Reviews by Phil Bloomfield
Romeo & Juliet
Phil Bloomfield
But, soft, what light through yonder laptop breaks? It is the Zoom, and Creation Theatre is the fun. Yes, that’s right, Creation have now focussed their talent on Verona and those two feuding ...
4 years ago
Romeo & Juliet
Time for Tea - Opens at Dunedin Fringe
Phil Bloomfield
Ah, the beauty of remote theatre…. this week I was able to watch a very interesting one-act play at the Dunedin Fringe from the comfort of my laptop. Yes, that Dunedin, in NZ.The play is Time For ...
4 years ago
Time for Tea - Opens at Dunedin Fringe
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz - Performed Live online via Zoom
Phil Bloomfield
We were off to see the Wizard - well, actually the Wizard came to see us in our living room by the magic that is Zoom.The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is this year’s Christmas show by Oxford’s own ...
4 years ago
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz - Performed Live online via Zoom
Lone Flyer
Phil Bloomfield
They say your life flashes before you at the moment of death, which may be an old trope, but it is used to fresh effect in the latest Watermill Theatre production, Lone Flyer. Ade Morris’ ...
4 years ago
Lone Flyer
Shadows of Troy
Phil Bloomfield
Shadows of Troy is a presentation of two Ancient Greek plays: Iphigenia at Aulis by Euripides and Ajax by Sophocles, produced together in original translations, and set in times before and after the ...
5 years ago
Shadows of Troy
Madama Butterfly
Phil Bloomfield
Another year, another excellent Ellen Kent opera at the New Theatre: this time she gave us a splendid version of the classic Madama Butterfly by Puccini. Developed in several versions in the ...
5 years ago
Madama Butterfly
The Snow Queen
Phil Bloomfield
Not that I’ve got anything against pantos (it’s behind me now), but Creation seem to always come up with something fresh and interesting as an alternative. This one, The Snow Queen, is a musical ...
5 years ago
The Snow Queen
Trying It On
Phil Bloomfield
A man on the North Wall stage introduces us to himself twice: once as he is now and once as he was in his twenties; once in real flesh and blood, and once as a voice in an old cassette tape recorder. ...
5 years ago
Trying It On
Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love [12A]
Phil Bloomfield
She was a sun-bleached blonde Norwegian and he was a Canadian with very black hair. Neither thought of themselves as attractive, but each had no difficulty in enjoying a succession of partners in the ...
5 years ago
Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love [12A]
Bufo Bufo
Phil Bloomfield
The Awkward Silence’s latest show Bufo Bufo starts with a news conference, where the first of many characters, a Chandler-esque Chicago flatfoot leads us into distinctly noir country with a ...
6 years ago
Bufo Bufo
Nick Hall: Spencer
Phil Bloomfield
I’m sure that my 6x great grandfather would have remembered where he was and what he was doing when he heard that Spencer Perceval was assassinated. Perceval remains the one and only British ...
6 years ago
Nick Hall: Spencer
Dreamscape
Phil Bloomfield
A few years ago, Greg was put into an induced coma, and he described his experience of that time in a blog: 'I was living deep inside my own brain, in a completely new version of reality. These were ...
6 years ago
Dreamscape
Sameena Zehra: Tea With Terrorists
Phil Bloomfield
Sameena Zehra has had an interesting life and she tells a string of attention-grabbing anecdotes from her life in her successful show, Tea With Terrorists, presented in Oxford as part of the Offbeat ...
6 years ago
Sameena Zehra: Tea With Terrorists
Green Eyes / The Parade
Phil Bloomfield
There’s an interesting double-header of early work by Tennessee Williams at the Burton Taylor this week. Green Eyes is first up, a torrid tale from 1971 of a soldier and his new bride (no, not ...
7 years ago
Green Eyes / The Parade
Eugene Onegin
Phil Bloomfield
The Welsh National Opera (WNO) is making its annual autumn visit to Oxford this week. Amongst their Russian Revolution-themed offerings is a recap of their 2004 production of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene ...
7 years ago
Eugene Onegin
The Secret Keeper
Phil Bloomfield
The dolls’ house maker has a secret and its making him miserable, so depressed that he hasn’t had sex with his wife for nine years. His daughter offers to listen to his secret and promises never ...
