- November 2009
The play follows the philosophical, meandering and often comical conversations of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, two incidental characters from Shakespeare's 'Hamlet', as they wait for something to happen to them. Whenever something does, it is in the form of encounters with other characters from 'Hamlet', which just serve to make the title duo question the bizarre nature of their lives further. Slowly they realise, that rather than being leads in their own story, they might just be disposable roles in someone else's.
- November 2009
When a deranged boy, Alan Strang, blinds six horses with a metal spike, he is sentenced to psychiatric treatment. Dr Dysart is the man given the task of uncovering what happened the night Strang committed his crime, but in doing so he will open up his own wounds. While Dysart struggles to define sanity, and justify his marriage, his career, and his life of normality; ultimately he must ask himself: is it the patient or psychiatrist whose life is being laid bare?
- November 2009
“A great while ago the world begun with hey, ho, the wind and the rain ...”
When twins Viola and Sebastian are shipwrecked off the coast of Illyria, each of them believes that the other is dead. In order to survive alone in this masculine world, Viola disguises herself as a boy with some surprising consequences!
Come and audition for the chance to take part in Shakespeare’s darkly comic tale of love, deception and cross-dressing...
- May 2009
- March 2009
In the history of great men, where do the mediocre fit in?
Professor Thomson is, in her own words, “feckless and posh, but really rather clever.” However, despite her boundless self-confidence the invention of a time machine in her lab does come as something of a surprise. Her delicate equilibrium is further disrupted by the arrival of some angry historians closely followed by the political establishment. Fortunately two ambitious young journalists are at hand to make sure the fiasco is recorded for posterity.
Will the history of humanity be irrevocably altered? Will the space-time continuum be destroyed? But most importantly will Professor Thomson’s vintage wine smuggling project prove profitable?
- March 2009
In the history of great men, where do the mediocre fit in?
Professor Thomson is, in her own words, “feckless and posh, but really rather clever.” However, despite her boundless self-confidence the invention of a time machine in her lab does come as something of a surprise. Her delicate equilibrium is further disrupted by the arrival of some angry historians closely followed by the political establishment. Fortunately two ambitious young journalists are at hand to make sure the fiasco is recorded for posterity.
Will the history of humanity be irrevocably altered? Will the space-time continuum be destroyed? But most importantly will Professor Thomson’s vintage wine smuggling project prove profitable?
"Historical Fiction" is the runner-up in the Pembroke Players New Writing Competition.
- November 2008
- November 2008
A quiet family gathering. A harrowing revelation. A deep, dark, challenging piece of contemporary theatre.
Helge is sixty. It is a time of celebration. A time for the family to gather and smooth over the cracks left by the suicide of Linda, twin sister to Christian. As Helge's eldest son, Christian will raise the first toast.
Confined within the family house, the guests are rocked by the revelations that pierce and destroy the veneer of middle-class respectability.
- November 2008
Constantius, the ageing king of Britain, decides to entrust half of his realm to Vortigern. He accepts, but soon falls prey to his ambition, orchestrating the murder of Constantius and seizing the crown. When Vortigern is forced to London to take his last stand, the fate of Dark Age Britain is sealed.
Battles, discarded wives, dastardly murder, scheming warlords and sultry seduction abound in this “lost work” of the Bard, written fraudulently by William Henry Ireland in 1796. The play was inspired by the eighteenth century obsession with Shakespeare, but both play and author have lain in relative obscurity ever since.
Join the Pembroke Players for a one-night stand in the New Cellars on November the 19th, possibly this play’s first performance for over two hundred years, and enjoy an evening of treachery and greed in Mediaeval Britain.
- November 2008
To welcome you back to another year, Pembroke Players invite you to join them at the Sticky Floor Smoker. The reasons for its name may be lost in the mists of time, but it promises drinks, laughs and a good time all round.
- November 2008
- November 2008
"I want you to listen. Because I am trying to unlace all of my life."
Five stars in Varsity. "I really can’t think of a better new play I’ve seen at Cambridge...To say more would be to dissect too far. This play and production truly deserve to be seen." *****
An actress and a journalist. A brother and sister. Set in the hours before dawn and death.
By Freddy Syborn, joint winner of the Other Prize 2008, and writer of Flesh-Eating Jacobean Zombies, Indivisible and Now the late last winter.
