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THE STAGE | Panto Round Up 2012

The rest of those The Stage panto reviews... Sleeping Beauty Published Friday 14 December 2012 at 10:58 by Susie Wild "As usual the New Theatre bang out the bling and special effects in their big budget, long-running pantomime. This season’s festive fairytale Sleeping Beauty is packed full of fireworks, twinkle-twinkle starry nights, flying bicycles, tarzan-rope swinging, curtain-clinging, Batman and Robin and four can-canning penguins." Babes in the Wood Published Friday 14 December 2012 at 11:02 by Susie Wild "Babes in the Wood meets Robin Hood in this traditional, touring Owen Money panto vehicle. Based on an old English ballad, the story sees the wicked Sheriff of Nottingham plot to have his niece Samantha and nephew Simon killed, resulting in the two children being abandoned deep within Sherwood Forest where the Big Bad Wolf lives. But all is not doom and gloom as slapstick comedy, bad Christmas cracker jokes, considered costumes and strong songs

THE STAGE REVIEW | PETER PAN

Peter Pan Published  Thursday 6 December 2012  at  14:51  by  Susie Wild Sherman’s modernised story focuses on the experience of Wendy, a teenage girl growing up painfully fast. Rebecca Newham makes a confident stage debut complimented by a well-voiced cast and original songs with a Disney film feel. A scene from Peter Pan at the Sherman Cymru, Cardiff Photo: Farrows Creative Taunted by her brothers for owning her first bra, Wendy is left alone on Christmas Eve while her dad sneaks off to the pub. Feeling old enough to begin to understand the bigger questions in life but given none of the answers at home, she is whisked away to Neverland by mischeivous charmer Peter Pan (Joshua Considine). There she shifts identity from sweet mother homemaker for Adam Ant and the Lost Boys in part one, to rock chick pirate Black Heart, fighting out her teenage angst as the Captain’s right hook woman in part two. Stereotypes are subverted to good effect at the start, as Michael (Meilir

THE STAGE REVIEW | ALADDIN, ABERDARE

I am going to seven pantomimes and festive shows for The Stage this year. Here is my review of Pantomime Number One Aladdin Published  Monday 3 December 2012  at  11:37  by  Susie Wild Aberdare’s Aladdin combines Eastern magic, mummies and genies with plenty of rub-a-dub-dub. Last year’s ugly sister Frank Vickers once again dames up wonderfully as Widow Twankey, with more costume changes than the Oscars - highlights including a camel and ingenious variations on rotary washing lines thanks to the BA (Hons) costume staff and students from Coleg Morgannwg. Also trying to have a rub, but this time of the magic lamp, not the royal laundry, is Baker Boys’ Richard Corgan, making his evil panto debut by playing Abanazar as a Shakespearean villain - cue lots of silly jokes based on mispronouncing his name - ‘Av a banana’, ‘Abergavenny’ and so on. Lower budget than the big city pantos, this production’s sets are less flashy, but a stronger adaptation of the script to localise the

Cardiff Literary Salon | 11 December 2012 | Carrie Etter & Bob Walton

Cardiff Literary Salon Returns on 11th December 2012 Sherman Cymru have got their alphabet blocks out in anticipation... Sherman Cymru plays host to the Cardiff Literary Salon Tuesday 11 December  - 7.30pm Special Guest:  Carrie Etter American expat Carrie Etter has published two collections, The Tethers (winner, London New Poetry Award; Seren, 2009) and Divining for Starters (Shearsman, 2011), and edited Infinite Difference: Other Poetries by UK Women Poets (Shearsman, 2010). Her poems have recently appeared in New Welsh Review, Poetry Review, Poetry Wales, and The Rialto, among other journals.  For more information on the event visit the Facebook event page: https://www.facebook.com/events/269864903116866/ You should also join the Facebook Group for Cardiff Literary Salon: https://www.facebook.com/groups/199181613515199/

CLICK ON WALES | A WELSH REALITY TV CAR CRASH

A Welsh reality TV car crash Susie Wild says an emotional void has taken Wales out of the Valleys November 8th, 2012 Share on linkedin More Sharing Services 3 All would be well if, if, if Cry the green bells of Cardiff Why so worried, sisters, why Sang the silver bells of Wye And what will you give me Say the sad bells of Rhymney From  The Bells of Rhymney  by Idris Davies By now you have probably seen or heard about MTV’s latest Reality TV show  The Valleys . Filmed in Wales, it is a spin off from  Geordie Shore , MTV UK’s commercial hit show which was based in Newcastle. Following a similar format MTV producers chose volatile wannabe halfwits trying to make it in ‘the industry’, this time plucking nine young people from the ‘obscurity’ of the south Wales valleys and placing them in a share house in the bright lights of Cardiff. Although the show is unscripted, unlike  TOWIE  and  Made in Chelsea , it still sets up scenarios and heavily edits footage to cause th

