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	Pleasance Dome (venue website) Theatre 1-12, 14-27 Aug, 4:00pm-5:00pm
Family-friendly. Suitable for all ages.

With the arts convulsed by funding cuts, and financial corruption once again in the news, it’s an auspicious time to recreate Kemble’s Riot.  Two centuries ago, a Covent Garden theatre was closed by 66 days of popular uproar – kicked off by the failings of big business, and the price extracted from the common man.  It’s an intriguing tale, but this is no strait-laced historical drama.  Think of it more as a panto for grown-ups… where you’ll be called on to bellow, stamp, and behave very badly, all in the name of Theatre.

It’s a good-tempered but liberating experience, we wrote, in our five star review for the show’s debut in Brighton.  Guided by two whipper-uppers seated at the front of the audience, you’ll be asked to side with either the protestors or the management… though you may find your loyalties change, as uncomfortable truths unfold on-stage.  But it’s not all fun and games: the eponymous Kemble, caught in the midst of it all, cuts a lonely and tragic figure, too proud to renounce his preening ambition yet on the point of destroying all he holds dear.

It was that mix of bombast and poignancy which particularly impressed us, and we weren’t the only ones the feel that way – leading local reviewer Latest 7 gave Kemble’s Riot their prestigious award for the best theatre show of the Brighton Fringe.  Kemble himself has been re-cast in the time since then, so we’ll have to wait to see how new leading actor Richard Hansell performs.  But if it’s anywhere near as good as it was down in Brighton, we predict you’ll have a riot of a time.