- March 2018
Edinburgh, 2006. Romania, Susanne and Adrianne are students, living together but leading very distinct lives. Adrian is a junior lecturer whose nihilistic worldview cuts gradually deeper into his increasingly lonely life.
Washed-up Sacramento band The Stranger Than Fictions are in town, and when they offer Romania a gig all manner of uncertainties and anxieties start to crystallise.
From these characters and their disorientating web of friends, acquaintances, haunts and habits emerges a multilateral examination of depression, performative insincerity and exploitation of sexual naivety. There is no grand design or all-governing plot, but the coming-of-age struggle that all the characters face one way or another is presented in all its bitterness and uncertainty.
- February 2018
‘I shall do one thing in this life - one thing certain - that is, love you, and long for you, and keep wanting you till I die.’
Far From the Madding Crowd is set against the part-real, part-dream world of Hardy’s Wessex. Where Bathsheba's choices show us life in all it's unpredictability, the decisions we take, both wise and unwise. And those choices that cause aftershocks that reverberate throughout everything that follows.
This will be an intimate production performed in the round, with naturalistic scenes alongside movement pieces and music.
Adapted by Jessica Swale from the novel Far From the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy.
Directed by Eleanor Dodson, movement direction by Marlie Haco (RCSSD).
"Eleanor Dodson... saw its possibilities, and directs with extraordinary delicacy and long sorrowful silences of rose coloured tension" The Times.
Image by Jess Pigott.
http://www.castlegatehouse.co.uk/paintings-for-sale/jessica-pigott/
- February 2018
Are there any cynics in paradise?
When two brothers join a cult, things turn for the worse as Michael and Liam question their mortality, their faith and whether or not they can trust each other.
The pater familias has his own suspicious intentions, the outcast is ostracized yet untouchable and the remainder of the denomination ring out their doctrine in unison.
The Road to Nowhere is Alfred Leigh's debut play, promising to be an irreverent ideological examination.
https://bats.tessera.info/tickets/road-to-nowhere
https://www.adctheatre.com/whats-on/literary/the-road-to-nowhere/
'Darkly Seductive' - Varsity ★★★★
- November 2017
The Cambridge Impronauts are so proud to be running a BME-only improvised comedy workshop! We welcome all those who identify as BME, regardless of prior experience or year group.
Come along to learn a skill which will make you a better stage performer, and a better person in general!
- October 2017
New to Cambridge?
Not new to Cambridge, but new to theatre?
Not new to Cambridge OR theatre?
Audition Workshops will take place this Saturday 7th October at 17:00 and Sunday 8th October at 16:00 in the ADC Larkum Studio (just ask at the bar or the front desk if you are unsure of where to go). The workshops are open to anyone and everyone, regardless of your level of experience!
Come along to have a chat to Ellie and Adam, the CUADC Actors' Reps, about how auditions in Cambridge tend to work. We'll be on hand to answer any questions, and (hopefully) allay and fears you might have. Tea and biscuits will also be making a cameo appearance...
You don't have to come on the dot at 5 or 4, we'll be in the Larkum Studio for an hour on each day, so pop in at any point with a question or just to say hi!
Please send any accessibility concerns or pressing questions to Adam and Ellie at actors@cuadc.org.
- March 2017
Miss Phyllis Kelway talked to the animals and they answered.
Her friend, Miss Mary Sykes, one of the first lady solicitors, meant to build a house but found she had accidentally built an ark full of red squirrels, hedgehogs and Juggles the otter.
Now, to add to the pandemonium, there is a war on, an escaped adder, and Phyllis wants to keep geese to do her bit for the war effort.
- March 2017
Rehearsed reading of the play 'Bromley Bedlam Bethlehem' - a play exploring mental health across 3 generations of a family living in (shockingly) Bromley.
- May 2016
"You can’t let yourself be hollow anymore... beneath this whole covering of bad jokes and self-references and these papier mache memories... Are you even sure that you exist anymore?"
Trimalchio is a tragicomedy about Mark, a young playwright drafted in to adapt The Great Gatsby for his billionaire best friend. While slowly sinking into the mind of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Mark finds himself dodging demons from his romantic past. Fourth wall breaks abound.
Papercuts is the ADC's rehearsed reading programme. Come along, grab a drink from the bar, and watch new theatre in its purest form.
