Your own bit of The Doubtful Guest

Saying goodbye is always tricky, but a bit like spilling tomato sauce on white linen clothing, it is, alas, inevitable.

Here at Hoipolloi we are bidding farewell to some beautiful things, all of which have had their very own moments of fame starring in The Doubtful Guest. So if you have a penchant for the Gothic, are in need of some chairs to seat your derriere on, or want a souvenir from the show then perhaps you might fancy one of these...

Up for grabs we have a stunning French chandelier (held up by yours truly here. In fact I think 'hand/arm modelling' may be my new secret calling), a gorgeous hexagonal hall lamp which is pictured here in action, and another delightful art noveau hall chandelier to fix all of your lighting needs.

If your dining table is missing some chairs then fear not! We can solve your woes. Two classic Thonet Bentwood Bistro chairs are waiting here for you to get your mittens on. Or if all things Edwardian float your boat, then we have a pair of antique Edwardian chairs. If you have more than two bottoms to seat then perhaps our set of six Gothic antique dining room chairs may be just the thing for you.

Not from the show, but still super duper cool, is the small inflatable sofa. Its 70s cover is screaming for you to put your flares on and snuggle up on it with some cheese and pineapple on sticks and a gin and tonic.

And finally we come to the prize item, the one which will be missed by us most of all... it is the Georgian dolls' house. I know it is hard to believe, but we really are going to let it go. We care about it very much, so we'd like it to have a good home where it will be loved dearly.

All of the items are on eBay, or if you have any questions, email us at info@hoipolloi.org.uk

Photo by Geraint Lewis

A fantastic review from The Scotsman

Ok, so that's not strictly the truth. We got a 2 star review from The Scotsman for The Doubtful Guest. But bizarrely, it's made me very happy. In fact, it's given me so much energy that I've forgotten about my aching back*

The review can be found in full here. You'll need to skip through the first half to find the bit about us (unless you want to read about Inspector Sands's If That's All There Is).

I'll also share my favourite line of the review with you:
"The idea that this sort of middlebrow tosh has any serious role in the future of theatre is ridiculous and ought to be knocked on the head, right now."

Reviews are a funny thing. It's always a delight to receive praise for the shows you work on and often it's hard to swallow the negative comments.

But The Doubtful Guest seems to be one of those shows that divides it's audiences (as a look through the reviews on EdFringe website will demonstrate) and I'm pleased that we're causing strong reviews amongst people who see the work.

I'd like to thank Joyce MacMillan for her words. That final sentiment she expressed will be something that inspires me to work against it for many years to come (I'm looking forward to enlarging it and sticking it over my desk).

I personally think Joyce is wrong (but that's my job) and I know many of you do too. And if you've not seen the show already, why not book some tickets and make up your own mind.

Oh, and thank you to @cmfwood for her head's up that Joyce didn't enjoy the show. I've never seen a reviewer being reviewed, whilst reviewing the show. But having read...

"Just sat through Joyce MacMillan sighing and tutting all the way through The Doubtful Guest"

I've been prepared for this news for a week now!

And finally, I met someone yesterday who personally requested a new video from the double act that is David and I (see this video for our earlier work!). We haven't made one for ages so watch this space!

*I slipped over in the bath on Saturday morning and after a 2 hour stint at Casualty, I was discharged with a very sore back (although no broken bones). I ran out of painkillers this morning but Joyce's review has certainly kept me smiling and happy all day.

The Doubtful Guest nominated for a Total Theatre Award

I'm delighted to report that The Doubtful Guest has been nominated for a Total Theatre Award! The show's going extremely well with sell-out performances and happy audiences. It runs at Traverse until 30 August, click here to book tickets.

Congratulations also to the teams behind My Name Is Sue and 6.0 How Heap and Pebble Took on the World and Won, both of which have also been nominated. They were two of my favourite shows of the festival so far and I've mentioned them both on this blog before. Richly deserved, well done!

Hugh Hughes in... 360 was also 'Longlisted' for a Total Theatre Award. I honestly have no idea what this means but we'll take it as a compliment! Click here to book your tickets for 360.

Daydd James, who co-wrote and performs in My Name is Sue gave us a lovely compliment yesterday: "Hugh Hughes is the best show to exit-flyer because the audiences always come out so open and happy!" And at last night's performance, a man arrived wearing is 'Making Connections' badge from Floating. A true fan.

