WHAT'S ON at CANAL CAFÉ THEATRE
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TOP PICK - all the year round
NEWSREVUE
Four nights a week
Thursday – 7.30pm
Friday – 9.30pm
Saturday – 9.30pm
Sunday – 7.00pm
The world’s longest running live comedy show. A fast-moving mix of sketches and songs, NewsRevue propels you through the world’s news and current events at breakneck pace — all-kicking, idol-burning comedy, with brand new content injected into the show weekly by a crack team of writers and cast alike.
This current affairs parody song and sketch show is acknowledged as a “rite of passage for all comedy newcomers” (Chortle). Alumni include The League of Gentlemen, Sarah Pascoe, Bill Bailey, Saskia Reeves and Michelle Collins. The cast members, described as having “Herculean levels of talent” (WhatsOnStage.com), together with an on-stage musical director receive 5-star reviews at Edinburgh Fringe Festival every year. Masochistically popular amongst politicians, you may see an MP in the audience!
CLOSE ENOUGH
23 April & 7 May
An award-winning quartet perform a sparkling cocktail of tunes.
Close Enough Barbershop Quartet is ‘a class act’. The dapper gents won Best Small Vocal Ensemble (’22, ’23 & ‘24) in Buxton for their ‘witty repartee’ and ‘vocal acrobatics’. The four gents now head to the Big Smoke to perform their sparkling cocktail of tunes, with everything from Dvořák to Jerry Herman, Louis Prima, and the Sherman Brothers.
Woody Allen (tenor), Thomas Eyre (lead), Tom Rogers (baritone) and Johnny Shipley (bass) have spent the past decade singing their brand of light-hearted and lyrical songs across the green and pleasant parts of the UK, with performances at Alex James’ Big Feastival, and the Burford, Bath, Brighton and Buxton Festivals. They also toured the distilleries of the Hebridean island of Islay, but they’re a bit hazy about that.
Now they return to the Big Smoke to seek their fortune, with a special residency at the Canal Café Theatre. It’s a fun show for all!
PAVEMENT SHARK
12 - 17 May
‘Jaws’ meets ‘The Mighty Boosh’ meets ‘The Cornetto Trilogy’ in this absurd new comedy from Hannah Henderson and Katie Lynch.
Two best friends’ lives are changed forever when they discover that sharks have evolved legs and are stalking our very pavements, feasting on innocent pedestrians. After a night at the pub our protagonists are integrated into the world of the ‘Pavement Preppers’, two eccentric conspirators who have dedicated their lives to stopping the Pavement Sharks. Chaos, PowerPoint presentations, a training montage, and dance numbers ensue as they fight together to save the world from these apex predators.
A dramatic face to face encounter with a Pavement Shark leads our characters on a valiant journey across London from an underground lair on The Thames all the way to 10 Downing St. Plot twists cause some casualties and make heroines out of best friends as they find themselves trying to stop Pavement Sharks dominating the world as we know it.
Will they save the world? Will they ever make it back to the pub?
Camp, outrageous, fun but F’in dangerous. A shark tail that will leave the audience chomping at the bait.
DOUBLE BILL
14 May
A professional reading of two different short plays; one based on the past year, the other set billions of years ago.
Taking A Bullet by Nirjay Mahindru
Nirjay Mahindru’s shocking new political thriller will take you on a roller-coaster inspired by recent traumatic events in America. This play exposes a divided America in the most potent of ways.
“The devil doesn’t trick you. He just waits for you to trick yourself. That’s the real game.”
This performance is a rehearsed staged reading.
That Mad Little Planet Called Earth by Tamsin Irwin
In complete contrast, Tamsin Irwin’s sci-fi comedy explores how life started on Earth through a witty parody of human relationships.
“Ouch…you’re too radiant…I need to wallow in my darkness for now…alone…Sun. Stop being so, so…so sunny, darkness can be nourishing too. Please.”
That Mad Little Planet Called Earth was part of the UN’s World Space Week at the British Interplanetary Society.
This performance will be a reading.
SCATTERED ISLANDS
20 May
A scratch-night inspired by the work of Sylvia Plath.