BBC WALES ARTS BLOG | Do Not Go Gentle festival designed with Dylan Thomas in mind

Thursday 1 November 2012, 15:44 Laura Chamberlain 56 Share Facebook Twitter COMMENTS Tagged with: arts and culture ,  festivals ,  music ,  literature Organisers of the inaugural Do Not Go Gentle festival, which takes place in Swansea this weekend, have kept one of the city's most famous sons firmly in mind during its planning. The new festival celebrates the life and work of Dylan Thomas. As the website says, it aims "to be a festival Dylan might have liked, and yes that involves beer, but it also involves cosy and atmospheric venues, great acts and the lovely people of Swansea who first inspired him to write all those years ago." Writers involved in the weekend include the inaugural winner of the Dylan Thomas Prize, Rachel Trezise; poet Rhian Edwards, who was the winner of the 2012 John Tripp Award for Spoken Poetry; writer and co-organiser of the recent  xx minifest of women's writing , Susie Wild; plus comic poet and performe

NWR Blog | xx Minifest of Women's Writing

BLOG  Gwen Davies NWR Issue 97 xx Minifestest of Women's Writing "Had a good time on Saturday at this new festival for the writing of women from Wales and beyond. It was excellently organised (despite a concurrent beer festival at Chapter) and publicised by the team of Penny Thomas, Carole Burns, Amy Wack and Susie Wild. The audiences were large and the evening 'Salon', featuring the short story with Roshi Fernando and Rachel Trezise, sold out. The main delight for me was chatting in the bookfair section to Roshi about balancing international gigs publicising Bloomsbury's edition of her integrated short fiction collection,  Homesick ,  Read about it in NWR's Online Interview, Roshi Fernando , with developing her debut novel,  The Elephant's Wife , an excerpt from which appeared last year in  NWR 92, The Elephant's Wife Extract . " Read the blog in full:  http://www.newwelshreview.com/article.php?id=380

BBC Arts Blog: Women's writing celebrated at the xx minifest

Women's writing celebrated at the xx minifest Friday 26 October 2012, 12:04 Laura Chamberlain Share Facebook Twitter COMMENTS Tagged with: arts and culture ,  writing ,  poetry Writing by and for women will be celebrated this weekend as the xx minifest of women’s writing 2012 takes place in Cardiff. This inaugural festival will take residence at Chapter Arts Centre this Saturday, 27 October. It aims to publicise the range and diversity of writing by women from Wales in the English language, and encourages both men and women to attend and take part. This one day minifest will act as a "taster session", as a more extensive literary programme is already being planned for 2013. I put a few questions about the festival to Susie Wild, one of the co-organisers of the xx minifest. Wild is a writer, an editor at Parthian Books and she also organises the  Cardiff Literary Salon , and will be holding a special edition of the literary gatheri

PHOTO BLOG | WM | Why women write

THE STAGE REVIEW | A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM

A Midsummer Night’s Dream Published  Wednesday 24 October 2012  at  11:14  by  Susie Wild http://www.thestage.co.uk/reviews/review.php/37614/a-midsummer-nights-dream Shakespeare’s classic fairytale forest farce is transposed to the home front during the Second World War. Air raid sirens sound as we join the cast in watching a charming silent railway rescue film - Help! Help! - and then the real action begins. Mappa Mundi and Theatr Mwldan have been creating and touring accessible new co-productions annually since 2006. Together with guest director Peter Doran of The Torch Theatre, Milford Haven, they have conjured a moonlit multimedia show of shadowy uncertainty where dreams play within dreams and even night is confused. Most of the 13-strong cast are Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama alumni including a sweetly stubborn landgirl Hermia (Lisa Zahra), a haughty, snivelling Helena (Joanna Simpkins) and an American GI Lysander (newcomer Jack Brown) but not Francois Pandol

WM | Why Women Write

I guest edited The Western Mail's women's supplement WM today, which included contributing a column and an xx feature... Already snuggling up with a good book as the nights draw in – why not go out and see some of your favourite writers reading their work live this weekend? xx minifest is a celebration of women’s writing taking place at Chapter Arts Centre in Cardiff on Saturday, featuring readings, performances, book stalls and bookish discussion. WM caught up with three of the writers taking part... Read More  http://www.walesonline.co.uk/showbiz-and-lifestyle/showbiz/2012/10/23/an-all-women-s-writing-workshop-for-south-wales-the-writers-tell-us-what-to-expect-from-xx-minifest-91466-32081370/#ixzz2A80vtUoH