- June 2008
On their 125th anniversary, the world famous Cambridge Footlights come charging back with their eagerly anticipated, brand new show, "Devils".
Throughout their long and grand history, Footlights continue to be an unparalleled force in British comedy. The club's luminaries range from Peter Cook and John Cleese to present day stars such as Mitchell and Webb, Sacha Baron Cohen, and last year's if.comedy Best Newcomer, Tom Basden. "Devils" is the culmination of a fantastically successful year for a club, as the finest few comedians have been plucked from one of the largest and hardest-working comedy institutions in the world, to present a stunning mosaic of sketches, monologues, songs and more.
Sharp, exciting and unfailingly hilarious, "Devils" promises to be a sparkling comic treasure, and a landmark event in Footlights's 125-year history.
Edinburgh Festival Sell-Out Show 2007
"A must-have ticket" - The Times
"**** impeccable, excellent, fautless" - Edinburgh Festivals Magazine
"Fast, well-observed, hilarious - lives up to the hype" - Fest Magazine
"I was charmed and delighted - really good" - Simon Amstell
- May 2008
Cambridge's finest comedians in all their shiny glory.
FEATURING: Tom Ovens, Nate Dern, Will Hensher, James Moran, Lucien Young to name a few...
Compered by the dazzling Will McAdam, this will be quite the night.
Please email wpm22 for more information.
- March 2008
Sit down and relax as ICE bring you a series of comedic tales from a world that seems strangely similar, and yet strangely different from our own. Just what is the secret that lurks at Joe's farm? What's in the briefcase that everyone's dying to get hold of? And which stories are actually parts of a greater whole, entangled with each other as the plot threads weave through the night? You decide!
- March 2008
Anatol is a twenty-something who loves women and is equally loved by them. In a loose sequence of six scenes he encounters his many different girlfriends. However, since he loves them all, passionately, forever for the moment, he is haunted by the consequences: deceit, jealousy, clashing dates, rejection and wounded pride.
The production gives consideration to the role Anatol and his girlfriends play in a modern world and time in which compensation for de-individualisation and industrialisation of men (and women) is sought in the worship of the moment. Just as the women are interchangeable, so are the men: Anatol and his friend Max, two extreme poles of sensibility and rationality, highly sexed and asexual, acting and observing, are entangled in this comic and sometimes tragic play of real and false love, of passion and indifference, and maybe a deeper meaning...
The play is entirely in German.
- March 2008
An unnamed man - apparently a war criminal -is being interviewed by a woman possessed by an absolute conviction in her nation's ability to kill history, and her assistant, who tells bad jokes. They discuss Viennese coffee, quantum physics and the multi-world theory, art, advertising, Shakespeare as an infinitely-typing monkey and how best to kill a man with a set of dentures. They also discuss the extermination of a race.
Partially based upon Hannah Arendt's account of Adolf Eichmann's trial in Jerusalem, Indivisible is the latest play from the writer/director Freddy Syborn who was responsible for last term's Flesh-Eating Jacobean Zombies, and who is currently co-writing a new sketch show for Tiger Aspect, a comedy and drama production company.
- March 2008
On a Saturday evening in July, Sarah, arrives with her husband Reg, to his mother's home to give Reg's sister, Annie, a weekend off from caring for their cantankerous invalid mother. Norman, Annie's brother-in-law, a scruffy assistant librarian, who dreams of sexual conquests, also arrives. An exploration of deceit, sex and control soon follow with Sarah learning that Norman, having had sex with Annie the previous Christmas, now intends to take her away for a dirty weekend to East Grinstead. That evening, a hilarious scene of false manners ensues. Etiquette and absurdity dominate this brilliant "comic masterpiece".
- February 2008
This powerful thriller sees two Oxbridge students, Brandon and Granillo, first deciding to murder a fellow student, and then to hide him in a chest in their flat, justifying their actions as "intellectual pursuit". Before disposing of the body, however, they decide that inviting the boy's father and aunt around for a party would provide their actions with a fitting denouement. Cue suspicions and sexual tensions in this dark, but striking 1920s drama.
- November 2007
Four young men embark on a three-year course of study with the noblest of intentions. In fact, they are so well meaning that they swear never to see a woman until their studies are over with.
And that's all fine until the Princess of France arrives…
Love, banter, Spanish princes, this hilarious but rarely seen comedy is not to be missed. ESPECIALLY because it's set in the 80s.