Lowdoorproductions and 23andcounting return for a collaboration following their Camden Fringe debut in 2023 with Semblance of a Woman. Scattered Islands is a scratch night which will interweave passages from Plath’s Three Women, alongside a plethora of new and dynamic performances.
Three Women is composed of three interweaving monologues, all pregnant women, all with very different perspectives. The first is happily expectant, excited with the promise of the child to come. The second has already suffered more than one miscarriage, and goes into hospital in the knowledge she has likely lost another child. The third is a student who has carried an unwanted pregnancy to full term, awaiting the moment she will give the baby up for adoption. Three perspectives on birth, on death, on bodily autonomy. Published in 1962, and premiering on BBC radio in the same year, it is a work of Plath’s that has been historically overlooked, pushed to the margins and often disregarded as a theatrical piece. It is our mission to set the record straight.
This event will see the themes of Plath’s work, grief, motherhood, bodily autonomy, explored in a variety of new and exciting ways. Proceeds from the night are going towards a rehearsed reading of Three Women, expected later in the summer this year.
LOSE YOUR MARBLES
26 May
An evening of pure absurdist comedy with extreme ASMR practitioner Yogie Belle and friends.
Get ready to Lose Your Marbles at the Canal Café Theatre in Little Venice, Maida Vale!
Curated by the worlds #1 extreme ASMR practitioner and sound beautician, Yogie Belle, this vaudevillian extravaganza delivers a hand-picked line-up of alternative acts who’ll leave you wailing with joy like a dolphin that’s escaped from Leningrad zoo.
Unapologetically original absurd alternative comedy— from the front trenches of the fringe.
Lose Your Marbles celebrates the theatre of the weird, the wild, and the wonderfully bizarre in a collision of storytelling, performance, music and clowning in a kaleidoscope of unlimited limitless silliness.
What to Expect:
· Fringe artists who dare to be different.
· A chaotic night of pure comedic anarchy.
· The perfect evening for fans of boundary-pushing brilliance.
Grab your tickets before they’re gone—this show sells out fast! Book now—and get your *FREE sound shower on the house!
*Disclaimer: Sound Shower is only available on a first come basis
#LoseYourMarbles #AlternativeComedy #FringeComedy #AbsurdistTheatr
FRENZY
27 & 28 May
A gloriously frenetic hour of physical comedy.
Bursting with all the whacky dynamism and giddy joy of a Roadrunner cartoon, like witnessing Mr Bean on Acid.
Kit Loyd is an award-winning writer and performer. Using audio-visuals and mime he performs one-person physical comedy sketch with a narrative. Loyd was the winner of the British Comedy Guide Talent Award 2023. He was shortlisted for the BBC New Comedy Award 2024. His 2023 split bill show, Nightwatchman, received a 4 star review in The Scotsman and was included on their ‘Best Fringe Comedy’ list.
WUMMY
A whirlwind one-woman comedy play about a wannabe yummy mummy on her mission to have it all.
Wummy is broke, flat-sharing and craving luxury. Her dream? “A Chelsea townhouse, husband, baby, nanny, and – most importantly – a bin hidden within a kitchen island!” Wummy attempts to manifest her dream life, but the universe answers her call with an unexpected bump in the road.
“I would pay to watch Charis drink a cup of tea – let alone perform a show.” Sophie Winkleman – (Peep Show)
La Petite Valise au bord du canal
25 June
Vintage jazz and cabaret as they are meant to be.
Allow us to introduce on vocals the ever vivacious and effervescent Ms Janey Gardiner and tickling the ivories musical maestro Mr Will Hall, a veritable impresario of unique and original arrangements à la cabaret, La Petite Valise, (from Et Sa Valise-Vintage Cabaret).
Vintage jazz and cabaret as they are meant to be- from the grimy underground sounds of 1920s Berlin and songs of gay Paris to the fun, frivolous, and frankly fabulous, grab your feather boa and do not miss this unique night out. The intimate cabaret space of Canal Café Theatre provides the perfect setting to immerse yourself in a world of torch songs, show songs and vintage jazz loveliness, expect the unexpected, old-school escapism at its best…
All that remains is for you to relax and enjoy a wonderful Wednesday with us. Life is a cabaret old chum, so come to the cabaret.
