Jessica Norman is a playwright and screenwriter whose play This Little Earth, which was long-listed for the Women’s Prize for Playwriting, will debut at London’s Arcola Theatre this autumn.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Jessica a couple of days before the production opened about the play and its development, conspiracy theories and those who believe them and about writing in general.

This Little Earth runs at the Arcola Theatre in London from 22 October to 15 November 2025.

A post-show discussion with Jessica and journalist and author Gabriel Gatehouse, Emeritus Professor of Anomalistic Psychology Chris French and CEO of the UK Antarctic Heritage Trust Camilla Nichol will take place on Thursday 30 October.

The Antarctic Climate Café, allowing people to come and talk about the climate crisis, will be before the show on Thursday 13 November.

Rebecca Atkinson-Lord was Director of Theatre at London’s Ovalhouse (now Brixton House) until 2016, but has since moved to the island of Mull in the Scottish Hebrides as Chief Executive and Artistic Director of An Tobar and Mull Theatre.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Rebecca while she was in rehearsals for a stage adaptation of Sarah Moss’s novel Night Waking, adapted by Shireen Mula. She explained about the play and the process of adapting and rehearsing it, as well as the challenges of touring to rural venues and to theatres where some of your audience comes by boat and what she misses about working in London.

Night Waking opens at Mull Theatre on 28 and 29 September 2025 before touring to Edinburgh, Stirling, Greenock, Wick, Inverness, Ullapool, Strathcarron, Castle Douglas, Dumfies, Fife, Paisley, Dunoon, Lochgilphead, Oban, Iona and back to Mull, finishing on 31 October.

Playwright Martin Sherman was born in Philadelphia and raised in New Jersey but has lived in London for more than forty years.

His memoir On the Boardwalk is about to be released, covering the first part of his life up to his first major success as a writer with the play Bent at the Royal Court Theatre in London in 1979, which starred Ian McKellen, who has written a foreword to the book.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Martin about his life and work including his mother’s Huntington’s Disease which he feared inheriting, his father’s narcissistic personality disorder, his time at Boston University and Lee Strasberg’s Actors’ Studio, his failed productions before his introduction to Gay Sweatshop in London and the O’Neill in Connecticut, being represented by the great Peggy Ramsey and his success with Bent, where the book ends.

On the Boardwalk will be released by the publisher Inkandescent on 25 September 2025.

Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran’s most famous works are TV sitcoms such as Shine On Harvey Moon, Birds of a Feather, Goodnight Sweetheart and The New Statesman.

They have also written for radio and for stage musicals such as Dreamboats and Petticoats, but their latest piece, currently running at London’s Upstairs at the Gatehouse, is a play called Dr Freud Will See You Now, Mrs Hitler.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Laurence and Maurice about the play’s story, history and long gestation as well as the extensive research that went into it, touching on how they have dealt with controversy over their work in the past, especially for their TV miniseries about Oswald Mosley, their writing process and much more.

Dr Freud Will See You Now, Mrs Hitler opened at Upstairs at the Gatehouse in London on 4 September and runs until 28 September 2025.

Actor and author Emily Woof is best known for her film and TV work such as Mandy in The Full Monty, Shannon in Velvet Goldmine and Nancy in Oliver Twist, but she has also written novels and devised her own theatre pieces.

At this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe, she is performing her own solo play, Revolver, directed by her husband, Hamish McColl, writer and co-founder of theatre company The Right Size.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Emily during her Edinburgh run about the play’s subject matter, its predecessor piece at the 1993 Fringe, her devising process and her other writing work.

Revolver, produced by Shared Experience, opened at Pleasance Courtyard on 14 August and runs daily at 2:20PM until 25 August 2025.

(Photo of Emily Woof in Revolver, credit Sheila Burnett)

Indie rock band The Wedding Present was formed in Leeds in 1985, achieving a huge critical success with its debut album, George Best.

40 years and 300 songs later, the band is still going, and Artistic Director of Engine House Theatre and Wedding Present fan Matt Aston has written and is directing a new musical, Reception, based on the band’s back-catalogue.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Matt during rehearsals for the show about how he put it together, his history as a long-time fan of the band and the challenges of producing an original musical.

David also spoke to David Gedge, founder, lead singer and songwriter for the band, about his reactions to having a musical based on his songs, his reflections on what he has seen in rehearsals and his songwriting style and technique.

Reception: The Wedding Present Musical will be performed at The Warehouse in Holbeck, Slung Low, Leeds from 22 August to 6 September 2025. Tickets can be booked at the Leeds Playhouse web site.

For more information about The Wedding Present, David’s other band, Cinerama, and his annual Brighton festival, see the Scopitones web site.

Photo: Matt Aston (furthest left) and David Gedge (furthest right) and the cast of Reception on the first day of rehearsals (credit: Northedge Photography)

This episode features two very different solo shows, which can both be seen at the 2025 Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Thom Tuck is playing the titular 100-year-old clown, whose life story takes audiences though some of the major events of the 20th century, in Justin Butcher’s Scaramouche Jones, which he performed in Edinburgh in 2005, then again in 2015.

His partner, Jenny Ryan, best-known as The Vixen on TV quiz programme The Chase, is performing her musical comedy show Björn Yesterday that unpacks her theory that ABBA never existed.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to them both together almost halfway through the 2025 Edinburgh Fringe about their shows, the current state of the Fringe, remembering lines and quiz answers, philosophy, the music they grew up listening to and lots more.

Björn Yesterday runs every day at 5:30PM in the Cabaret Bar at Pleasance Courtyard from 30 July to 17 August. Thom Tuck is appearing in Scaramouche Jones at Hoots at Potterow at 2:45PM from 1 to 25 August 2025.

For almost 40 years, the Classic Thriller Season has been held during the summer at the Theatre Royal, Nottingham. It’s one of the few rep seasons left in the country.

In 2025, the season has been reduced to three weeks instead of four and will feature plays by Peter Gordon, Ira Levin and Richard Harris.   BTG Midlands editor Steve Orme spoke to Karen Henson from the producers Tabs Productions as well as Mark Pearce, who’s taking part in his first Thriller Season as the incomparable Inspector Pratt, and Sarah Wynne Kordas, who will be appearing in all three plays.   The Classic Thriller Season will run at the Theatre Royal from 12 until 30 August.   PICTURE: Sarah Wynne Kordas, Mark Pearce and Karen Henson.

While the various Edinburgh festivals are running, one of the many publications providing extensive coverage of them is The List magazine, which this year celebrates its 40th anniversary.

The List publishes year-round free print publications and online content on arts and entertainment in Scotland, but it will be producing seven print publications in six weeks dedicated to the festivals, as well as bringing back its cross-festival awards, which it inaugurated last year and this year has expanded with new categories.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to List Publishing Ltd’s CEO, Sheri Friers, about how The List started, how it kept going after lockdown nearly closed it down, expanding into Australia, the challenges of journalism in the 21st century and covering the Edinburgh festivals.

To find out more and to read the magazine online, including back issues going back to 1985, see list.co.uk, or if you are in Edinburgh during August, you will be able to pick up a current issue in print from many different locations around the city.

The winners of the biennial Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting, which this year celebrates its 20th anniversary, were announced at a ceremony at Manchester’s Royal Exchange Theatre on Monday 21 July 2025.

Immediately after the awards were presented, BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to four of the five winners: Daisy Miles, who won the £10,000 North-West Original New Voice Award for her play R Lady’s, Terri Jade Donovan, who won a special commendation of £5,000 for Dog Dog Dog, Silva Semerciyan, who won the Judges’ Prize of £10,000 for her play Przewalski's Horses, and Tolu Okanlawon, who won the £20,000 overall prize for his play Shooters.

The winner of the International Award of £10,000, Jesús I Valles, for his play Spread was not able to attend the ceremony.

(Photo of winners Silva Semerciyan, Daisy Miles, Tolu Okanlawon and Terri Jade Donovan in the Royal Exchange Theatre following the ceremony, credit: Ellie Kurttz.)