THE STAGE REVIEW | GAZA/BLAENANNERCH

Gaza/Blaenannerch Published  Tuesday 23 October 2012  at  12:19  by  Susie Wild http://www.thestage.co.uk/reviews/review.php/37613/gaza-blaenannerch Gaza/Blaenannerch reveals Ladd’s personal reflections on the parallels between the disruption of nationhood and the disappearance of identity in the similarly sized countries of Wales and what used to be Palestine, and the ensuing dispersal of their people, scattering them well beyond their ancestral homeland. The idea for this sequence of expressive and intelligent dance pieces was sparked by the unmanned drones currently tested near the home of Ladd and the Welsh village of Blaenannerch. In front of a screen that moves from slate to blood red, Eddie switches continents and moods, from the contemplative, the impish and playful to the tortured, the lost, the flailing as she uses her body as both storyteller and teaching aid. She wriggles and writhes, she clambers and climbs, occasionally throwing in facts verbally, or with the

THE STAGE REVIEW | GRIMM TALES

Grimm Tales Published  Wednesday 17 October 2012  at  14:40  by  Susie Wild Everyone knows that Grimm’s fairy tales are the best fairy tales, and as this year marks the bicentennial of their publication they are undergoing a resurgence of popularity assisted by Philip Pullman, who has recently released his Penguin Classic retellings of 50 of his favourite dark Brothers Grimm stories. For Grimm Tales production company Theatr Iolo has brought three of the better known folk tales - Hansel & Gretel, Ashputtel (the original Cinderella story) and Snow White - back into their original realm of oral heritage; staging them with Iolo’s usual blend of charm, verve, and playful humour. Erini Gregoriades’ set - a puzzle of wooden doors and picture frames - enabled the cast to conjure the scary shadowy forests for Hansel and Gretel to get lost in, and Snow White to escape to, and Jem Treays’ enchanting movement design created energetic dances and hilarious, sweet dwarves. All four memb

CLICK ON WALES REVIEW | THE FRONT LINE IN CARDIFF AFTER DARK

Susie Wild examines a snapshot of the capital’s after-hours wrecked zone delineated by Caroline Street and St Mary Street October 13th, 2012  Polish-born, London-based photographer  Maciej Dakowicz  brings a sobering outsider’s eye to the night-life of central Cardiff, where he lived for seven years, co-founding the  Third Floor Gallery .  All the world’s a stage , but this photographer’s insightful gaze returns again and again to the performances of punters and pranksters on parade, imbibing on St Mary Street and then later stuffing faces and each other outside Tony’s. He conjures tales of cowboys and Casanova, cigarettes and regrets.  Cardiff After Dark  is a hyper-real world, fuelled by Jaeger shots, graffiti-scrawled emotions and outfits and lipstick with the contrast turned up. A melting pot of lust, fistfights, bawling and blood-spattered brawling. The flesh-flashing mating rituals and macho tomfoolery. The headrush fun of it all, side-splitting, shirt-rippin

THE STAGE REVIEW | NEVILLE'S ISLAND

Neville’s Island Published  Friday 12 October 2012  at  10:53  by  Susie Wild http://www.thestage.co.uk/reviews/review.php/37563/nevilles-island Black RAT have been striving to bring quality existing comedy drama to developing audiences in Wales, touring enjoyable productions of well-tested accessible scripts and actors in an attempt to pack out theatres in towns across the country. For this autumn season, they bring us Calendar Girls’ writer Tim Firth’s popular black comedy, Neville’s Island. Telling the tale of four middle-aged, middle-management males shipwrecked on a rocky island in the Lake District after a training day goes downstream without a paddle, we see their careers and relationships hit the rocks along with their boat as cold, hunger and paranoia kick in. The single-set production physically puts its cast to the test from the domino of visual gags in the first scene and the four men are drenched, starved, covered in mud, blood and at the mercy of carnivores.

Autumn Gigs

Hello Folks! I have a number of fun gigs and salons and bits and pieces coming up, which I thought I should tell you about. I shall be performing poems and stories at: 1. National Poetry Day is on 4 October 2012. I shall be assisting Rhian Edwards in her role as Poet in Residence at John Lewis in the day, writing poems about toasters and other homeware. I shall then be heading along to the Seren First Thursday Shindig at Chapter in the eve to read a poem or three at the open mic. 2. Birkenstock at Gwdihw in Cardiff on Sunday 7 October 2012. My awesome man Meirion is playing too. 3. Mozarts @ Do Not Go Gentle. I shall be doing a few poems in support of Rhian Edwards at Mozarts between 6 and 7pm on Sat 3rd November. Come along. I also have literary salons coming up at: 1. Cardiff Literary Salon xx special, as part of xx minifest of women's writing which I co-organise. This will be held at Chapter Arts Centre, Sat 27 October 2012, 7.30pm: