Dickens comes alive at arts centre

THE Arts Centre at Edge Hill University, Ormskirk, has a feast of festive entertainment on offer in the run-up to Christmas.

On Sunday (December 4), Northumberland Theatre Company will bring a cast of five to the stage with a new combination of well-loved, familiar and unfamiliar fairytales: a collection of funny and scary stories including Little Red Riding Hood and The Wolf and The Fox, making seasonal entertainment for family audiences.

With lots of songs, music, chilling moments and plenty of laughs – this is imaginative storytelling at its best.

St Agnes Fountain, who visit next Tuesday (December 6) are the band that gives Christmas songs a good, if respectful, kicking.

Founder member David Hughes, Chris Leslie (Fairport Convention) and Chris While and Julie Matthews (Radio 2 folk award winners) together bring great musical talent, wit and invention. For the past 16 years, the band has reunited each December for an annual Christmas tour.

Finally on Thursday, December 8, Kent-based European Arts Company, fresh from a recent West End run, brings its authentic adaptation of A Christmas Carol in aid of the children’s charity Barnardo’s.

A Christmas Carol was the first public performance Charles Dickens gave of his own work.

He enacted it over 150 times and the effect on the public was phenomenal.

European Arts Company is recreating the spirit of these performances with actor John O’Connor as Dickens himself.

John lives in Rochester where Dickens lived, died and set many of his stories.

The show is adapted from Charles Dickens’ own public reading scripts.