The Doubtful Guest makes itself at home

The Doubtful Guest ran riot through the Traverse Theatre this morning during a sold-out first performance of the show. Banging and clattering away, the inimitable Guest has taken up residence at the theatre and can be found there for a further eleven performances!

After a hectic get-in yesterday, this morning's show went extremely well. And with their preview performance under their belt, the cast are looking forward to having lots of fun with the production over the next two weeks. Click here to see show times and to book tickets.

I found this the other day whilst trawling through cyberspace. It's a lovely illustration by Edward Gorey, author of The Doubtful Guest: have a look.

I also saw the Tiger Lillies last night. The Tiger Lillies ('the world's foremost Death Oompah Band') were in contact with Gorey just before he died and he gave them a box of unpublished manuscripts and drawings, which inspired their concept album The Gorey End. They're great fun live and you can catch their show at Pleasance Above at 9.40 every night. Highly recommended.

5 stars and just 1 day to wait

David should be taking a well-deserved day off today so it's left to me, Simon, to complete today's blog entry.

And what an exciting day to pick up the reins! It started with a delightful email from Nancy, our press rep, to say that we've picked up not one but two 5 star reviews today for Hugh Hughes in... 360!

The first is from Three Weeks (which I'm yet to find a copy of online) but starts:

"I can't figure out the mechanics of the magic trick I saw this evening, so there's no way of explaining it properly in a review"

And then continues on to say:

"As beneath the surface something extraordinary is happening: impossibly subtle states of mind are being expressed. I've never seen anything like this before, and as soon as I've recovered I'm going straight back."

Once it's online, I'll link you to the rest!

Our second 5 star came from a blog called All the Festivals and can be found here!

It's also just one day until The Doubtful Guest opens at the Traverse Theatre and I'm getting stupidly excited about it! Tomorrow's preview is sold out but there are still tickets available for the remaining 11 shows and you can get your ticket for the show here.

Oh, and if you haven't already, head down to the Pleasance to see Hugh Hughes. He's got a day off today but is back on at 7.05pm tomorrow. Book your tickets here!

We've arrived!

I'm relaxing in the Traverse Bar at the moment. It's terribly civilized and I'm admiring several Doubtful Guest posters adorning the walls.

But this afternoon all attention will turn to Hugh Hughes' brand new show 360. Tonight is our first Edinburgh performance and in a moment I'll be heading for the scrum of Pleasance Courtyard for my first bout of flyering!

The show is on at Pleasance Two at 7.05pm... hope to see lots of you there!

Throughout the festival, we'll be Blogging EVERY day and tweeting more often than you can imagine, so keep your eyes peeled and keep in touch.

Here's to Edinburgh 2009...

Hitting the Top 100

Good morning on this sunny Saturday. It's a particularly exciting morning as I've discovered that the Scotsman's Top 100 shows at the Fringe includes BOTH Hugh Hughes in... 360 and The Doubtful Guest.

This is fantastic news and makes a great start to the weekend. The Scotsman is such an important paper during the Fringe and I'm excited that out of 2098 shows to choose from, they've picked both of ours to make their list of safe bets to book for!

You can read the full list for yourself by clicking here (Hugh Hughes is near the top, the Doubtful Guest is near the bottom!).

Or, if you just want to go ahead and book your tickets, click here for Hugh Hughes and click here for The Doubtful Guest.

Finally, for some vaguely interesting blog/tweet trivia!

I've just realised that my 200th Hoipolloi tweet was all about making the top 100. Funny how numbers stack up like this! And having just looked back at things, my 100th tweet was a link to a video diary for Shift Happens which takes place on Monday and Tuesday this coming week. Bizarre!

Time to let the cat out of the bag...

So, it's time to let the cat out of the bag (and provide myself with a terrible excuse for a semi-cute animal picture!)...

We're off to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe!

As it's our fifteenth birthday this year, we thought we'd really push the boat out and have decided to take two shows up to the Festival.

We're really excited that The Doubtful Guest will be playing a strictly limited season at the prestigious Traverse Theatre. This darkly comic tale, inspired by Edward Gorey's fantastic book, will run from 18 to 30 August at varying times.

And Hugh Hughes is heading back to his regular haunt at the Pleasance Courtyard to premiere his brand new show, Hugh Hughes in...360. This time he'll be found in the Comedy section, with shows at 7.05pm from 5 to 31 August.

Full schedules for both shows can be found here.

We'll be pushing the boat out with our blog, our tweets and various podcasts, videos and photos from our time in Edinburgh and you'll be able to find all the latest news and gossip via our homepage.

