In The Paper

This week’s issue of The Stage is our double size Christmas spectacular. This week’s cover star, Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps actor Sheridan Smith talks about performing from an early age, her dedication, and playing the lead in Legally Blonde the Musical:

It’s a dream part. I would have been gutted if I hadn’t got it. I know it’s a big, fluffy camp show, but it does have a lot of heart and a lovely message — that you can achieve things others don’t think you are capable of

Since Edward Bennett took on the role of Hamlet at short notice from David Tennant in December 2008, a succession of high profile understudies have helped ensure that the show goes on even when the leading actors can’t. To celebrate, we honour the role of the understudy with a photoshoot of eight talented performers either currently working as understudies or who have taken over in a major role this year.

The Stage’s Hamlet cartoonist and TV reviewer, Harry Venning, took a decade to transform his Guardian comic strip Clare in the Community into the successful Radio 4 sitcom. As his second show, Sneakiepeeks is now under way on the broadcaster, the former actor shares his tips with aspiring broadcast writers:

Sitcom, in particular lends itself to radio far more than TV, where budgetary constraints and the demands of a live audience limit the action to however many sets can be crammed into a studio. Usually this just means three, with one almost invariably a semi-detached, suburban living room. Sneakiepeeks has already gone on location to the Cote d’Azur, the United Arab Emirates, Ceredigion, Eastbourne and Madame Tussauds

Review of 2009

• From taking part in the third Move It dance event in London and reviewing more than 350 productions at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, to providing scholarships to talented young performers and returning to Blackpool to hold our annual light entertainment party, it’s been an eventful year for The Stage

• Photographer Tristram Kenton shares the photographic highlights of the year

• News reporters Lalayn Baluch and Matthew Hemley look back at the key news stories of the arts sector and broadcasting industry

• Our arts correspondents look back at the last twelve months of West End, London Fringe, regional theatre, opera, dance and light entertainment, television and radio performances, as well as the pick of books, CDs and DVDs

Also this week:

We pick the best radio, TV and podcasts to watch and listen to over the festive period

Physical theatre company Footsbarn will be braving the cold to bring a fortnight of bawdy performance to Shakespeare’s Globe this Christmas. Globe and Footsbarn artistic directors Dominic Dromgoole and Paddy Hayter tell Lalayn Baluch to expect a weird and wonderful array of puppets, music, circus and song, suitable for the whole family

Award winning playwright Che Walker, best known for The Frontline, tells Chloe Thomas about working on Jack and the Beanstalk at the Lyric Hammersmith and why he loves panto

Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler’s children’s books, including The Gruffalo rely on gorgeous illustrations to add to the story — so that adds additional design challenges when transferring them to the stage. Lisa Martland meets Katie Sykes, who has converted the Donaldson/Scheffler book Stick Man for the Soho Theatre

Newly graduated performers should think twice before reaching for the bottle this Christmas, says Hilary Strong, director of the National Council for Drama Training — alcohol can ruin an actor’s career before it’s begun

Since becoming managing director, Andree Deissenberg has transformed iconic cabaret venue the Crazy Horse in Paris, overseeing a €2.5 million refurbishment and injecting a fresh creative buzz by hiring big name performers including Dita Von Teese

For every Christian Bale and Minnie Driver, there are plenty of stories about Brits who have failed to make the grade in Hollywood. We speak to agents and actors to discover the dos and don’ts for developing a Hollywood career

Twins Gary and Paul Hardy-Brown talk about their career as illusionists and their work on pantos up and down the country this Christmas

As the year draws to a close, careers coach and agony uncle John Byrne reflects on the ways you can ensure that your friends and colleagues past and present enjoy a merry Christmas and even, perhaps, a prosperous new year

Showpeople: Teneisha Bonner, appearing in Into the Hoods at the Queen Elizabeth Hall; Frank Sanazi, a comedy cabaret blend of Frank Sinatra and Adolf Hitler; Neal Craig, playing Romeo in Oddsocks’ touring Romeo and Juliet; Charlotte Chinn, appearing in Goldilocks and the Three Bears at the Georgian Theatre Royal, Richmond.

This week’s double size issue of The Stage is available from the usual outlets for the one-off price of £2.00.

The next issue of The Stage will feature the annual Stage 100 power list, and will be published on December 30.

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In this week’s issue of The Stage (which comes with a free 2010 wall planner), as an increasing number of drag stars are being cast as pantomime dames over the more traditional female impersonators, is the genre changing for better or worse? Six industry professionals give their view.

Also this week:

Starring in a wide variety of roles from Shakespeare to sitcoms, Robert Lindsay has written his autobiography based on the audio diaries he started making when his mother died a decade ago. He talks about his career and how he’s conquered his tendency towards professional jealousy.

