Category: entertainment and leisure news

THE Thame Players Theatre alterations and improvements are almost complete and soon the public will once again be able to enjoy the very best of local amateur dramatics and professional, visiting productions. Here’s a taste of what’s to come:

Quartet by Ronald Harwood – Tuesday, Saturday, September 9 – 13, at 7.45pm – The setting is a retirement home for musicians. Three elderly former opera-singers, who often worked together, are sitting in the music room. They are about to be joined by newcomer Jean, a major star in her day and to whom Reginald was once married. A gala concert is about to take place at the retirement home to celebrate Verdi’s birthday, will they sing together again. The show must go on…
Writing for The Independent, Paul Taylor described the play as “an unashamed — no, shameless — vehicle for four feisty old troupers whose task is to make us laugh a little, sigh a little and cry a little as they take us into the bittersweet world of facing up to age and mortality.

The Neil Diamond Story – The life of a legend in song… Presented by Bob Drury; Sunday, September 21, at 7.45pm – As Neil Diamond prepares to mark 50 years at the top of his profession, singer and guitarist Bob Drury, described as the UK’s ‘Voice of Neil’, celebrates the life and work of this musical legend. Featuring iconic songs from a hit filled musical career such as Cracklin’ Rosi’, Sweet Caroline, Love on The Rock’, America’, Brother Love’s Travelling Salvation Show, Play Me and Girl You’ll be a Woman Soon alongside much loved album tracks and more recent acoustic material. Bob Drury’s one-man show is a must see for all Diamond fans.

Two Kinds of Teardrops – The Roy Orbison & Del Shannon story – Saturday, September 27, at 7.45pm – Roy Orbison and Del Shannon had much in common ….. exceptional vocal styles, distinctive sound, dramatic song structures – plus their links to The Traveling Wilburys.

This multi-media show spans five decades of some of the most dynamic songs of joy and pain ever expressed in popular music – with Mike VanDetta singing all the hits, complemented by a biographical narrative, giving a rare insight into Roy and Del’s truth-is-stranger-than-fiction personal life stories.

Mike has been a session singer, a published songwriter and performed with such diverse acts as jazz-pop maestro Georgie Fame and folk-blues legend John Martyn.

Tickets online from www.thameplayers.co.uk (10% booking fee applies) or Tickets Anywhere, Greyhound Walk, Thame 01844 217228

WHY not re-live the decade that fashion forgot – which is also remembered for its flouncy-cuffed New Romantics – low budget television programmes where more money was spent on the theme tune and the hairstyles than the screen writing. This was the decade where SodaStream and Blue Nun were household names.

Think back and reminisce with us about the time where Boy George was sparking gender confusion, Michael Jackson was King of Pop, Iceman was your wingman, and Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan were Ramsay Street’s most famous couple.

The Spread Eagle Hotel in Thame presents, on Friday, September 12, 2014, the date to re-live the glory days of the 1980s. Rummage through your wardrobe, shake up that hairspray, trowel on the eye-liner, splash on some Old Spice and crack open some Babycham.

Proceeds from the night will be donated to The MS Society and Chiltern MS Centre – find out more at http://www.mssociety.org.uk/ and http://www.chilternsmscentre.org/

Come dressed as your favourite 80s icon, or make a bold fashion statement!
Dj Kristian will be spinning the best floor fillers from the best decade EVER!

Tickets £10 and are available from Fore Golf/Domino formal Hirewear, Buttermarket Thame. Jenny 0776 9647745 (Cash sales only please)
Please spread the word and invite all your friends personally and on the Facebook events page for what will be an awesome night of party mayhem!

“Roads? Where we’re going, ……we don’t need roads”
– Doc Brown, Back to the Future, 1985

SOURCE: Facebook https://www.facebook.com/events/1459022794355367/

THAME Players Theatre Company, whose 70th anniversary falls this year, has just been awarded grants worth £10,000 from two funding organisations, The Theatres Trust and The Foyle Foundation, towards its Building A Better Theatre refurbishment campaign.

The Theatres Trust has announced its fifth round of small capital grants to theatres across the nation, in which Thame Players was one of five theatres fortunate enough to receive a grant of £5,000. This grant goes towards the installation of a moveable wall system to improve the size and flexibility of the stage and enables Thame Players to complete their stage refurbishment. It also helps to complete a larger capital project which will improve the quality of the theatre and increase the seating capacity from its present 119 to 132.

Mhora Samuel, Director of The Theatres Trust, said: “I’m delighted that we are able to help five more theatres with small grants from the Theatres Protection Fund. The support we receive from the Andrew Lloyd Webber Foundation and Judy Craymer MBE towards our Small Grants Scheme is making a real difference to these theatres.”