- May 2016
- May 2016
Losing my Religion follows public intellectual and atheist campaigner Pritchard Fawkes, loosely based on a certain 'someone'. Finding himself championing the great cause against God, he soon finds himself hilariously wrapped up in a crisis of faith. Following tragedy in his own life and against apocalyptic currents, Pritchard slowly begins to find out he just might be the Second Coming of Jesus Christ.
Papercuts is the ADC's rehereased reading programme. Come along, grab a drink from the bar, and watch new theatre in its purest form.
- May 2016
Joshua and Llewellyn tell stories. Stories which always end the same way. Stories which offer no relief. Stories for an audience of one.
They’ve been doing this for a long time now. Somewhere in the depths of a vast library filled with masks, Joshua and Llewellyn tirelessly weave old narratives into new faces. They tell and play out tales of all kinds: a fantastical child wanders lost in the forest; a priest receives a most unexpected confession; one man dreams of an impossible toilet.
But there is always the Worm. It watches them work, feeds on their labours, stretches their lives. They’ve been doing this for a long time now. Llewellyn remembers, but Joshua thinks; when the shelves are full and their work is over and the Worm is fat, they’ll find their way out. They’ll complete themselves.
They’ve been doing this for a long time now.
--
Papercuts is our new rehearsed reading programme.
We believe that the best way to help writers and their work develop is to get the script on its feet and spoken. Papercuts is produced in the Larkum Studio at the ADC Theatre, and is intended to let the writer see their work given a voice.
Come along, grab a drink from the bar, and watch new theatre in its purest form.
- March 2016
Which country is this?
Population paranoid about 1% of its citizens;
Press at odds with politicians;
Propelled towards war behind closed doors.
Answer: England. 1907.
Eddie is a well meaning and cash strapped minor Edwardian aristocrat. In the years before The Great War he is an acquaintance of both the King and the Kaiser and finds himself caught in gathering tension. He tries to build bridges, and with one innocent remark, he changes the course of history...
A lifelong soldier, later he's in command on the Western Front. Increasingly frustrated by events, disastrous leadership and the futile loss of life, he and one other commanding officer resist sending their men over the top on 1st July 1916. This remains the worst day in the history of the British Army. One man meets an ignominious fate while the other is treated as a hero and later becomes ADC to the King. Why?
- March 2016
- February 2016
An unscrupulous landlord lets the same flat out to two different men: a hatter who is out at work all day, and a printer who is out at work all night. When the hatter is given the day off and the two lodgers discover each other, the landlord’s scheme falls apart. But when the lodgers discover they have something in common, will they forget their quarrel?
Adapted by F.C. Burnand from a play by John Maddison Morton, and composed in 1866, this one-act musical farce was the first successful operetta by Arthur Sullivan, who later collaborated with acclaimed playwright W.S. Gilbert on such household names as The Pirates of Penzance, The Mikado, and H.M.S. Pinafore, which continue to delight and entertain audiences of all ages today.
- February 2016
"Maximum Firepower"
Join us as once again the Impronauts battle it out in a fun, competitive showdown of quick scenes and long laughs.
Join our Improvisational Gladiators as they once again take to the arena to battle for your amusement. For too long, the Cambridge Impronauts have been weaving tales together in relative peace and harmony. But now, things are getting personal as a crack team of Impronauts will go head to head, duelling through sketches, skit, and songs, all completely made up on the spot, for your applause!
There can be only one winner, but who will it be? And to what lengths will they need to go to win your approval? Come along to marvel at the magnificence and madness of the Cambridge Impronauts. You decide the winner. The power is in your hands...
- February 2016
London, 1665: one man suffers love and loss in the shadow of plague. In this song cycle, drawn from accounts such as Defoe's 'A Journal of the Plague Year', Mark Ravenhill’s wry libretto and Conor Mitchell’s experimental score sensitively explore questions of mortality and survival, whilst revealing sharp parallels with modern epidemics.
- February 2016
After a huge sell-out success in "Impronauts Quickfire - Too hot for the ADC" the Impronauts are back with "Quickfire - Turning up the Heat"
Join our Improvisational Gladiators as they once again take to the arena to battle for your amusement. For too long, the Cambridge Impronauts have been weaving tales together in relative peace and harmony. But now, things are getting personal as a crack team of Impronauts will go head to head, duelling through sketches, skit, and songs, all completely made up on the spot, for your applause!
