Shakespeare In Love, Steel Magnolias and the musical Calamity Jane are to be among the highlights of the Cotswold Players 2027-28 season, announced as part of their Annual General Meeting held at the Playhouse on September 1st, writes Nick Brunger.
In an exciting climax to the evening members of the theatre company were given the oppo rtunity to add one more production to the list, selecting J B Priestley’s classic masterpiece An Inspector Calls, more than forty years since they last staged the play.
Actors, backstage staff and supporters chose the powerful drama over other popular works including Mrs Warren’s Profession and Blithe Spirit in a live on-line poll, with the results displayed on giant screen to applause and cheers as the winner emerged.
Considered to be a scathing indictment of capitalist greed and Edwardian upper-class hypocrisy, Priestley’s drama was written in 1945 but set in 1912. Frequently performed on both stage and screen, the tense play highlights a wealthy family’s complicity in the suicide of a working-class girl to expose how the privileged exploit the vulnerable.
The Players also used the AGM to announce their 2025 theatre awards with The Wizard of Oz being judged as the Best Production of their most recent season.
Independent adjudicator Tony Domaille praised the company’s professionalism, imagination and talent adding: “coming to the Cotswold Players shows is as good as it gets.”
“There has been so much great work that when it comes to awards it’s been incredibly hard to choose.”
Alice Dillon was named as Best Actor in a female role for Rosalind in As You Like It, with Simon Amos selected as Best Actor in a male role as The Creature in Frankenstein.
Pic: Liv Powell
Other acting credits went to Sarah Wiggins as Celia in As You Like It and Tristan Holland for the part of Rob in Misconceptions, with other awards including As You Like It for creativity and design and The Wizard of Oz for technical achievement.
The Magical Musical Moment was judged to be “Welcome to Munchkinland” in The Wizard of Oz, with the pirate battle in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead the “Champagne Moment” of the season.
The Cotswold Players’ Chair, Judy Free, praised the company for producing “the best local amateur theatre around” and for showing “a deep-rooted commitment to the Stroud community”.
She told the packed theatre that the past season had seen sixty-seven actors taking on eighty-five parts, with seventy members taking up a variety of other roles behind the scenes.
Looking forward to Underdog: the Other Other Bronte and Orgreave, an original show written and directed by Players’ member John Salter, she said: “I am proud that we have productions reaching professional standards and for offering shows that are both varied and ambitious.”
