-ago era – “during the war”. And throughout it all, we hear the music and the songs from that time, when everything changed and women drove tractors, milked cows, delivered lambs, ploughed fields and brought in the harvest.

by Tim Firth

13 - 22 September 2012

"We're going to need considerably bigger buns!"
So says one of the characters in this dramatization of the true story in which a group of WI ladies created a sensation when they hit upon the idea of making their own 'girly' calendar. Their daring enterprise was a bid to raise sufficient funds for a new settee in the local hospital's waiting room. In fact, they have so far raised a staggering sum in excess of £3 million, donated to leukaemia research."Dazzlingly funny . . .utterly captivating . . .the mingling of pathos and comedy is simply unbeatable".

by Shelagh Stephenson

18 - 27 October 2012

"Mary wants us to talk about the girl that killed our son. I want to wipe her off the face of the earth".
Arguably Shelagh Stephenson's finest play, The Long Road is a raw, compelling drama about a family's long and painful struggle to come to terms with the murder of their youngest son Danny, in a random knife attack by a teenage girl.
When Danny's mother decides to visit his killer in prison to try to make sense of why her son was killed, the family is thrown into further turmoil.
This honest and poignant play communicates directly with the audience to give the voice of both victim and perpetrator, in a powerful study of loss and the true nature of forgiveness. Contains explicit language.

by Alan Bennett

22 November - 1 December 2012

An unruly bunch of bright, funny sixth-form boys in pursuit of sex, sport and a place at university. A maverick English teacher at odds with the young and shrewd supply teacher. A headmaster obsessed with results and a history teacher who thinks he's a fool.

Alan Bennett's very successful and humorous play is intensely moving and has been described as one of his finest works. Winner of a host of awards, the original production played to sell out performances at the National Theatre, the West End and on Broadway. Contains explicit sexual references.