Can Peter hold on to his victory in the first round or will one of his apprentices rise up and strike down the master? There can be only one winner, but who will it be? And to what lengths will they need to go to win your approval? Come along to marvel at the magnificence and madness of the Cambridge Impronauts. You decide the winner. The power is in your hands...
- January 2016
‘Girl, Interrupted’, chronicles Susanna Kaysen’s stay in a mental hospital in 1967 after an attempted suicide.
18 year old Susanna was put in a taxi and sent to hospital to be treated for depression. She spent most of the next two years on the ward for you women, in the psychiatric ward renowned for its famous clientele, including the distinguished poet and author Sylvia Plath.
This is a new adaptation of ‘Girl, Interrupted’, written for the stage by Rosie Brown. Susanna’s story is explored in new and exciting ways, set to music composed specifically for this original production.
Mental health, gender, sexuality and non-conformity are examined in this predominantly female production, for the most part through the eyes of Susanna.
- November 2015
The Battle of Stamford Bridge is looming.
A single soprano enters the space. All of a sudden she is King Harald, then the ghost of Saint Olaf, then Harald's wives, then the men of his kingdom.
This exciting and short contemporary opera tells the tragedy of King Harald in a demanding and engaging ten minute performance.
This unique aural drama, as the soprano flits between roles and perspectives, will aim to engage and draw out Judith Weir's deeply engaging and unique music, convincing us all not only of each role but of the deep emotional responses behind them.
- June 2015
“I was surprised it didn’t rip; surprised I didn’t burst all the way from the nape of my neck down to the small of my back, like the seam of a ripe peach. The memory of you, it was suffocating.”
In a hilltop house overlooking the sea, three women drink wine and reconnect with their past. What happens when an unexpected dinner guest arrives?
CRACKED is a new memory play about the experience of abuse.
- May 2015
From the writer who brought you Ajax440, comes an imaginative and quirky retelling from Ovid's Metamorphoses. Moved to modern-day, the original set of star-crossed lovers find themselves on Tinder, looking for a meaningful connection. As romance unfurls across the realms of social media, connected by the truest of loves and the most infinite of broadbands, will they actually find that the screen keeping them together is the very thing keeping them apart?
'I can't wait til I can photoshop my actual face. What's that called? Surgery?
Papercuts is the ADC's rehearsed reading programme. Come along, grab a drink from the bar, and watch new theatre in its purest form.
- March 2015
24 hours, 9 old friends and 5 years' worth of tension. Starting at the end and moving back this play explores the complexities of the relationships you share with the people you most love and the inability to separate the past, present and future.
- February 2015
Watching You is a brand-new play written by Nathan Smith. Absurdist and dark it aims to explore the paranoia and addiction behind TV. With hundreds of channels at hand, and thousands of hours of new input released each day, its never been easier than to just sit in front of the box. But what message are they sending out, and would we notice if it changed?
You're invited to join our main man for a night of TV browsing, everything's on offer and everything wants your attention. Warning, though, you may not want to give it...
- February 2015
The magician Nathaniel Taumont is putting on a show, and everybody who’s anybody is coming to see it. Enthusiasts, wits and skeptics alike have gathered in a small city theatre, and eagerly await what they know to be a most unusual performance: Taumont, with the aid of two loyal assistants and a curious, inscrutable frame, is going to raise the dead.
Come and see the great figures of the ancient world, in all their imperial splendour, come once more to life before your eyes! Watch as the frame, with all its intricate workings, communes with spirits long departed, eager to impart their wisdom to a welcoming and sage modernity!
Pay no heed to the look of disquiet in their eyes, or to the trembling of their borrowed, bruised body. Taumont is a master of the stage, and this is all, of course, merely a performance.
--
Papercuts is our new rehearsed reading programme.
We believe that the best way to help writers and their work develop is to get the script on its feet and spoken. Papercuts is produced in the Larkum Studio at the ADC Theatre, and is intended to let the writer see their work given a voice.
Come along, grab a drink from the bar, and watch new theatre in its purest form.
- February 2015
Execution is a new thriller set in a criminal syndicate. After a disastrous heist, Michael has been told he must murder Tim, the man supposedly, and perhaps deliberately, responsible. But Tim has information that complicates what should be a routine operation, and soon both men are locked in a tense power struggle, and at least one of them will not leave the room alive.
- February 2015
Welcome to a world away from the world, as George transforms an abandoned flat and grabs everything at his disposal to tell you the story of his life.