Can't wait to see you up at the Fringe!

Thanks to Mava for the photo!

A Happy (Gorey) Hallowe'en

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

"He got more than the odd sideways glance and couple of strangled screams as he made his way into the busy market..."

Edward Gorey's mischievous creature has been on the loose in Leeds, as The Doubtful Guest continues to play to enthusiastic audiences at West Yorkshire Playhouse this week!

The Guest provoked a playful brand of havoc at Neil's Fruit Shop in Leeds' Kirkgate Market yesterday, helping itself to a pile of Hallowe'en pumpkins. The local press reported that "the creature speaks very little English but did explain that a lantern was all he needed to complete his crazy trick or treating costume".

They were also kind enough to point out that "Hoipolloi Theatre's The Doubtful Guest is the Hallowe'en treat for families at the Playhouse until 1 November".

The show will be staged at West Yorkshire Playhouse tonight (Friday) at 7pm and tomorrow at 1pm and 7pm, so if you're in the area, you still have a few chances to catch it! Then we'll be heading into the final week of the tour, at the Sherman Theatre in Cardiff from 6 to 8 November.

In the meantime, have a very happy Hallowe'en and, wherever you are tonight, watch out for a Doubtful Guest lurking in the shadows...

A big Thank You to photographer James Hardisty for these great shots!

What a week...

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant. Hoipolloi)

Phew! Here at Hoipolloi headquarters, we’ve just about calmed down and caught up on sleep after our very busy week with The Doubtful Guest at Cambridge Arts Theatre. And what a week it was...

Six performances in just four days, and more than 1,700 people saw the show. That’s a Hoipolloi record for sure! It was wonderful to receive such great support in our home town. In the last twelve months we’ve staged Floating, Story of a Rabbit and The Doubtful Guest in Cambridge and our audiences have grown and grown. Hits from the Cambridge area on our website and this blog went through the roof last week, and we had some very favourable write-ups from the local press and the Cambridge University newspaper Varsity (articles are here and here). And The Doubtful Guest video trailer on YouTube has now been viewed over 1,000 times!

The company are enjoying a well-deserved week off at the moment, but The Doubtful Guest will be brooding in Leeds next week and Cardiff the week after that. Click here for the full tour schedule and, for good measure, here’s The Doubtful Guest video trailer one more time!

Gathering stars...

Posted by Simon Bedford (Marketing & Touring Manager, Hoipolloi)

Two lovely five-star reviews for The Doubtful Guest rolled in last week during our run at Cambridge Arts Theatre.

The first, from Varsity (a Cambridge University student paper) had this to say:

"Hoipolloi’s Artistic Director writes ‘we hope that age won’t matter when watching The Doubtful Guest’, and the first thing you notice in the auditorium (which you are encouraged by the cast to consider) is that all sorts of people are there. This production has something to offer each one of them, and in that single, glorious idea lies Hoipolloi’s greatest strengths – the excitement to leave no stone unturned and the ability to lever them up from every angle."

Click here for the full review!

The second, from Whatsonstage.com, was equally complimentary:

"Edward Gorey was someone about whom I knew very little; this production sends me straight to the library to find out more. Which is probably as high an accolade as you can bestow on a stage adaptation of a written work... Like all good folk legends and fairy stories, it’s for adults just as much as for youngsters. Gorey illustrated Edward Lear, and one can sense the affinity. Catch it if you can."

Click here for the full review!

Become a groupie!

Posted by Simon Bedford (Marketing and Touring Manager, Hoipolloi)

Good evening, ladies and gentleman blog readers. It's been a little while since I posted on here as I've handed you over to the very capable hands of my assistant David (and as he's got a first in English from Cambridge University he's far more qualified to entertain you with witty wordplay than I am!).

It's been a hectic week for everyone here at Hoipolloi.

The Doubtful Guest has been running at Cambridge Arts Theatre since Wednesday (and with three performances left, you haven't missed your opportunity to see it here just yet!). And as its our home town, we've been busy making new friends and entertaining guests.

Anyway, my reason for posting is to alert you to a brand new tool on the blog - your opportunity to become a Hoipolloi groupie! By signing up (using the link on the right-hand side), you'll be able to follow this blog closely and be automatically updated when we put up a new posting.

And this isn't the only way you can follow our activites! Why not click here to sign-up to the free Hoipolloi mailing list to receive regular emails from us or join either the Hoipolloi facebook group or the Hugh Hughes Appreciation Society.