7 years ago
The Secret Keeper
Idle Women of the Wartime Waterways
Phil Bloomfield
During the Second World War the men went off to fight and women were needed to take their places and work in the factories. This much is common knowledge but fewer readers will be aware that women ...
7 years ago
Idle Women of the Wartime Waterways
Offside
Phil Bloomfield
Set in a typical changing room, Offside is a tale of two professional footballers. But they are not the pampered male stars of the Premier League, oh no, this is about two women who are benefiting ...
8 years ago
Offside
Kieran Hodgson: Maestro
Phil Bloomfield
Last night Edinburgh Fringe favourite Kieran Hodgson brought his much-acclaimed one-man show Maestro back to the city where he graduated and rejected a much more sensible career. He started his ...
8 years ago
Kieran Hodgson: Maestro
Nabucco
Phil Bloomfield
The quality of Ellen Kent's operas is a given: they are traditionally set, have exceptionally good solo singing, the gowns are to die for, and there's often a real live horse. Ellen's current ...
8 years ago
Nabucco
Adderbury Chamber Orchestra
Phil Bloomfield
The Adderbury Chamber Orchestra, directed by the outstanding violinist Martyn Jackson, performed their Candlelit Concert of 'great Baroque favourites' in the delightful SJE venue. The setting was ...
8 years ago
Adderbury Chamber Orchestra
Carols for Choir and Audience
Phil Bloomfield
There's a lot of music around at this time of year and Oxford has an abundance to enjoy. The Cathedral Singers of Christ Church is a voluntary adult choir of about 30 singers, supporting the ...
8 years ago
Carols for Choir and Audience
Creation Theatre's Snow White and Other Tales from the Brothers Grimm
Phil Bloomfield
This year's Christmas show from our amazing Creation Theatre is the splendid Snow White and Other Tales from the Brothers Grimm. Written and directed by Gari Jones, there's lots of typical Creation ...
8 years ago
Creation Theatre's Snow White and Other Tales from the Brothers Grimm
Self-Service: A Resurrection Story
Phil Bloomfield
I came to this revelation at Self-Service: A Resurrection Story, starring Shesus (Loose Baker) and the merciful Sistas, nuns Mary Berry and Pauline Hollywood (twins Danielle and Lauren Meehan). It ...
8 years ago
Self-Service: A Resurrection Story
Blown Away
Phil Bloomfield
Blown Away by Rob Biddulph is a great kids' book about three lovable penguins: Penguin Blue, her friends Jeff and Flo, and the big adventure they have when Penguin Blue receives a red kite in the ...
8 years ago
Blown Away
The Glenn Miller Story
Phil Bloomfield
You have to suspend belief just a tiny bit for this one, but if you do then the rewards are high. An admittedly sprightly almost 80-year-old Tommy Steele pretends to be our youthfully eponymous hero ...
8 years ago
The Glenn Miller Story
The Tempest
Phil Bloomfield
There's a lot of Shakespeare in Oxford this summer. Siege Theatre is contributing their interesting take on The Tempest at the atmospheric Oxford Castle Unlocked Courtyard.
It starts with a ...
8 years ago
The Tempest
Croft and Pearce Show
Phil Bloomfield
This is a little gem tucked away in the late evening on Radio 4: a comedy sketch show by two new and brilliant writer-performers, Hannah Croft and Fiona Pearce. They have honed a distinctive style ...
9 years ago
Croft and Pearce Show
King Lear
Phil Bloomfield
Creation lived up to their name in The Norrington Room last night with their latest production, King Lear. You know the tragedy: Lear gives away his kingdom to two of his daughters, Goneril and ...
9 years ago
King Lear
Treasure Island
Phil Bloomfield
That wonderful team at Creation Theatre has put together yet another memorable Christmas show at the North Wall Arts Centre. This time they have turned their talents towards that well-known and much ...
9 years ago
Treasure Island
The Deep Blue Sea
Phil Bloomfield
First performed and set in 1952, Terence Rattigan’s The Deep Blue Sea is now considered to be one of his finest plays. He was a master of the “well crafted play”, skilfully writing about ...