The Trust’s Small Grants Scheme helps theatres in need and at risk to address urgent building repairs, improve their operational viability, introduce environmental improvements, and enhance physical accessibility.

The Foyle Foundation has also just awarded a grant of £5,000 to Thame Players to help them complete their Building A Better Theatre Project. The Foundation was formed in 2001 to implement the terms of the will of the late Christina Foyle. She was the daughter of William Foyle who, with his brother, founded the family owned bookshop Foyles in Charing Cross Road, London, which she continued to manage after her father’s death. The Foyle Foundation’s Small Grants Scheme is designed to support smaller charities in the UK, especially those working at grass roots and local community level, in any field, across a wide range of activities.

Thame Players Theatre Company, a non-professional theatre group and a registered charity founded in 1944, has owned The Players Theatre since 1977. It is the only dedicated theatre and cinema serving the town of Thame and surrounding area, presenting a variety of productions by Thame Players and other visiting companies and also screening films throughout the year. Pat Shepherd, Chairman of Thame Players, comments, “I am delighted that we have been successful in winning these two important grants from The Theatres Trust and The Foyle Foundation, which will make a massive contribution to our fundraising programme and help us complete the building work that is now underway. The major work involved in enlarging the stage and moving it further back, together with other improvements, will mean that more people can be accommodated to see more shows, there will be a better view from anywhere in the theatre, and more ambitious productions can be put on, so audiences can enjoy a greater variety of theatrical and cinema entertainment.”

Thame Players are also grateful for grants and donations received from South Oxfordshire District Council, Thame Town Council, The Garfield Weston Foundation, The Oxfordshire Community Foundation, The Doris Field Trust, The Pye Charitable Settlement, The Mayor of Thame’s Charitable Fund, The Rotary of Thame, businesses and private donors.

The next Thame Players’ production, when the theatre re-opens next month following completion of the building work, will be Quartet by Ronald Harwood from September 9 – 13, 2014 More information: LINK

SOURCE: Contributed

THE herd of Thame cows, dotted around the town as mobile notice boards, are two down this week, following the sad news that a second cow has been stolen.

Sadly, Ermintrude, who was in the care of Abbotts Office Solutions, in Station Yard, Thame, was, the company has revealed, subject to a spot of ‘cattle rustling’ at the beginning of the year. Her padlock and chain where cut and she has not been seen since.

Another of the Thame cows disappeared a few weeks ago from Racquets Fitness Centre – based fittingly enought, at the rear of the Cattlemarket car park in Thame. Then there was Mabel, who went walk-about over the Christmas break from outside Jordan’s courtyard. She was spotted one night outside The Swan Inn, then further down Swan Walk the next night and finally seen peering out into Wellington Street from where three strong regulars from The Swan, kindly carried her back home.

There is though something being ‘moooooooted’ that could, potentially, bring a new lease of life for the Thame cows, expecially those in need of a bit of TLC like the poor old cow outside the Citizens Advice Bureau who had one of her horns broken off and was sprayed with pink paint by vandals a few months ago.

It’s all a bit ‘hush hush’ at the moment and depends on some funding that is being applied for right now, but watch this space and hopefully some exciting news for fans of the Thame cows will shortly be revealed, in time for the Thame Food Festival in September.

Residents of Thame have enthusiastically welcomed the herd of cows to the town over the last 18 months – there was even a ‘Save the Thame Cows’ campaign when the town council threatened to have them banned. The cows in question are life size models featuring advertising boards which have been stationed at various sites in the town and used to promote local community events. The herd consists of 10 adults and two baby calves, one outside A Piece of Cake in the Upper High Street, and another which lives at Lotte’s Cafe in Chinnor where ‘he’ Brian, thinks he’s a girl and is happy to be adorned with a pink, chiffon scarf.

The cows were provided by 21st Century Thame and formed part of a project to promote market towns, which was funded by South Oxfordshire District Council and LEADER, a European Commission programme that supports community-led local economic development in rural areas. The herd are looked after by various businesses throughout the town.

AS the Towersey Playing fields become a hive of activity in preparation for the 50th Towersey Festival, the organisers have announced today that 2014 will be the last year that the festival will be held in the village of Towersey itself.

From next year, the Towersey Festival will be held on Thame Show Ground, just a stone’s throw away.

Joe Heap, whose family has been involved with organising the show since its inception, told Thame.Net: “We were warned by the farmer, David White, a couple of years ago that the show may have to leave his farm and now he has decided to retire and has sold some of his land. But the move will be a positive thing for the show, taking it into the next half century and enabling us to improve some things, like having less gates to Man and check, and to continue involving the people of Thame more by bringing more local Arts, theatre, music and culture etc to the show.”

