We are very excited to announce that our new poster is winging its way to the printers and will be on display soon.

It has a QR code which links directly to where you can buy tickets on Eventbrite where there is a reduced “Earlybird” price which runs until the end of the second week in April. The link to Eventbrite is also here:

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/hound-of-the-baskervilles-sherlock-holmes-tickets-585798417837

Don’t worry if you prefer to speak to someone, the telephone booking office will be open from the 1st May.

Please Help!

We have an urgent need for storage and removals of our Flats, Props and other Equipment.

If any of our members or supporters have any temporary or preferably long term accessible storage available please let us know right away. We have to find it a solution by mid-week so that we can have moved it by the end of January.

We would probably need at least the size of a 20’ long storage container and potentially 2 or a double garage. Maybe you have space in a barn or outbuilding?

Thanks in advance for any assistance
Please email Churchdownplayersgroup@gmail.com

We would like to say a massive thank you for all the support in our fundraising efforts this year. You have been fabulous!

Firstly our retiring collection during our variety show ‘Happy Days are Here Again’ where we raised £1200 for Jenson's Journey and for Jenson (a local boy who suffers with Duchenne’s Muscular Dystrophy) and his Family.

Secondly for participating in our first ever Christmas Fayre. From donating raffle prizes, buying tickets, renting a stall, visiting Santa in his magical grotto, bringing your children along to sing carols, and those at Churchdown Players that worked so hard on the event to coming along, spending your money and enjoying the entertainment. Thanks to all, we surpassed our target of £2.5K and raised an amazing £2548!

We are so pleased with this amazing figure and hope to repeat our Christmas Fayre next year having learnt some lessons from it and would love to hear any comments or suggestions you have. We would also love to see any photos you have of the Fayre as we were too busy to stop and take any.

Our next director, Janet Clark has cast our next production for June 21st-23rd 2023 and rehearsals start in the new year. A large cast Sherlock Holmes play to accommodate some of the many new faces, Hound of the Baskervilles.

Stay tuned for updates.

Auditions open to everyone that is a member or potentially interested in joining Churchdown Players.

Come and put your name down for the parts you would like to try out for and the director will get you to read out the following audition pieces from the script adapted and dramatised by Tim Kelly. Copies of the script will be available at the audition for this, no need to buy one at this stage.

Watson, Lady Agatha, Holmes -top of pg9 - pg 11
Mrs Barrymore, Laura, Jack, Holmes - pg 41 - pg 43
Sir Henry, Barrymore, Perkins - pg 30 - pg 32
Kathy, Sir Henry, Holmes - pg 66 - 67
Mrs Barrymore, Lady Agatha, Barrymore, Watson - pg 55 - pg 57
Jack, Kathy, Sir Henry - pg 27 - pg 28
Sir Henry, Perkins, Kathy, Watson - pg 25 - pg 26
Laura, Sir Henry, Holmes, Watson - pg 62 - pg 64

Written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
adapted by Tim Kelly

Characters: 5 male, 5 female

Holmes' most spine chilling mystery is placed in a modern setting in this version with suspense, humor and terror. Sir Henry is heir to the vast Baskerville fortune, a legacy that comes with a family curse death at the fangs of a horror that prowls the moor. Only Holmes can stop the beast. While mysterious lights signal Baskerville Hall and the hound terrifies the countryside, the sleuthing begins and suspicion falls on sinister servants, butterfly collectors, ladies in distress and escaped convicts. Who wrote the letter that summoned the hound? Is Sir Henry's romance with the lovely Kathy doomed? Is the supernatural at work?

WOW, what an amazing turnout. Thank you to everyone who came and supported us.

Thank you to Santa who managed to see all of the children who came.

A huge thank you to Malcolm and the rest of the players involved in the enormous task of grotto design and build. It was truly magical.

Thank you to the singers, performers and backstage; and to all the players that helped out. Not so easy performing in a busy cafe. The pianist, Winnie, was amazing after just two rehearsals together.

Not least a big thank you to the organisers of what turned out to be a successful event.
We can’t wait to see how much we raised.

We were all so busy we didn’t get many photos but here are just a few. Please share yours with us.

We’re having our auditions next week for ‘The Hound of the Baskervilles’ which we will be performing (on the stage) from the 21st to 23rd June. Watch this space!

The Fayre is almost upon us and what an incredible amount of work and organisation has gone into it. We are confident we will raise sufficient funding to cover our next production.

The Santa’s Grotto is open at 11.30 and will be accessed from the rear of the building until the Fayre opens. A block of prebooked tickets have been sold per half hour but Santa will be able to see some more children that haven’t already booked, but these spaces will be limited. When the Fayre is in full swing you will be able to access the grotto from the games room. Here you will find facepainting and tattoos; photo booth; Cornhole and air hockey; festive crafts; lucky dip; teddy tombolla and sales of reindeer ’food’ and ‘poo’.
The main doors will open at 12.00 and you will be welcomed into the main hall with some Festive singing from Churchdown Village School Choir before shopping will commence with around 60 independent stalls throughout the Community Centre.