Book online to avoid disappointment at www.pembrokeplayers.org or get your tickets at the door.
- October 2007
Of all the names it is possible to give a man (and there are many - Watkins, Smith and so on) there is one in particular which seems to hold a strange and profound significance; a name that seems to declaim itself from the rooftops, and from the peaks of mountains, and the cry echoes through the valleys of the ages like the bellow of a frustrated hilltop gorilla, resounding from one end of the rainbow to the other and washing back in the whisper of the tide… "Lancelot Sebastian von Ludendorff…"
This is the winner of the first year of Pembroke Players' New Writing Initiative. The Initiative was set up to encourage and draw attention to new theatrical writing from Cambridge students. We will be open to new applications at the end of Lent Term 2008. For more information visit www.pembrokeplayers.org.
- October 2007
Newcomers to the Cambridge comedy scene and old Footlights favourites join together for a night of stand-up, sketches and a bit of singing. 100% of ticket price goes to Oxfam, as part of the nationwide Oxjam Music Festival.
- May 2007
Escape revision, chill out and chuckle in the company of Cambridge's coolest comedians... Friday 4th May, 8:00 for an 8:30 start Pembroke New Cellars Drinks served To reserve tickets, or to arrange an audition, email comedy @ pembrokeplayers.org.uk or visit www.pembrokeplayers.org.
- March 2007
On his travels, and eminent British writer stumbles across a set of memoirs, which he concedes might make a good play. Even this 'provincial' story could be saved from obscurity by an 'artistic' adaptation that he is quite willing to provide.
In the white heat of the afternoon, the residents of the tiny village of Perdido await he arrival of the Guagua. As the play unravels, the paradoxes of the writer's heavy-handed interventions compete with the tragi-comic stories of the villagers. Intrigues of love, power and betrayal unfold, and somewhere in the play the original author of the memoirs is growing impatient...
- March 2007
“How long have you been here?”
Experience the surreal figures of the bitter “Thump,” the glutton “Guzzle,” the vain “Gazer,” the medicated “Gloom,” the chatterbox “Gossip,” and the indecisive “Twittering,” with their respective inner worlds of entrapment and illusion.
Enter their cage and “home”.
Watch as their bizarre characters unfold, and then how their deluded inner worlds are threatened with the entrance of “The Wild One:” their newest “cage companion;” bent on escape.
Will the Wild One succeed in her aim of breaking free from the cage?
Or are all the Cagebirds destined to remain trapped, oppressed by the authoritative “mistress” who rules over them?
Campton’s play presents a poignant exploration of freedom and oppression; considering what happens when one individual attempts to initiate change; and subsequently posing serious questions as to the kinds of self-imposed mental and physical “bird-cages” we may all entrap ourselves in.
- February 2007
Come along and see what we do best - improv! As ever we don't know exactly what'll be happening, but the likelihood is we'll be trying out a couple of the new games we've been working on at the workshops and in private rehearsals. We're an improvised comedy group, so everything we do will be made up on the spot. Games, songs, sketches - you name and (quite literally) we'll do it. Why not come along and see something new? Check us out at http://www.srcf.ucam.org/alcock for more info.
- February 2007
Charley loves Amy and Jack loves Kitty. The boys are on the point of proposal - but it must be done quickly. This being the 1890's, to get the ladies away from their dour guardian a chaperon is required. Enter Charley's Aunt - a millionairess from Brazil, visiting Oxford and her nephew that day. However, events take an unforeseen turn when the real Aunt is delayed. Undeterred, the boys press in a thespy friend to impersonate the real Aunt - who then manages to arrive on time after all...
Book tickets at: www.pembrokeplayers.org
- November 2006
- August 2006
A psychological drama exploring the relationship between director and actress at an audition where the normal rules and etiquettes have all been dispensed with. This new drama is hard-hitting and spiky, both suggestive and revealing. An insight into the mindsets of the examiner and the examined. please visit www.the-audition.co.uk; [The Venue260 is right in the heart of Edinburgh Royal Mile, our shared-between-6 3-rooms-flat is only 50m away from the venue and see all shows free at Venue260 and 45!]
- March 2006
- February 2006
Bound by circumstance, a father and daughter find themselves boarded up in a bed. She's got polio, and he's obsessed with furniture sales. Join us for arse-licking, murder, and arson: an extraordinary adventure stretching from Dublin to Gay Paree, as they rage down their twisted memory lane with toxic humour. In a fragile nightmare bordering on breakdown, father and daughter exorcise their pasts, and struggle towards tenderness: a misplaced bedtime story.