Hours of tape recordings, cupboards of costumes and boxes of props weave together a life of teaching English as a foreign language, trainspotting, and a meticulous obsession with the great grey cityscape outside.
- February 2015
"God and the Devil tread in my footsteps. I feel breath on my neck and
wings above my head"
"Great… He’s lost it"
The New Mexico Desert.
In the half-remembered borderlands of empire four Spanish soldiers wait for the captain who will bring them home.
But a century of colonial oppression has taken its toll on the land, and a stranger has come knocking who will cast long shadows on their world.
A one-night Papercuts rehearsed reading in the ADC Larkum on Friday of Week 3.
- January 2015
As part of Papercuts there will be a rehearsed reading of two scenes from a theatre adaptation of Henry James's ghost story The Turn of the Screw.
The ghost of a past governess haunts Bly Manor. Trapped in a Gothic world of secrecy and intrigue the new governess battles to maintain her sanity as the ghosts of Bly encroach further on her life.
- November 2014
Arthur seems to be a well-meaning, attentive husband. Miryanna is his wife, slowly coming to realise the truth about her husband's dealings, comes to realise the true purpose of her existence in Arthur's eyes. At Sixes and Sevens is a devastating exploration of a failed drive for individuality, subverting all idealistic considerations of the human condition.
This performance is part of the ADC's Papercuts series. Papercuts is produced in the Larkum Studio at the ADC Theatre, and is intended to let the writer see their work given a voice.
Come along, grab a drink from the bar, and watch new theatre in its purest form.
- October 2014
In amongst slates of cold metal, A. sits at their desk shuttling data files to and fro. But, in a moment of clumsiness, a cascade of drives fall and upset the delicate balance of the mess and unearths a single photograph. Who is that? Where's that come from? What does that go with? 'Clutter' is a new play that looks at information, memory, and identity. There might be yoga.
- October 2014
Emily lives a comfortable life with her high-flying boyfriend, complete with outdoor swimming pool and inflatable dolphin. But when her unstable past tries to catch up with her, will she be moved to see everything in a new light? And what about the waves?
A snapshot of intersecting lives, as they try to fit together.
This is wave.
wave is this year's first instalment in the ADC's Papercuts programme of rehearsed readings.
- June 2014
Julie Atherton is coming to the ADC for one day only to lead a Musical Theatre Masterclass - including tips on singing, audition technique and advice on how to survive in the 'the business'.
Julie has had an incredibly broad and impressive career in Musical Theatre, starring in several shows from Fame to Sister Act, Avenue Q to The Last Five Years. As well as this, she is a founder member of the Notes from New York company, and has released two of her own solo albums.
She will be instructing a few performers individually, but the event is open to the public who are welcome to participate in the Q&A session which will follow.
- May 2014
“The next stop is coming up. I am going to get up and I am going to get off. And you are not going to stop me.”
Clive’s trip home on the night bus takes a disturbing turn when nineteen year old May sits down next to him. She calls him a pervert. He misses his stop. As they travel together to the end of the route, Clive and May learn more about each other than they had bargained for. Round and Round, a new play by Hannah Greenstreet, tests whether a chance encounter can lead to a real connection, or whether it can lead to something worse.
This rehearsed reading is part of the Papercuts series.
- March 2014
Dijana Polančec knows exactly how much she is worth.
'1000 Euros because that is how much Babac paid for me. To put this in easy language, that is like two and a half iPhones.'
The Larkum Studio provides a malleable canvas for it felt empty when the heart went at first but it is alright now by Lucy Kirkwood. As disturbing as it is radiant, it felt empty when the heart went at first but it is alright now is an immersive journey through the landscape of Dijana’s life; a volatile terrain of optimism, bravado and the painful reality of life as a trafficked sex-worker.
Presented by Old Labs Productions and the Dryden Society
- October 2013
This new play by Marika Mckennell is an urban, gritty and darkly comic trajectory of a boy who is just trying to live, draw and smoke. A rehearsed reading of the text will be performed at the Larkum Studio for one night only as part of the ADC 'Papercuts' program. Come along, grab a drink from the bar, and watch new theatre in its purest form.
'Papercuts' the ADC's new rehearsed reading program and is intended to let the writer see their work given a voice
- October 2013
The most helpful of helplines. For when you need that little push.
I HEAR YOU is an unsettling piece of new student writing conerning attitudes towards suicide. This is a rehearsed reading in the ADC Larkum Papercuts program.
