Stan Graham's Leisure Guide for North and West Yorkshire
Here we go with pantomime number two of the season, and this one is in Harrogate which means that like all good children, I should be home for bedtime. Are you listening, Santa! Like most pantos it is based on a fairy tale, a term coined in France by Madame d’Aulnoy in the late 17th…
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Humour is a funny thing, it either gets you or it doesn’t. I am not a great fan of farce, being too logical, probably the Virgo in me, and prefer cerebral antics to physical ones. That being the case, I didn’t hold out much hope for Bedroom Farce, by the esteemed Yorkshire-based writer, Alan Aykbourn,…
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I am being spoiled for comedy this week, what with Consumed on Thursday and Black Tie Ball tonight. Both were hilarious and both relied on stereotypes, doesn’t most comedy, but they couldn’t have been more different. I wrote that Consumed took stereotypes and turned them on their head, whereas Black Tie reinforces the initial opinion…
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After a very quiet August, it was great to get back to work, and what better way than with a play staged within walking distance of home which ended at the civilised time of 9.20pm. The Signalman is based on a short novel by Charles Dickens, which was part of a collection called The Mugby…
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I’m a bit late to the party with this one. Nothing new there, then. Harrogate BID’s contribution to your sanity by keeping the family occupied this summer, is a trail of Lego sculptures depicting jungle animals. I donned my Pith helmet, safari jacket and long, khaki shorts – only metaphorically as I didn’t want to…
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I am writing this article the day following the Lionesses retaining their Women’s European Championship after extra time and penalties. Had the men’s team enjoyed even a fraction of the success gained by the women, this play by Christopher Wollaton may have turned out much differently. The piece is a two-hander, starring the playwright and…
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I was always told that using upper case characters was the equivalent of shouting, well, Emergence Dance Company are quite partial to capital letters but it doesn’t matter, because they have something to shout about. Having said that, they are dancers so don’t speak at all. The group is a postgraduate dance company of Joss…
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To mark Bradford’s tenure as UK City of Culture, Opera North decided to spread the love and stage the first two performances of the 2025 Tour of Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra at St Georges Hall, handily situated across the road from the Interchange. I say ‘staged’ advisedly, as that is the term used to describe the…
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I don’t use a star system to grade the things I review. My reasoning for this is that the top rating would mean, should something come along which was palpably better than those to which I had allocated five stars, I could not do it justice. In 1999 the Jumeirah Burj Al Arab was so…
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I was remarking to a friend recently that I don’t get to review restaurants much any more, a classic example of being careful what you wish for! When I was invited by some former colleagues to join them at The Crown Hotel in Harrogate for a meal, I jumped at the chance, as I love…
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Tyke It To The Limit 