A video explaining the move, is available on the Towersey Festival Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Towerseyfestival

THERE are still some tickets left for a fabulous day at the Raymond Blanc Cookery School, generously donated by Le Manoir aux Quat’ Saisons to the Thame Food Festival, to help raise funds towards sustaining this great, annual event in the town.

Thame Food Festival Patron, Lotte Duncan, explained: “Thame Food Festival is a CIC, set up as a platform for artisan producers and to support our beautiful market town. There are only 10 places available – so be quick if you want to come.

“I’ll be there on the day too – I’m doing a cookery demonstration for you all at some point which is an incredible treat for me, if a little bit scary!”

DETAILS; Exclusive event: A day at the Raymond Blanc Cookery School with Mark Peregine and Lotte Duncan; Monday, September 22, 2014.

Master effortless entertaining at the world famous cookery school at Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons; Create the perfect autumn dinner party menu; Ideas for simple, seasonal dishes to impress your guests!
Learn and practise new techniques with the chefs

Make your own pastry, pasta, soups and much more; Try some of Raymond Blanc’s favourite recipes; Discover the secrets of entertaining guests with minimal effort and maximum impact.

Book today for this special event in support of this year’s Thame Food Festival – September 27, 2014

A full day’s tuition, morning and afternoon tea, lunch and course certificate cost £365 per person. To book, please go to www.thamefoodfestival.co.uk and click on Events.

THE newly-formed THAME POP CHOIR has successfully completed its first term and is looking for even more members to swell its sound.

The choir was formed in April of this year, with an attendance of 24 on the first evening, rising to 36 by the end of term. Musical director Ian English said: “I’m delighted with the response – we have made excellent progress in just 10 weeks, and with a choir of this size the melodies and harmonies are already sounding very strong.”

The choir meets weekly on Tuesdays (in term-time) at 7.30pm at the Guide HQ, Southern Road, Thame OX9 2EP. Previous choir/singing experience is not necessary, music-reading is not required and there are no auditions – just a desire to sing and have fun! The cost is £5 a session.

Further details and term dates can be found on the choir’s website www.thamepopchoir.org.uk. If you would like to be added to the mailing list you can use the ‘contact’ page on the website. There is also a ‘Thame Pop Choir’ Facebook page. If you would like more information from Ian, give hime a call on:  01844 261171.

New members are always welcome, and the first ‘taster’ evening is free. The autumn term commences on Tuesday, September 16. As the website says:

“Singing is fun, therapeutic too; it is good for your soul, reduces stress and lifts your spirits!”

THAME Players produced top-class performances of Much Ado About Nothing, one of Shakespeare’s greatest comedies, in front of a capacity audiences in the beautiful setting of The Elms in Thame, from Tuesday to Saturday last week.

Although now twenty years since the Players last performed open-air in the same delightful garden setting,  you would not have thought so, because this production, set in the Edwardian era with the Grade II listed house as backdrop, and complete with Charleston dancing and 1920s jazz music by Jelly Roll Morton, was highly professional, slick, and well thought-out by its director, David Bright.

James McCann, the sound engineer, deserves a particular mention for the clarity of the sound production – not always easy in the open air with cast members moving around on stage.

The lead parts of Beatrice and Benedick were played beautifully flirtatiously by Claire Southeard and Richard Roach, with a superb cast of 20, including the bad guys, suitably hissed at by an appreciative audience, played by Tim Shepherd, James Whitaker and Andrew Clamp, and comic relief uproariously provided by Tony Long, Colin Love and a trio of watchmen.

Fine weather prevailed for all performances, marred only by some light rain on the opening night, and audiences flocked to The Elms, generously opened to the public by its owners for the week, to enjoy picnics on the grass before the show, with delicious home-made food provided by local cooks, Kirsty’s Kitchen and Made by Mums. This was surely an idyllic experience for all who came to enjoy one of the Bard’s most joyful plays in such a fine setting, and one to remember fondly in the colder months ahead.

Thame Players, who this autumn will be celebrating 70 years as an amateur theatre group, are grateful to their sponsors, Rectory Homes, Reaston Brown, Wills & Trusts, Pearson Insurance, RCP Service Centre, Abbotts Office Solutions, Richardsons, XT Brewing and Connect Scaffolding, for making such a polished production possible.

For more information about Thame Players visit http://www.thameplayers.co.uk.

To obtain tickets for Thame Players’ next production, Quartet by Ronald Harwood, at The Players Theatre in Nelson Street from September 9 – 13, call Tickets Anywhere on 01844 217228 or book online at http://www.thameplayers.co.uk

To become a Thame Players member, friend, or to help as a volunteer, call Tony Long on 07938 857291.

SOURCE: Contributed by Helen Johns