Tonight we've got a potentially riotous company meal at CB2 (where you can also find our Hoipolloi photo exhibition) and then The Doubtful Guest moves on to Leeds (from 28 Oct to 1 Nov) and Cardiff (5 to 8 November).

Wishing you a fantastic weekend!

Spectral sounds

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

A big thank you to everyone who came to see The Doubtful Guest in Southampton last week and Plymouth the week before. We've had some very complimentary emails and posts on our Facebook Group from audience members who enjoyed the show.

At this very moment, the company are at the Cambridge Arts Theatre setting up for tonight's performance. We're delighted to be playing in our home town and we hope that The Doubtful Guest is as well received there as Floating was last December. The show runs at the Arts from Wednesday to Saturday, with matinees on Thursday and Saturday. To book tickets, click here!

If you see the show over the next few weeks in Cambridge, Leeds or Cardiff and you leave the theatre humming the haunting tunes from the show's original soundtrack, you can buy your own CD copy in the theatre foyer after the show for a measly £5. If you've seen the show already and would like a CD, just send us an email.

The soundtrack was written and recorded by the production's composer Alex Rudd, who spent the rehearsal week before the first night of the tour dashing all over the country, from our rehearsal room to his recording studio and back to his new baby, writing and recording new songs and incidental music for the show.

It's a beautiful soundtrack, perfectly suited to the eerie world of Edward Gorey! You can hear a taster in our video trailer for the show:



For the rest of The Doubtful Guest's tour dates click here. See you at the theatre soon!

The Doubtful Guest returns tonight!

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

Our autumn tour of The Doubtful Guest opens in Plymouth tonight! The curious creature will then be heading to Southampton, Cambridge, Leeds and Cardiff. Click here for the full tour schedule and box office details, and book tickets soon!

Since joining Hoipolloi in July, I’ve had a great time learning about Edward Gorey, whose book The Doubtful Guest Hoipolloi’s production is based on. Gorey’s biography is a series of curious anecdotes and eccentricities. For those who are new to the blog and my Gorey obsession, let’s have a recap...

Edward Gorey was an American author and illustrator, and he still has a cult following in the States. He produced hundreds of books, all of which exhibit a melancholic wit and a playful sense of the macabre, not unlike Edgar Allan Poe. Gorey’s stories are full of mysterious mishaps. The Gashlycrumb Tinies, for instance, is Gorey’s take on children’s alphabet stories; but in Gorey’s world, “S is for Susan who perished of fits”, whilst “T is for Titus who flew into bits”.

Gorey’s distinctive hand-drawn illustrations take the viewer into a pseudo-Gothic, Victorian world, reminiscent of Tim Burton, who acknowledges Gorey as a huge influence. The eccentric Mr. Gorey was famous for his enormous fur coats and his white plimsolls; his books feature brooding, ominous figures in similar outfits!


The Times called Hoipolloi’s version of The Doubtful Guest “a playful, accomplished piece of nonsense” and The Guardian said it “captures all the Victorian pastiche, fantastical imagination and ominous air of Gorey’s original”.

I've just come back from re-rehearsals in Plymouth and the show looks better than ever! Once again, click here for the full tour schedule. We hope to see lots of you at the theatre over the next few weeks!

And here for good measure is our trailer for the show:

“Obsessed by what? Ourselves, I expect.”

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

When Edward Gorey, author of The Doubtful Guest, arrived at Harvard in 1946 as a fresh-faced freshman, he found himself sharing a room with a man who would become one of the twentieth century’s most celebrated poets: Frank O’Hara.

By the time O’Hara died prematurely in 1966, he had cemented his reputation as a bold and inventive writer at the forefront of what is now called the New York School of poetry. Like Gorey, O’Hara had rather a lot of strings to his bow. As well as writing, he devoted a significant portion of his career to visual art. He worked at New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) until he died, he was close friends with painters including Jackson Pollock and his writing reflects a fascination with Surrealism and Dadaism. He was also an accomplished pianist and he referred to writing as “playing the typewriter”!

This inter-disciplinary approach, combining text, visual art and music, perhaps stemmed from his university days with Gorey, where students were encouraged to see themselves as “artists”, rather than restricting themselves to one medium. This approach is evident in Gorey’s work too.

Over the course of his life, O’Hara became a famed socialite, mixing in circles with painters, jazz musicians, writers, dancers and aesthetes. And all this started in the Harvard dorm he shared with Edward Gorey.

