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Review: Fawlty Towers at the Liverpool Empire ****
Fawlty Towers is often voted among the best ever British television sitcoms. But it wasn’t, as it happens, an overnight sensation. The show aired first on BBC2 in September 1975 and garnered just under two million viewers. That’s a good figure by today’s standards, but in an era with only three TV channels it was decidedly modest (Stanley Baxter on ITV at the same time apparently pulled in 12 million). Reruns, and a move to BBC1, changed all that, and half-a-century, but stil
Paul Nicholas on his Major role at the Liverpool Empire
When Fawlty Towers was first broadcast in the 1970s, the series attracted millions of TV viewers. But it turns out Paul Nicholas wasn’t one of them. Because 50 years ago, the actor and singer was busy building a career on stage and screen and tended to find himself otherwise occupied at night. “I caught bits of it,” he explains, “but I was working a lot of the time, and it was pre being able to record programmes.” So when the he was asked if he was interested in playing the M
Review: Little Women at the Liverpool Playhouse ****
Those Little Women have been on a big journey over the course of 2025 with this sprightly new production of the classic coming-of-age tale crisscrossing the UK. But it’s apt the tour of a story which opens amid the brutal upheaval of the American Civil War should finish here in Liverpool, and in this week too. While it officially ended six months earlier, the American Civil War finally concluded on November 6, 1865, when Captain James Waddell sailed up the Mersey in the CSS S
Timothy Lucas is the purfect panto villain at St Helens this Christmas
Deck the halls, ring those bells and warn the partridge in the pear tree – Timothy Lucas is back on panto duty at St Helens Theatre Royal this Christmas. And this time he’s planning to be royally bad. After moonlighting at the Wolverhampton Grand last season, the irrepressible Lucas is back in harness for Regal Entertainments at St Helens, and he couldn’t be happier. “Great theatre, great people, loyal audiences,” he says. “They are good people who just back you and support y
Review: Top Hat at the Liverpool Empire ****
The Empire is currently celebrating its centenary - and back in the same space in March 1926, Liverpool audiences would have been treated to Mr ‘top hat, white tie and tails’ himself Fred Astaire treading its boards. Astaire appeared with his sister Adele in George Gershwin’s Lady be Good. And it evidently proved to be good, because they returned to Lime Street for another run in early 1927. By the mid-30s, Astaire had gone from big theatre star to even bigger screen star. An
Review: Breaking the Code at the Liverpool Playhouse ****
When playwright Hugh Whitemore wrote Breaking the Code 40 years ago, Alan Turing may have been a huge cheese in the development of computing, but his wasn’t a name commonly known among the general public. Consider how much has changed since then, and indeed from 30 years earlier than that when Turing’s life was snuffed out aged just 41 in desperately sad – and still contested – circumstances. Along with Andrew Hodges’ book Alan Turing, The Enigma and Whitemore’s play, there h
Jason Donovan makes Rocky Horror Liverpool return in 2026
Jason Donovan is set to return to the Liverpool stage in The Rocky Horror Show. The Aussie superstar will head the cast of Richard O’Brien’s outrageous cult musical when it comes to the Liverpool Empire next May. Donovan previously performed the part of transvestite scientist Dr Frank-n-Furter for a limited number of shows when the musical was staged at the Liverpool Playhouse last Christmas. Join two squeaky clean college kids – Brad and his fiancée Janet whose car, in a twi
Review: Lost Atoms at the Liverpool Playhouse ****
When a trio of Swansea university students formed a theatre company there in the mid-90s, little could they have imagined that they themselves would one day be studied in turn. But 30 years on, Frantic Assembly is on not one but several curricula, as the huge number of young people in the audience at the Liverpool Playhouse on opening night revealed. The company has a long association with Liverpool. One of its earliest successes was Wirral playwright Michael Wynne’s Sell Out
Pantomimes and Christmas shows in Liverpool City Region for 2025
On the first day of Christmas Liverpool region's theatres gave to me...three Cinderellas, two Beanstalks and Beauty and the Beasties and a host of other shows to entertain everyone from three to 103. It's true the 'greatest fairytale of them all' appears to be the most popular choice for Christmas 2025, but away from pumpkins, glass slippers and clocks striking 12 there's a lot of choice out there this year - whether you want full-blown panto or something a bit different. In
Liverpool Irish Festival 2025 programme of events
Liverpool Irish Festival returns to city venues next week with 10 days of cultural events and activities. The 2025 event runs from October 16-26, and this year has the theme of Liverpool Irish Festival is the UK’s largest arts and culture-led festival and marks its 23 rd anniversary this year. It is set to be officially launched at Liverpool Irish Centre on Thursday, October 16 where there is the opportunity to meet the team and hear more about the 2025 programme. There will
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