Theatre review:Wedding Band: A Love/Hate Story in Black and White

Alice Childress' 1966 play about segregation Wedding Band: A Love/Hate Story in Black and White is set in South Carolina in 1918, and the fact that it's the final year of the First World War is a constant underlying theme: Black soldiers like Lula's (Diveen Henry) adopted son Nelson (Patrick Martins) and sailors like Mattie's (Bethan Mary-James) husband are fighting the same as white Americans and risking their lives the same, but in an upcoming celebration Nelson will, like the rest of the black troops, have to add himself to the end of the parade uninvited; and when the war ends, however much they try to convince themselves otherwise, they know their contribution won't be recognised by allowing them into the spaces they're currently forbidden from. But if Lula and Mattie think they've seen it all, their new neighbour will confront them with one more taboo.

Theatre review: Gods and Monsters

The film industry's early days saw it take as laissez-faire an attitude to homosexuality as most creative arts, but as movies became more and more of a business, puritanical attitudes set in. James Whale (Ian Gelder) was one of the first star directors, making his name with Journey's End but becoming most famous for Frankenstein and its best-loved sequel, Bride of Frankenstein. But by the time we meet him in 1957 he's long since been spat out by the industry. Wealthy but isolated, he lives in a Hollywood mansion, tended by his maid Maria (Trinity Wells, newsreader of the Apocalypse Lachele Carl) and getting the occasional thrill when he's visited by handsome young fans, whom he likes to convince to strip for him. But following a stroke that's left him with regular blinding headaches, even this is now too much excitement for him.