10 years ago
The Deep Blue Sea
Oxford Early Music Festival 2015
Phil Bloomfield
The final performance in this year’s splendidly successful Oxford Early Music Festival was a wonderful Stile Antico concert of music for compline, given in my favourite music venue in Oxford, the ...
10 years ago
Oxford Early Music Festival 2015
STAND
Phil Bloomfield
You may have heard of this one. First preformed at the West Oxford Community Association last June to celebrate our city “as the home of Radical Thinking”; it sold out. It was put together like ...
10 years ago
STAND
My Mother Said I Never Should
Phil Bloomfield
My Mother Said I Never Should, by Charlotte Keatley, is essentially a social history of the twentieth century from the Second World War on, as seen through the eyes of four women in one family; the ...
10 years ago
My Mother Said I Never Should
La Traviata
Phil Bloomfield
You can be sure of the quality of Ellen Kent’s operas: they are traditionally set, have very good solo singing and the gowns are to die for. Her current production of Verdi’s La Traviata is no ...
10 years ago
La Traviata
Plenty
Phil Bloomfield
First performed at the National in 1978, Plenty receives a welcome revival at the O’Reilly this week. It’s an intriguing character study principally about Susan Traherne, who was a Special ...
10 years ago
Plenty
Oxford Lieder Festival Opening Concert
Phil Bloomfield
A Schubert Dip
Last Friday evening’s splendid concert in the Sheldonian marked the start of the remarkable Oxford Lieder Festival for 2014, The Schubert Project. It’s remarkable ...
10 years ago
Oxford Lieder Festival Opening Concert
Journey's End
Phil Bloomfield
The splendid Watermill Theatre, near Newbury, has revived one of the greatest war plays every written, Journey’s End, to commemorate the First World War centenary. Originally written in ...
10 years ago
Journey's End
Merton's 750th Anniversary
Phil Bloomfield
It’s a big year for Merton College, its 750th anniversary, so it was entirely fitting that Elgar’s non-oratorio The Dream of Gerontius was chosen as one of the major events in ...
11 years ago
Merton's 750th Anniversary
The World According to John Bird
Phil Bloomfield
Into the Playhouse on a rainy Friday afternoon, to join a sparse audience of fellow-huddlers to hear John Bird, The Big Issue man, flog his latest book. On slumping in my seat, and looking ...
11 years ago
The World According to John Bird
Le Corsaire
Phil Bloomfield
English National Ballet’s latest touring production the C19th classic Le Corsaire is just wonderful. They’ve put together all the component parts so cleverly and so competently, to give ...
11 years ago
Le Corsaire
Piracy! Comedy on the High C's
Phil Bloomfield
As we settled into our seats in the Al-Jaber Auditorium in Corpus Christi there were shanties to set the mood, whilst Questing Vole Productions prepared to share with us the preview of their first ...
11 years ago
Piracy! Comedy on the High C's
Less Than Kind
Phil Bloomfield
Although written in 1944, this Terence Rattigan play first premiered with its original text only a couple of years ago. This was because “an accident of wartime” had resulted in the only ...
12 years ago
Less Than Kind
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2013
Phil Bloomfield
Nancy knew she wanted to be a writer from the age of six, and got there via a History degree and work as a trader in options on Wall Street. I’m glad she gave up on the bull in Wall Street, ...
12 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2013
Reflections of Spain
Phil Bloomfield
This was the first time that I’ve been to SJE Arts on the Iffley Road. It used to be St John the Evangelist Church, opposite the athletics track and so close that Sir Roger would get to it in ...
12 years ago
Reflections of Spain
Searching for Sugar Man [12A]
Phil Bloomfield
Well, this one’s about the ‘70s rock star Rodriguez. You’ve never heard of him? No, me neither. But that’s probably because you’re not from South Africa. So ...
12 years ago
Searching for Sugar Man [12A]
Made In Heaven
Phil Bloomfield
So we started with a Prairie Girl lying on the stage dressed in blue and white gingham, with the look of Dorothy (but alas, no Toto). Then, to a Sonic Youth track, she erupted into yoga asana meets ...