O’Hara and Gorey have been described as a “noticeable odd couple on campus”. They bonded over their love of stylised English writers like Ronald Firbank and Ivy Compton-Burnett, a passion for foreign films and trips to the ballet. They hosted innumerable parties, where guests would lounge on rented garden furniture, drinking, arguing and listening to Marlene Dietrich records. It was here that Gorey began illustrations which would later appear in his books.

Together O’Hara and Gorey founded the Poets Theatre in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Gorey designed programs and posters and O’Hara wrote experimental new plays. In an interview, Gorey said of the period: “We were all obsessed. Obsessed by what? Ourselves, I expect.”

Over time, O’Hara’s rambunctious social life became too much for the reclusive Edward Gorey and the pair drifted. But that’s probably a good thing, because it gave Gorey time to write The Doubtful Guest, which Hoipolloi have adapted for stage.

Did I mention that The Doubtful Guest’s autumn tour kicks off in just over a fortnight? It’s coming to Plymouth, Southampton, Cambridge, Leeds and Cardiff. Click here for the full tour schedule and book soon because tickets are selling fast!

Mystery, missing toast and Sesame Street...

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

A friend of mine, when aged about three, accidentally stabbed herself with a pin and needed several stitches. But despite being in immense pain and bleeding all over the sofa, she didn’t find the time to tell either of her parents until that day’s episode of Sesame Street was over. Even three year olds know how to prioritise.

If you’re vaguely the same age as me, or if you have children who are, Sesame Street should be etched into your memory as a daily slice of televised joy which, at that age, was enough to make the world seem entirely happy and complete.

And do you remember Vincent Twice, who always said his name twice and hosted a segment called Mysterious Theatre? What British viewers probably didn’t know was that Mysterious Theatre was a spoof of long-running American TV show Mystery! (yes, it’s always spelt with an exclamation mark) which tells detective stories featuring familiar characters like Miss Marple, Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes.

Mystery!’s animated opening sequences were created by none other than Edward Gorey, the cult author and illustrator whose book The Doubtful Guest Hoipolloi have adapted for stage. Gorey is famous for his playfully macabre, pseudo-Gothic-Victorian visual style which Tim Burton, amongst others, acknowledges as a huge influence on his own work.

Here’s one of Gorey’s truly wonderful Mystery! intro sequences:




And just for good measure, here’s an episode of Sesame Street’s Mystery Theatre, in which Sherlock Holmes investigates the case of The Missing Toast!




Funnily enough, having spoofed Edward Gorey on Sesame Street, Jim Henson Productions have recently announced that they'll be making a Muppets-style film of The Doubtful Guest.

Meanwhile, Hoipolloi's autumn tour of The Doubtful Guest kicks off in less than three weeks. Tickets are selling fast, so if you haven’t yet booked for Plymouth, Southampton, Cambridge, Leeds or Cardiff, get in quick! The full tour schedule and all box office details can be found here.


Finally, here’s a trailer for The Doubtful Guest to whet your appetite.

Gorey accomplices

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

A quick hello to some fellow Gorey-lovers Hoipolloi have met in cyberspace....

The Edward Gorey House in Massachusetts exhibits original copies of Edward Gorey's illustrations and celebrates his life and work, in the very house in which Gorey lived. It also honours Gorey's compassion for animal welfare issues by supporting local and national animal welfare projects. You can visit their website by clicking here. They've even got Doubtful Guest t-shirts in their online shop!

Goreyography is an online compendium of all things Gorey. There are articles about Gorey being translated into Japanese, first edition Goreys for sale and, my favourite, an online exhibition of the front covers Gorey designed for Anchor paperbacks (not a million miles from the British Penguin Classics series). For a lesson in Goreyography, click here.

Happy browsing!

A pornographic work by Ogdred Weary

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assitant, Hoipolloi)

"Alice was eating grapes in the park when Herbert, an extremely well-endowed young man, introduced himself to her."

What better way to liven up a Monday morning than with some titillating quotations from Ogdred Weary's "pornographic work" The Curious Sofa?

"Downstairs the three of them played a most amusing game of Herbert's own invention called 'Thumbfumble'."

"Ogdred Weary" is, of course, an anagram of "Edward Gorey", the maverick writer and illustrator whose book The Doubtful Guest Hoipolloi have adapted into a rather wonderful play. (You can find out a bit more about the eccentric Mr. Gorey in one of my previous posts here.)

