About the show

Down Among the Wines & Spirits: the Golden Age of the real Music Hall

Sewell Barn Theatre, Norwich, Norfolk

Performance dates: March 6-8 2014 (including a matinee on 8 March ) 

The show fills an unusual slot in the 2013-14 season at the Barn, as it's to be a 'half-run': just four performances, taking place one week after the conclusion of the previous show in the main season. We hope that it will give a wonderful opportunity for performers to experiment with a style and a set of skills not often required in local theatre seasons, but which are the roots of much of the entertainment that we provide in other shows.

You’d be forgiven for believing that the Music Hall consisted of a hotch-potch of entertainment covering some 150 years. From the ‘song-and-supper’ taverns of the 1830s through to the Royal Variety shows of the mid 20th century, from solo singers to comedians to melodramas to stand-up comedians to acrobats, from music hall to burlesque to variety: all are now thrown into a great melting-pot of entertainment.

This show, however, will present a more focused and authentic view. We’ll present artistes who would have been at their peak in the Golden Age:  from around 1880 until the outbreak of World War One. The audience will hear the familiar and obscure, the spoken and sung, the jolly and sentimental, the sweet and the saucy.

Come and recreate the entertainment that was enjoyed by your late Victorian and early Edwardian ancestors, performed by artistes of skill, character and versatility – whether they were ‘top of the bill’ or ‘down among the wines and spirits’.

Click here for details of what's required and how you can take part in this exciting project.