Drama at the Belgrade
Dracula Mina's Reckoning - one of the fabulous productions coming up at the Belgrade Theatre this Autumn. Photo (c) Pete Dibdin.
The team at the Belgrade Theatre are excited to announce details of the exciting and eclectic programme of drama that will be running on both the Coventry venue’s Main Stage and B2 auditorium this autumn.
Preview by Arabella Neville-Rolfe
In the B2 Auditorium:
BROWN BOYS SWIM [26-30 September]
PHANTASMAGORIA [5-7 October]
MADE IN (INDIA) BRITAIN [9-11 October]
CHEEKY LITTLE BROWN [24-28 October]
On the Main Stage:
THE BOOK THIEF [11-16 September]
DRACULA: MINA’S RECKONING [18-21 October]
THE REAL AND IMAGINED HISTORY OF THE ELEPHANT MAN [24-28 October]
I, DANIEL BLAKE [28-11 November]
B2 Auditorium
Winner of a Fringe First and the 2022 BBC Popcorn Writing award, the acclaimed play Brown Boys Swim by Karim Khan runs from 26-30 September following sell-out runs at the Edinburgh Fringe and London’s Soho Theatre. Fierce, funny, and brimming with heart, Brown Boys Swim examines the pressures faced by young Muslim men in the exhilarating new play about fitting in and striking out.
Award-winning theatre company Kali Theatre will bring award-winning international playwright Deepika Arwind’s gripping psychological horror Phantasmagoria to Coventry from 5-7 October. The chilling horror for our time explores the dangers of right-wing populism and unbridled social media to show how fear can be manufactured and manipulated with chilling consequences.
Made in (India) Britain, which won The Deaf Excellence Award at The Neurodiverse Review Awards, runs at the B2 auditorium from 9-11 October. The coming-of-age story follows Roo, a deaf Punjabi from Birmingham, as he narrates - through pain and laughter – the impact of ableism and racism throughout his childhood and adult life, navigating across borders and grappling with his sense of identity. All performances will be in BSL, Spoken English and Closed Captions.
Cheeky Little Brown, by Papatango Prize winning playwright Nkenna Akunna (Some of Us Exist in the Future) will run from 24-28 October. It is a failed night out, a musical, a show about heartbreak and queerness, taking place on a journey through the city Lady calls home. With original songs, the coming-of-age story examines a friendship between two Black women, on diverging paths of self-love and acceptance.
The Book Thief. Photo (c) Pamela Raith.
Main Stage:
A mesmerising new musical of Markus Zusak‘s international bestselling novel, The Book Thief, will run from 11-16 September. The musical is adapted by award-winning bestselling author Jodi Picoult (My Sister’s Keeper) and Timothy Allen McDonald (Roald Dahl’s James and the Giant Peach, Between the Lines) with music and lyrics by Kate Anderson and Elyssa Samsel (Central Park AppleTV+).
The National Theatre of Scotland and Aberdeen Performing Arts, in association with Belgrade Theatre Coventry, will bring Dracula: Mina’s Reckoning to Coventry from 18-21 October. Not for the faint-hearted, Morna Pearson’s adaptation of Bram Stoker’s classic tale is filled with her trademark humour and taste for the strange and grotesque. This breathtaking gothic production transposes the action to Scotland amid the wild beauty of the landscapes of the northeast which originally inspired the novel. With an all-female and gender nonbinary ensemble cast we witness the addiction, intoxication, and empowerment of Mina Murray – who, under the buzzing lights of a psychiatric hospital in 1897 Aberdeenshire, recounts her encounters with Dracula.
The European premiere of Australian playwright Tom Wright’s acclaimed play The Real and Imagined History of The Elephant Man plays from 24-28 October. Arriving from his East Midlands beginnings in a London thick with the grime of industrialisation, Joseph Merrick travels through the workhouse, the freakshow and hospital as he searches for acceptance in a society that just wants to stare at him. Powerful, angry and surprising – The Real and Imagined History of the Elephant Man questions industrialisation, capitalism, disability and difference, finally putting Joseph at the centre of his own story.
Every performance of The Real and Imagined History of the Elephant Man is presented in a relaxed environment, which means that audience members are able to exit and re-enter the auditorium during the performance if they need to and there is a relaxed attitude to noise so that audience members can respond to the show in whatever way feels natural. Please note that these are not fully relaxed performances and house lights may be dimmed in the auditorium. All performances will also have integrated Captioning and Audio Description.
I, Daniel Blake, hailed as one of the most important stories of a generation, plays from 8-11 November. The play is a touching and vital story of how people come together in the face of adversity and how sometimes creating a family to support you just isn’t enough, providing a glimpse behind the headlines and the stark reality of what happens when the political system is stacked against you. The show is adapted for stage by Dave Johns who played Daniel Blake in the award winning 2016 film.
For tickets please go to: https://www.belgrade.co.uk/