I remember John Howard Davies, then head of comedy at the BBC, asking me what I wanted to be. Was I an actor? Or was I a frustrated entertainer? And did I really want to be Betty Bothways and have it all?

… There are some actors who take themselves very seriously and would hate to be thought of as entertainers. For me, it’s about having a direct relationship with an audience. Yet, strangely enough, I didn’t fully realise that I had this affinity until I played Archie Rice in The Entertainer at the Old Vic two years ago.

Award-winning BBC drama Cranford returns for a two-part special over Christmas, with new cast members including Jonathan Pryce and Celia Imrie. Mary Comerford finds out more:

Imrie joins the illustrious cast this time round, another fine example of an actress in her prime, and [Julia] McKenzie reckons TV executives have finally got the message.

“I think they’ve realised that if you’re young, you’re probably out clubbing and that people at home would like to see people of their own generation on TV,” says the actress, who has never been busier after landing the iconic role of Miss Marple on ITV1.

“It’s taken them an awfully long time, but I’m hoping there will be more parts for older actresses, because we have such actresses in this country who are so wasted. It’s so sad when your talent is not being tested at a time when it’s at its peak.”

• We reflect on the 50-year history of Hampstead Theatre, during which is has been housed in a scout hut, and ugly sixties prefab and now a state of the art venue

• At a time when the concept of digital theatre is being embraced, Theatre Voice editor Aleks Sierz talks about the Urban Scrawl audio drama project, which broadcasts a play a week based on the 53 stations on the London Underground’s Piccadilly Line

• Insight: As an increasing number of production companies swap live music for prerecorded backing tapes, it is not just the livelihood of professional musicians that is under threat, but also live performance as an art form, as audiences are being robbed of a vital element of theatre

• The Scottish Government’s recent reshuffle, which saw embattled education secretary Fiona Hyslop take over Mike Russell’s role as Minister for Culture and External Affairs, signals that the arts are once again being treated as a political dumping ground, argues Thom Dibdin

• Maggie Brown: “Spare us embittered creatives who spit poison into the system”

• Kenrick Sandy: “Hip hop is so self-disciplined and so motivated… It’s about engaing with young people and making them feel that they can also be more than a dancer”

• Dear John: “I’m working through Christmas on a hectic touring schedule. How do I keep healthy?”

• SHOWPEOPLE: Drag queen Bette Rinse, playing Cinders in Sinderfella at the Leicester Square; Scottish Ballet’s Martina Forioso; Dan Hagley writer/performer of ‘anti-panto’ production Patrick and Bernadine

The Stage is avilable from major newsagents for £1.40, or via postal subscription: see http://www.thestage.co.uk/subscribe for more information

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In our special Christmas show preview issue, we talk to Susie McKenna, writer and director of Hackney Empire’s panto Aladdin, about that show and reviving her 2003 A Christmas Carol for the Arts Theatre. Plus we have 7 pages of panto and Christmas show listings covering the entire UK.

Also this week, model and actress Kelly Brook talks about her determination to develop her career in theatre, how she deals with negative reviews and why her current West End role is close to her heart:

I’d been back in LA doing a couple of films, but I wanted to be in London and near my family and boyfriend [rugby player Danny Cipriani] again. The rugby season starts in September so I asked my agent what was going on. TV has been taken over by reality, so unless you’re on Strictly Come Dancing or the X Factor it’s quite difficult. So we talked about doing a play and I was walking past the Noel Coward Theatre when I saw that Calendar Girls was playing and I got a strange feeling. It had been mentioned a few weeks previously, so I got my agent to get in touch with the producer David Pugh and we had a cup of tea…

…I lost my father to cancer a couple of years ago, so it’s a subject quite close to my heart and something I can really relate to.

Award-winning TV producers and former members of the Royal Ballet, Michael Nunn and William Trevitt’s latest offering is a radical reinterpretation of Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring for BBC3, featuring a range of dance styles including pole dancing and tango.

Insight: If elected, the Conservatives plan to give communities more control over central government spending in their area by allowing them to trigger referencums on funding for local arts organisations and projects. Would this help to make the arts more democratic, or provide a way to censor artistics expression?

Theatres make enough money from their festive shows without pressurising parents into purchasing additional merchandise for their kids, argues Roger ‘Scrooge’ Foss

Dear John: “I’d like to have a go at writing my own material. How do I start, and what aelse can I do with my ideas if writing isn’t for me?”

Showpeople: Celia Adams, performing in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz in Lancaster; Kate Marlais, playing Cinderella at the Salisbury Playhouse; Russell Clough, playing Pinocchio at the Torch Theatre

The Stage is available from major newsagents for £1.40. For postal subscription rates, see www.thestage.co.uk/subscribe

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