13 years ago
Made In Heaven
Close The Coalhouse Door
Phil Bloomfield
Wey, me an wor lass went doon the toon last neet (no, not th Toon, just Oxfad). Mind, ah still had to leave off me hat an me ganzhi as it wasn’t cad. Anyways, we went to see that play ...
13 years ago
Close The Coalhouse Door
Mary Shelley
Phil Bloomfield
Shared Experience Theatre Company tells the remarkable story of Mary Shelley, daughter of early feminist Mary Wollstonecraft and the controversial political philosopher William Godwin, in this ...
13 years ago
Mary Shelley
Songs Of Love And Loss
Phil Bloomfield
The City of Oxford Choir gave their termly concert, Songs of Love and Loss, last Saturday in the splendid Queen’s College Chapel. It started well when a delightful lady stepped forth to ...
13 years ago
Songs Of Love And Loss
The Adventures of Wound Man and Shirley
Phil Bloomfield
The intimate setting of the Burton Taylor was perfect for this delightful story of a 14-year-old boy with a girl’s name, Shirley, and his new neighbour Wound Man. The latter is a ...
13 years ago
The Adventures of Wound Man and Shirley
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2012
Phil Bloomfield
Plugging the paperback version of his latest book, Adapt, Tim Harford gave a talk referring only to his chapter on Iraq to illustrate the idea in the title. He started with one of the ...
13 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2012
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2012
Phil Bloomfield
Interesting throughout, Saturday’s lecture was a brilliant combination of erudition and anecdotes, delivered with characteristic Jonesian flair. He dismissed creation stories in the first ...
13 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2012
Moya
Phil Bloomfield
We dropped in to this bright Slovakian restaurant in St Clements for a quick pre-concert supper. It was very cold outside, but warm and welcoming inside. The décor is modern, ...
13 years ago
Moya
Phantasm
Phil Bloomfield
I doubt if there could be a better venue for this music; it certainly has the appropriate spirit of place. You may already know that Phantasm is a highly gifted six-player consort specialising ...
13 years ago
Phantasm
Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves
Phil Bloomfield
If you possibly can, get yourself out to West Oxfordshire to see this wonderfully traditional pantomime. The Chipping Norton Theatre is particularly good at panto, enjoying a national ...
13 years ago
Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves
Oxford Lieder Festival 2011
Phil Bloomfield
It was a privilege to witness the premiere of Charlotte Bray’s latest work, a song cycle based on Sonnets and Love Songs by Fernando Pessoa, a quirky Portuguese poet who thought he had multiple ...
13 years ago
Oxford Lieder Festival 2011
Oxford Lieder Festival 2011
Phil Bloomfield
Brilliant! What a wonderful concert this was, from first to last notes, and such an interesting and entertaining programme. There was an enthusiastic welcome for James Gilchrist from his many ...
13 years ago
Oxford Lieder Festival 2011
Oxford Lieder Festival 2011
Phil Bloomfield
It is amazing to think that this is the tenth year of the Oxford Lieder Festival, that brilliant celebration of wonderful music. This concert was the first in the Festival’s Swedish Weekend, a ...
13 years ago
Oxford Lieder Festival 2011
Oxford Lieder Festival 2011
Phil Bloomfield
Mercifully transferred to the Holywell at the last moment due to a piano malfunction, this delightful recital was the second concert in the Swedish Weekend by outstanding soprano, Ida Falk Winland. ...
13 years ago
Oxford Lieder Festival 2011
Antony & Cleopatra
Phil Bloomfield
It’s an Egyptian Tragedy, a Mediterranean Eastenders. You’ll know the story: boy meets girl; boy marries another girl; boy goes back to first girl; all hell breaks loose; and then girl meets ...
13 years ago
Antony & Cleopatra
Love, Love, Love
Phil Bloomfield
Ken and Sandra are groovy baby-boomers who meet at Ken’s brother Henry’s flat in 1967. He’s an Oxford student down to London for the vac and sponging off his brother. She’s a bit of ...
14 years ago
Love, Love, Love
Tea is an Evening Meal
Phil Bloomfield
All thirteen of us gathered around Faye Draper’s farmhouse table for a nice cup of tea and some bourbon biscuits. We had a selection of interesting and historic mugs to choose from, and not one was ...