- February 2006
On 22nd July 1928 in the dusty heat of Andalusia, a young bride flees with her ex-lover on her wedding night to a dank forest where death waits.
Based on a true story, one of the 20th century's most celebrated writers, F.G Lorca, uses the 'crime of Nijar' to investigate illicit desire, repression, ritual, and constraints of the community. Using a bold new translation, a large cast fuse music, drama, poetry and electro-tango to present a dark and poetic vision of love as a precursor to betrayal and violence.
- November 2005
The enigmatic figure known to the world of mad science only as ‘The Doctor’ and his gormless assistant, Arthur Nice, are hungry little moles. And they’re certainly going to gobble up lots of worms. Such worms as: human decency, basic morality and rigorous, empirical scientific research. A comedy extravaganza of top-hatted frock-coated mad science not to be missed.
In his underground lair (in the murky depths of the Pembroke new cellars) the doctor has called together the greatest cracked pots of his generation to partake in the 1st annual symposium of the association of crazed, reprehensible, odious and neurotic young men or A.C.R.O.N.Y.M. His aim? To bring to an end the all-to-long reign of good science and to usher in a new era of malignant, horror-inducing insane science. Or, failing that, do something really cool with acids.
But be warned. Enter his world and you enter a world of genetically spliced grotesques, a monstrous arena where mammals are forced to do battle armed with weapons they should never have got hold of in the first place, a place in which the greatest experiment ever conducted will take place, perhaps with uncontrollable results. You certainly aren’t in Kansas no more, folks, and Toto’s got a BB-gun.
This comic, chemically fuelled explosion is brought to you by two of Britain’s best young comedians. Adam Terry and Fred Crawley are recent graduates of Cambridge University (and were founding members of the Cambridge Comedy Club). Currently both are living in London and making their intrepid way onto the national comedy circuit. Come and see their critically acclaimed Edinburgh Festival Fringe tour show in its last three performances back in Cambridge. See them now, so you can say you saw them then.
“It is really funny. The script is so packed with one liners and throw away dry wit that you don't care it's late, you don't care that some idiot is drunkenly shouting "Gangster!" you just laugh.”
Three Weeks
“This is a fantastic show with a couple of guys who are seriously funny.”
www.edfringe.com
- November 2005
At the dark heart of master playwright Henrik Ibsen’s Ghosts lies the tortured fate of a woman denied any chance of fulfilment by a male dominated world. In Ghosts Ibsen damningly exposes the hypocrisy and limitations of a self-righteous society, and his subversive treatment of marriage, infidelity, incest and venereal disease provoked scandalized outcry when first performed. Yet ultimately it is the eternal question of the individual’s right to self expression and freedom which drives this powerful tragedy – a question voiced by Ghosts as shockingly and vibrantly now as it ever was.
- November 2005
ALL MY SONS opens on a Sunday morning in a garden in the Mid-West in August 1947. The day is to be burning hot but now it is cool as Joe Keller reads the want ads in the paper. The silence of mundanity hangs in the air as he, his wife and neighbours go about their weekend leisure. But his son has arrived home to marry the childhood sweetheart of his brother whose jet went missing over the South China Seas in the war. What follows is a devastating and tragic deconstruction of the American way of life- family, morality and community are all held to trial in Arthur Miller’s first great play:
“What was Larry to you? A stone that fell into the water? It’s not enough for him to be sorry.”
- March 2005
On Christmas Eve, two strangers arrive in the Irish village of Bochtan. The crops are blighted, and all must prepare for another year of poverty. But in the face of their misfortunes, the villagers begin a laughing contest... Years later, Mommo tells the story of this night of mirth, repeating it time and again without ever reaching its tragic conclusion. Every evening her tale intrudes on her granddaughters' modern lives, and its repetition seems to hide the secret of their broken family. But tonight, things turn out differently...
Tom Murphy´s unique combination of drama and storytelling has made him one of the most acclaimed contemporary Irish dramatists. In this grotesque Christmas tale, he addresses the haunting past of Ireland's poverty with all the fierceness of satire and the black humour of tragi-comedy. When bedtime stories go wrong, and families are torn apart by misfortune, what else can we do... but laugh?
