Dickens ghost stories with a comic twist - coming up in Hastings

Fresh from five-star reviews at Edinburgh Fringe and from touring in the USA, Australia and beyond, they’re now at The Stables. The pair have recently returned from Seaside in Florida, where they performed Frankenstein – the 3D Podcast at the REP Theatre. The piece was created in January in Seaside through Escape To Create.

Nicholas won Best of The Fest at Orlando Fringe this May for his performance of Your Bard – An Evening in the Pub with Will Shakespeare, before travelling to Kansas City to direct Prejudice and Pride, a new musical which he co-wrote with Sam Wright. The show then transferred to 59E59 off-Broadway in July.

Ghost of a Smile offers two of Charles Dickens’ creepy tales – with a comic twist. Tales with a tingle, but also a giggle, as Nicholas says: “Two yarns to chill and charm! Stories with a shiver and a smile! Like The Woman in Black – but funnier, with fewer people!”

Collaborating since 2007, Gavin and Nicholas have now created a total of seven solo shows and three two-handers, including Spitfire Solo, Bond! and The Six-Sided Man. They tour across the UK and are regular visitors to the REP Theatre in Seaside, Florida, the Adelaide Festival and Edinburgh Fringe.

The Dickens is at The Stables Theatre, The Bourne, Hastings on Tuesday, November 14 at 7.30pm. Tickets £13.50 and £8.50 on https://stablestheatre.co.uk/the-ghost-of-a-smile/ or 01424 423221.

Gavin Robertson comes from a physical theatre background (Lecoq, Lindsay Kemp, Gaulier) creating and performing his own work for national and international touring. He has a diverse portfolio of productions including Bond, Crusoe, Spittoon, The Three Musketeers, The Six-Sided Man, Fantastical Voyage, Escape From The Planet of The Day That Time Forgot! and many others. Each of his productions has toured internationally including several tours to Japan, Australia, New Zealand, USA, Singapore, Tunisia, Senegal and Morocco, as well as Hong Kong, Lebanon, Turkey, Oman, Brazil, Chile, Taiwan, Costa Rica, Bosnia, Russia and various other European countries.

Nicholas Collett is an award-winning actor, director, writer and producer. His theatre work includes A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Winter’s Tale at the Royal Shakespeare Company at the Barbican and Bombur in The Hobbit at the Queen’s Theatre in London. He has appeared in more than 40 productions in repertory across the UK. He is the co-founder of Third Party which toured classics worldwide from 1994 to 2014 giving more than a thousand performances and won a Peter Brook Award in 2010 for Dr Faustus.