14 years ago
Tea is an Evening Meal
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Phil Bloomfield
Martin Nowak, a mathematical biologist at Harvard, and Roger Highfield, editor of the New Scientist, talked about their new book, Super Co-operators, in which they attempt to explain the logic of how ...
14 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Phil Bloomfield
Peter Atkins retired three years ago from his post as Professor of Chemistry at Oxford University. During his working life he published many successful books on science. His new work, On Being, which ...
14 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Phil Bloomfield
Science writer Georgina Ferry chaired three different panels in succession through an interesting afternoon focussed on Synthetic Life, the Diversity of Life and Life in Space, respectively. The ...
14 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Phil Bloomfield
We started with a spirited, “Happy birthday to you, dear Anthony,” for it was indeed AC Grayling’s birthday. He overcame any momentary embarrassment to lead quickly into a wonderful 40 minute ...
14 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Phil Bloomfield
Dr Sarah Thomas, Bodley's 24th Librarian, spoke to us in the stunning Divinity School about her vision for the future of the Bodleian Libraries. She started with a quick historical summary before ...
14 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Phil Bloomfield
Most of this session was an engaging interview between Dave Freeman and author Colin Thubron, who is reputed to be “one of this country’s most distinguished travel writers”. Dave’s questions ...
14 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2011
Animal Kingdom [15]
Phil Bloomfield
In an arresting title sequence, teenager Josh Cody (J) has one eye on the TV, showing the Aussie version of Deal or No Deal, while his Mum, slumped on the sofa, is being treated for a heroin overdose ...
14 years ago
Animal Kingdom [15]
Oxford Lieder Festival 2010
Phil Bloomfield
You will know that Oxford is a very civilised place. One of its cultural delights is the Lieder Festival, an “annual two-week extravaganza” of song. A highlight of the Festival this year just has ...
14 years ago
Oxford Lieder Festival 2010
Are There More of You?
Phil Bloomfield
This excellent production is a series of loosely interlinked monologues about four middle-aged women who live in SW11, all written and performed by the highly talented Alison Skilbeck. Firstly, ...
14 years ago
Are There More of You?
Propaganda
Phil Bloomfield
The set-up: the Lord Chamberlain’s Men at the Globe have been persuaded to put on an old Shakespeare play, Richard II, by Robin, the Earl of Essex, and his fixer, Harry, the Earl of Southampton. ...
15 years ago
Propaganda
The Glass Menagerie
Phil Bloomfield
Poor Tom Williams: stuck in a cramped St Louis apartment with his loony Mum and his crippled sister, working at a dead-end day job in a shoe warehouse and spending his nights either escaping at the ...
15 years ago
The Glass Menagerie
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Phil Bloomfield
Professor Richard Wiseman is now a psychologist, but was once a professional magician, so he introduced this excellent lecture/performance with a disappearing hanky trick, using that as a way into ...
15 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Phil Bloomfield
There was a smattering of photographers and a film crew at the Sheldonian for Philip Pullman’s session on his new book, the controversial The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ. The theatre ...
15 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Phil Bloomfield
These two eminent scientists, both highly experienced in the public regulation of food, gave us a fascinating double-act on the latest research on obesity. Kessler was promoting his new book, The End ...
15 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Phil Bloomfield
Ben Goldacre, author of Bad Science, broadcaster, and medical doctor who writes the weekly Bad Science column in the Guardian, entertained a sell-out Garden Marquee crowd at the Festival. He spoke ...
15 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Phil Bloomfield
Neil MacGregor, Director of the British Museum, talked about the BBC Radio 4 series A History of the World in 100 Objects, which looks at the whole world through its things. He started with the ...
15 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Phil Bloomfield
Unfortunately, Richard Dawkins did not join us as billed for this part of the celebrations for the 350th anniversary of the founding of the Royal Society. A few punters mumbled about getting a ...
15 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2010
Burton
Phil Bloomfield
Rhodri Miles performs as the mega actor and film star Richard Burton in this excellent one-man show at the eponymous studio theatre, where in 1944 Burton took his first standing ovation at the end of ...
15 years ago
Burton
Three Sisters
Phil Bloomfield
No, it isn’t the Bevs: it’s Chekhov, Jim, but not as we know it. There are no cool Derek Jacobi types in white suits and no pale sunshine streaming through the dacha’s French windows, ...
