Welcome to Pendon for Scarborough fund raiser
- Alan Hulme
- 6 minutes ago
- 2 min read
Fans of prolific Scarborough-based playwright Alan Ayckbourn will recognise the fictional town of Pendon as the setting for some of the master's most popular shows. For this year's annual fund-raising weekend at the town's Stephen Joseph Theatre (September 18-20), Pendon goes centre stage once again.
In Ayckbourn land, Pendon hosted a pageant in Ten Times Table; an amateur production of The Beggar’s Opera in A Chorus of Disapproval and all manner of watery shenanigans in Way Upstream, among many other comic episodes.
Pendon's most recent incarnation was in 2023’s Welcome to the Family, a show Ayckbourn wrote for the Old Laundry Theatre (now Victoria Wood Theatre) in Bowness-on-Windermere. The play will be seen in Scarborough for the first time, in a rehearsed reading, as the Sunday afternoon centrepiece of the Welcome To Pendon weekend.
In the comedy, Josh is keen to introduce his fiancee Sara to his parents, Lord and Lady Meizner, but as they’re dead, this is definitely a problem. Directed by the author, the cast of Ayckbourn regulars will be Eileen Battye, Terence Booth, Georgia Burnell, Bill Champion and Antony Eden.
The weekend kicks off on the Friday evening with Backstage Secrets, an evening of conversation with theatre professionals who have worked with Ayckbourn at the SJT over the years, including actors and directors Robin Herford and Antony Eden, choreographer Sheila Carter and stage manager Fleur Beeley. They will be sharing some exclusive insights into what really happens behind the scenes when you're working together to bring a play to life.
After the interval, they will be joined by the rest of the cast of Welcome to the Family, giving theatre fans or those just curious about how the magic happens, a chance to see the SJT from a new perspective.
All the money raised during the weekend will go towards the theatre's New Work Fund, which helps to put new work on its stages and nurture new talent.
Info and tickets here