The Curious Sofa is Gorey's only "pornographic" work and retains all the charm and playfulness of the rest of his oeuvre. Gorey's only teasing us by putting the word "pornographic" on the book's cover. Although every page is illustrated in his trademark style, there's nothing too salacious in view. But that's not to say our imagination won't run wild...

"To beguile the tedium of the journey, Albert read aloud from Volume Eleven of the 'Encyclopedia of Unimaginable Customs'."

Don't forget that Hoipolloi's production of The Doubtful Guest is back on tour in the autumn. It's not quite as naughty as an Ogdred Weary book but it's still great fun and The Guardian were kind enough to say that it "captures all the Victorian pastiche, fantastical imagination and ominous air of Gorey's original."

All the tour dates are here and tickets are on sale now! You can also see some video previews of the show here.

"Still later, Gerald did a terrible thing to Elsie with a saucepan."

Gorey details

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

Here at Hoipolloi Headquarters we’re putting the finishing touches to plans for The Doubtful Guest’s next UK tour. The company are extremely excited about getting back on the road, the show was a huge success when it toured for the first time earlier this year and we hope to see lots more of you in Plymouth, Southampton, Cambridge, Leeds and Cardiff. The full tour schedule will be posted here in the next few days.

The show is based on a book by Edward Gorey, an artist, illustrator and writer who is something of a cult figure in America, although still relatively unknown in the UK. Here are five things Hoipolloi pack in their suitcases to keep them in a Gorey mood when they’re out on tour...


1) Tim Burton DVDs:
Tim Burton, director of films like Edward Scissorhands, The Nightmare Before Christmas and Corpse Bride, acknowledges Edward Gorey as a major influence on the melancholic, macabre aesthetic of his own work.

2) Fur coats:
Gorey attended every single performance of the New York City ballet between 1957 and 1982, where he was made notoriously conspicuous by the enormous fur coats he wore to the theatre. He draws lots of his characters wearing similarly decadent outfits.

3) Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats:
Gorey illustrated an edition of this book by T.S. Eliot (here's a picture) as well as works by Edward Lear, Samuel Beckett and Muriel Spark.

4) A Grammy-nominated concept album:
In 2003, London three-piece band The Tiger Lillies released an album called The Gorey End. Edward Gorey had enjoyed one of their songs so much that he sent them a box of his unpublished stories and invited The Tiger Lillies to write some songs around them. The album was nominated for a Grammy!

5) Health and Safety manual:
Gorey’s stories are full of dreadful accidents and unexpected deaths... In The Gashlycrumb Tinies we learn that “S is for Susan who perished of fits”, whilst “T is for Titus who flew into bits”.


Here’s hoping that The Doubtful Guest tour will be a little less accident prone than your average Edward Gorey story! Make sure you book a ticket, or you’ll end up like Neville who died of ennui.

Here's a video trailer for the show:




If you’d like to find out more about Edward Gorey, these websites are a great place to start:

Edward Gorey House
The Guardian's Obituary of Edward Gorey
The Gashlycrumb Tinies
Some more extracts from Edward Gorey stories

First day

Posted by David Ralfe (Marketing & Admin. Assistant, Hoipolloi)

I’m sitting at a desk, in an office. This is a new experience and my adolescent self would be furious if he knew. Around the age of 14, I decided that office jobs were a soul-destroying fate worse than death, and that if necessary I would run away to South America and join a shady Socialist resistance movement, rather than spend a career surrounded by stationery and filing cabinets.

I’m pleased to announce that I’ve outgrown that phase and haven’t raged against any machines for ages. These days I prefer making connections. In fact, my teenage self would be delighted that the office I’ll be working in for the next year belongs to Hoipolloi. I’ll be helping out in rehearsal rooms, as well as the office, so I can learn how a company like Hoipolloi operates on both a creative and a practical level.

I first encountered Hoipolloi four or five years ago and they quickly became one of my very favourite theatre companies. It’s my first day here and I can’t quite believe that I’m now working at Hoipolloi, not just watching them! If my predecessor Sara’s last entry on the blog is anything to go by, I’m in for a wonderful year.

I’ll be writing on the blog fairly regularly, keeping you informed of everything that Hoipolloi are up to. We’re going to be busy! The Doubtful Guest will be back on tour in the UK this autumn and Hugh Hughes is heading to Helsinki, Singapore, Sydney, Melbourne, Tasmania and the USA.

Don’t forget to keep checking the website for the latest tour dates!