15 years ago
Three Sisters
The Last Station [15]
Phil Bloomfield
This is a biopic of a novelisation by Jay Parini of the last few days in the life of the Russian author Lev Tolstoy. As in all good novels there is a nice bit of conflict going on. Tolstoy (a ...
15 years ago
The Last Station [15]
Judgement
Phil Bloomfield
We enter the Studio, set out in thrust mode, to see a semi-naked man laid out, apparently asleep on a sarcophagus. The room is shrouded in smoke and lit by candles in tall stands. A carved ...
15 years ago
Judgement
Dick Whittington
Phil Bloomfield
It’s worth taking the trip out to West Oxfordshire to see this delightfully traditional Pantomime. Chippy is particularly good at these shows and this year’s version is again a winner. The story, ...
15 years ago
Dick Whittington
Dancing In My Dreams
Phil Bloomfield
This excellent musical play tells the story of Kathleen O’Neill, evacuated with her sister Christina from the East End of London to an unnamed village in the English countryside early in the Second ...
16 years ago
Dancing In My Dreams
Lost in the Wind
Phil Bloomfield
A huge success at the Edinburgh Fringe last summer, Bristol-based Theatre Company Lost Spectacles won hearts of all ages at the North Wall on Friday night with their evocative production - Lost in ...
16 years ago
Lost in the Wind
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2009
Phil Bloomfield
Susan Blackmore, a multi-talented psychologist with a shock of multi-coloured hair, started her talk by asking members of the audience, “Are you conscious?” When they answered, with whatever they ...
16 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2009
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2009
Phil Bloomfield
A Poet’s Guide to Britain is a new series for BBC Four’s Poetry Season, due to be screened this coming May. This preview screening was introduced by poet Owen Sheers, who has chosen six ...
16 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2009
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2008
Phil Bloomfield
Michael Holdroyd, the celebrated biographer of Lytton Strachey, George Bernard Shaw and Augustus John, was at the Lit Fest to promote his new work, A Strange Eventful History: The Dramatic Lives of ...
16 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2008
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2009
Phil Bloomfield
This session was a debate on the major questions being raised at every level in our educational system. It was chaired by Jenny Cuffe, a BBC journalist, who introduced the speakers. Each then spoke ...
16 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2009
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2009
Phil Bloomfield
In this Lit Fest session, author Graham Farmelo was interviewed about his book, The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac. John Carey, The Sunday Times Chief Critic, was the man asking the ...
16 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2009
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2009
Phil Bloomfield
David Starkey got the Oxford Literary Festival off to a grand start with a tour de force lecture about the early life of Henry VIII. His talk coincided with the publication of his latest book, the ...
16 years ago
Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival 2009
Double Bill from 16|22
Phil Bloomfield
This week the Burton Taylor Studio is offering two performances each night by members of 16|22, the resident young company at Oxford Playhouse. 16|22 members are either in their last two years of ...
16 years ago
Double Bill from 16|22
The Just Assassins
Phil Bloomfield
Is there such a thing as a righteous terrorist? Five Russian insurgents, four young men and a woman, meet to discuss their proposed murder of the Grand Duke Serge as he drives in his carriage to the ...
16 years ago
The Just Assassins
Dancin' Oxford Festival 2009
Phil Bloomfield
Part of the Dancin’ Oxford Festival, this show by Sakoba was commissioned by Pegasus, and features choreography by Bode Lawal, devised in a contemporary African dance style. He has taken ...
16 years ago
Dancin' Oxford Festival 2009
Valentine's Day Poetry Competition 2009
Phil Bloomfield
Italian ValentineWe sat together at FratellisIn a quiet and thoughtful spaceWithin the bustle of food and conversationsShe had the Parmigiana di MalanzaneMine was the Fettucine DiavolettoAnd we drank ...
16 years ago
Valentine's Day Poetry Competition 2009
Playbites 2009
Phil Bloomfield
This was a delightful way to spend lunchtime on a wintry day. I watched six short plays of variety and quality by members of the Writers at Oxford Playhouse Group performed by seven gifted actors of ...
16 years ago
Playbites 2009