There will be refreshments in the cafe/bar including mulled wine and mince pies. This is where you will also be able to take in some Festive singing with Churchdown Players followed by our Street Festival Style Mini-Panto, Red Ridinghood. Performances will be at 1pm, 2pm, and 3pm and last around 20 minutes. The Barbershop Choir will also be popping up during the afternoon.

As well as the majority of stall holders in the main hall, you will also find our ‘water or wine’ table and be able to purchase raffle tickets by the front of the stage.

The raffle is to be drawn at around 3.45 in the cafe/bar. See prizes below.

We hope you can make it and have a memorable time.

We will be reading through a playscript together in an informal environment on Wednesday 16th November, 7.30pm at the Community Centre to help the director decide on which production to do on 21st to 23rd June 2023. Please come along if you would be interested. Non members welcome.

Due to the amount of interest in performing we have changed the next play reading to involve a larger cast. We will now be reading:

Hound of the Baskervilles

Written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Adapted by Tim Kelly

Characters: 5 male, 5 female

Holmes' most spine chilling mystery is placed in a modern setting in this version with suspense, humor and terror. Sir Henry is heir to the vast Baskerville fortune, a legacy that comes with a family curse death at the fangs of a horror that prowls the moor. Only Holmes can stop the beast. While mysterious lights signal Baskerville Hall and the hound terrifies the countryside, the sleuthing begins and suspicion falls on sinister servants, butterfly collectors, ladies in distress and escaped convicts. Who wrote the letter that summoned the hound? Is Sir Henry's romance with the lovely Kathy doomed? Is the supernatural at work?

We will be Reading through playscripts together in an informal environment at the community centre to help the director, Janet Clark, decide on which production to do for 21st, 22nd & 23rd June 2023. Please come along if you would be interested in any capacity. Non members welcome.

Third Week in August
By Peter Gordon
When Sue decides to try a 'get away from everybody' caravan holiday, little does she realise that she's booked into the caravan site from hell. She is soon taken under the wing of expert but inadequate caravaner, Neville … that's when he's not engaged in battle with his wife or trying to cope with his difficult sister-in-law.
Matters become complicated with the arrival of the enthusiastic Tony and his complaining girlfriend, Jenny. When Neville decides that a communal barbecue is the order of the day, things really start to hot up!

Preparations for our first Christmas Fayre are going swimmingly. A lot of work has gone into getting this ready, as there usually is for a show. We are hoping for success that will mean we repeat the event annually, so we can continue to put on shows in the future.

Don’t forget to put it in your calendar: Sunday 27th November 12-4pm at Churchdown Community Centre. Christmas jumpers are optional! 😉 The cafe/bar will be open for refreshments, including mulled wine and mince pies.

We will have over 50 stalls, mostly run by small, independent sellers, where you buy unique Christmas gifts. We also have a kids Christmas craft colouring table, teddy tombolla, water or wine stall, face painting and lots more.

There is a Prize Draw Raffle with absolutely amazing prizes as listed on our home page. Tickets will be available beforehand and on the day, at just £1 each, with the draw taking place around 3.45pm. With a top prize of £100 Cash, it’s not to be missed.

In true Churchdown Players form, there will of course be some entertainment for you and all for free!

We will be performing a mini panto based on Red Riding Hood and written by our own Lisa Mills. This will be repeated a few times during the afternoon so that you don’t miss it while you are browsing the stalls. The Barbershop quartet will also be there to entertain and Churchdown Village School will have some festive music for you.

Finally, and probably most importantly if you have kids with you, there will be an opportunity for a number of children to visit Father Christmas in his magical grotto. As he is so busy visiting lots of children there will be limited places, so pre-booking is recommended.

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/come-and-meet-father-christmas-tickets-439100219577?aff=esfb&utm-source=fb&fbclid=IwAR0Sv5kz4bdwE3RnyQPp-MyESpmUsLRuuNyoeSWkPYSjL6JFlMSbQf7k3xw&utm-campaign=social&utm-content=attendeeshare&utm-medium=discovery&utm-term=checkoutwidget

We really hope you can come along to support us and have lots of fun. Come and say ‘Hi’ if you would like to get email updates of our next performances or if you are interested and having a go yourself.
Don’t forget we have open readings on the 19th and 16th November at 7.30. More information to follow soon.

If you are regular supporters of Churchdown Players you will know that for each production we have a retiring collection for a charity of that director’s choice.

Marilyn Webb chose a very local young boy with Duchenne’s Muscular Dystrophy. We are so excited to share that, with your help, we managed to raise an amazing £1,200 which has been split between Jenson’s Journey charity, which helps to raise awareness of the condition, and the other half to Jenson and his family to help with their costs of living with the condition - such as adaptations to their home. We have also hopefully raised awareness of the charity with all of our additional Facebook publicity and an interview with the lovely Caroline, one of our newest members and Vice Chairman, on local radio BBC Radio Gloucestershire.

Jenson and his family all came along to watch our variety show ‘Happy Days’ over several nights, which was our first show in a while due to COVID. What a fabulous response to both the show and the selected charity. A very inspiring comeback!

We recently got together with Jenson’s family to present them with a fun, giant cheque for the charity’s share of the collection which was greatly received. Such an inspiring family who have continued to be supportive of us.

Well done everybody!