Weymouth Drama Club stage version of Mark Evans' comedy play, adapted from his BBC Radio 4 series, about Pip and his friends trying to escape Mr Gently Benevolent.
Weymouth Drama Club are bringing Bleak Expectations to the Harbour Theatre on Hope Street this November, with six performances running from Wednesday 25th to Sunday 29th. It's a stage play by Mark Evans, which grew out of an award-winning BBC Radio 4 series. The production first opened at The Watermill Theatre in Newbury back in 2022, directed by Caroline Leslie, and has since been described as 'the story Charles Dickens might have written after drinking too much gin'.
The plot follows half-orphan Pip, his sisters Pippa and Poppy, and his best friend Harry Biscuit as they try to escape the clutches of the calculating Mr Gently Benevolent and defeat the hideous Hardthrasher siblings. It's billed as a hilarious, chaotic caper, and the Dickensian nods are right there in the names, though the tone is far more farcical than the original Great Expectations it plays on. The Weymouth Drama Club is putting it on here, and one of the cast members, Nathan Griffiths, has a bit of a full-circle story going: he grew up in the club's children's group and is now returning to the Harbour Theatre to play the villain.
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There are plenty of slots to choose from, so you can pick whatever fits your week. It runs at 7:00pm on Wednesday 25th, Thursday 26th, and Friday 27th, with a double-bill on Saturday 28th at 2:00pm and 7:00pm, and a 4:00pm matinee on Sunday 29th. That's six chances in one week to catch it, from mid-week evenings to a weekend afternoon.
