Hi! I joined Saddleworth Players after I had auditioned for Curtain Up! as Betty and was very surprised to get it. I have loved live theatre since first going to Oldham Rep (as it was then) at age seven or eight with my auntie who worked as a volunteer there. I sat watching the pantomime and loved every minute. In the 70s I was a volunteer at Playhouse 2 for quite a long time and […]
Hi, I’m Siobhan Ebden and in the comedy Curtain Up! I play Pam the first wife, mother of Teresa and daughter in law of Betty. Pam is not always a very easy character to like though she is great to play as she has a sharp wit and some fantastic one liners. I’ve been involved with Saddleworth Players for a few years, with some smaller roles in a couple of plays and open days. I […]
I have long been a supporter of Millgate Arts Centre and Saddleworth Players. Having been a member of Oldham Lyceum players for many years and volunteering on the bar occasionally, I appreciate how much time, effort and energy goes into each production. Many years ago, I had the pleasure of interviewing author Louis de Bernieres on the Millgate stage as part of a fundraising event for Delph Library; another example of how volunteers are so vital […]
Curtain up! is a hilarious comedy of five women who inherit equal shares in an old dilapidated theatre and plan to bring it back to life again. The females try various fund-raising schemes, but their most ambitious idea is to hold a concert featuring local talent and the world-famous star, Liza Minnelli, who agrees to appear for no fee. However, plans go awfully wrong, when they hear that Liza Minnelli has cancelled. It is a […]
The play is set in a ski lodge in France where Daniel Corban has just reported that his newly wedded wife has been missing for 10 days to the police. The Chief Inspector seems unhelpful but promises he will investigate for him. Seconds later the new local priest, Father Maximin, exclaims he’s found his wife and brings her to the chalet. However, Daniel claims he’s never set eyes on this woman before. As the story […]
Bette Davis and Joan Crawford: two of the deadliest arch-rivals of all time. Born in the same year (though Davis swore ‘Crawford is 5 years older than me if she is a day’, the two fought bitterly throughout their Long and brilliant Hollywood careers. The women worked together only once, in the classic thriller Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? in which their violent hatred of each other as rival sisters was no act. In this […]
Let me introduce you to Leonard, a somewhat frustrated writer. Unfortunately, his manuscripts are always being rejected by publishers. He enters a competition for ‘women only’ under a non-deplume. You can imagine the chaos winning the competition causes. Having to disguise himself as a female brings Mrs Doubtfire, Toosie, and Some like it hot to mind. The final scene is a comic masterpiece. Leonard is played by Simon Wood who was last seen at the Millgate Arts Centre […]
I had the great pleasure of attending the opening night of the new Saddleworth Players production of Pastimes on Saturday evening. It was touch and go as to whether the show would go on, owing to happenings beyond the Players control: a gas pipe sprang a leak just outside the theatre the day before and with mayhem of the central road in Delph being closed and lack of heating causing the auditorium to plummet to […]
A very big thank you to Phil Whiteman of The Old Bell, Delph, for raising £324 for the Millgate Arts Centre through a raffle. To show our appreciation of Phil’s efforts we have named two seats in the auditorium ‘The Old Bell’ – the plaques will be appearing very soon.
It’s good to be back with Saddleworth Players after such a long wait to bring this play to the stage. My character is Winifred, Connie’s long suffering friend, whose main source of pleasure seems to be having her feet done. Winifred is reluctantly drawn into the conflict between Connie and the two men they both married forty years ago. Secrets will out and all is not what it seems. Thank you to our director Carol […]