We’re pleased to announce our 2025 festival, which begins with a weekend of One Act plays and includes both matinee and evening performances. This is followed by a week of Full Length plays, evenings only.

One Act Festival Weekend

Saturday 19 April, 2pm

Service Players (Isle of Man) present Trees

Whilst unconscious in a hospital bed, Doris is confronted about the climate crisis by various characters and shown how important everyone’s actions can be.
(Comic Drama)
*flashing lights, offensive language and religious references

Service Players (Isle of Man) present The Same by Enda Walsh

Enda Walsh’s The Same is a two-hander exploring time and memory. It was first produced by Corcadorca Theatre Company at the Old Cork Prison, Cork, on 13 February 2017. It won The Irish Times Irish Theatre Award for Best Play. In the play, two women each tell their story about moving to a new city and crossing paths with one another. It becomes apparent that they are the same person, separated only by a number of years.
(Psychodrama)

Saturday 19 April, 7:30pm

Goodbye Piccadilly Productions (Isle of Man) present Shelter by Jenny Derbyshire

In Manchester during the blitz, Mary and Will sit in an Anderson shelter waiting for the ‘all clear’, however the conflict is not just happening on the outside of the shelter. Mary’s desire to talk and Will’s desire to remain silent is causing resentment since Charlie their son went to flight. Can a betrayal also be an act of love? 
(Drama)

Rushen Players (Isle of Man) present A Bench at the Edge by Luigi Jannuzzi

In a coma on life support, Person One lives out a twenty five-year existence on a bench at the edge of an abyss, witnessing many people over the years jump into it. When Person Two approaches the edge in a distraught state, they begin an encounter that explores with humour and empathy for the human condition the pros and cons of life and death.
(Dramatic Comedy)

Sunday 20 April, 2pm

Platform Theatre School (Isle of Man) present The Trials by Dawn King (shortened version)

The near future. The climate emergency is gathering pace, and our generation is being judged. The jurors are children. But are they delivering justice – or just taking revenge? The Trials is a near-future courtroom drama addressing the climate emergency and intergenerational conflict, as a jury of 12 to 17-year-olds sit in judgment over three adult defendants for the crimes they are alleged to have committed against the planet.
(Drama)
*this play contains strong language

Manx National Theatre (Isle of Man) present Big ‘E’ Club by C J Maybury

Three wronged women and their friend Cheryl discuss how they were given the ‘Big E’ and fantasise about the revenge they would like to take. Their fantasy becomes reality.

Sunday 20 April, 7.30pm

Parodos Theatre Company (Isle of Man) present Theodore by Gemma Varnom

It is the last night of the world with an asteroid due to hit earth. Mia has her whole evening planned out when there is an unexpected knock at the door from an old lover. How will their evening pan out, will they remain together by the end of the night.
(Drama)

Service Players (Isle of Man) present Losing it by Derek Webb

Jack is performing his own play, but his leading lady has not turned up. As he struggles to keep the audience’s interest ad audience member takes matters into her own hands with hilarious consequences.
(Comedy)

Full Length Play Festival Week

Monday 21 April, 7.30pm

Wellington Theatre Company (Isle of Man) present Blithe Spirit

Fussy, cantankerous novelist Charles Condomine has remarried but finds himself haunted by the ghost of his late wife, Elvira. Clever, insistent and well aware of Charles’ shortcomings, Elvira is called up by a visiting “happy medium”, the eccentric and flighty Madame Arcati. As everyone’s personalities clash, Charles’ current wife Ruth, is accidentally killed. She “passes over” and joins Elvira, allowing the two “blithe spirits” to haunt the hapless Charles into perpetuity.
(Comedy)

Tuesday 22 April, 7.30pm

White Cobra Productions (Isle of Man) present Our Man in Havana by Clive Francis

Jim Wormwold, an under-employed vacuum cleaner salesman living in 1950s ling to pay his teenage Cuba, is struggling to pay for his teenage daughter’s increasingly extravagant lifestyle. So when the British Secret Service asks him to become their ‘man in Havana’ he can’t afford to say no. There’s just one problem…. he doesn’t know anything! To avoid suspicion, he begins to recruit non-existent sub-agents, concocting a series of intricate fictions. But Wormwold soon discovers that his stories are closer to the truth than he could have ever imagined…
(Comedy)

Wednesday 23 April, 7.30pm

Keyhole Theatre (Isle of Man) present O’Brien’s Dream by Bill Morrison

O’Brien’s Dream is a musical play by the acclaimed Northern Irish playwright Bill Morrison. It deals with the experiences of Sean O’Brien when he arrives in Liverpool en route for a new life in America during the famine of 1847. In Liverpool he encounters various characters including the underwork and high society and finds love and hope despite various setbacks. The show features music written by Frankie Connor (from Radio Merseyside).
(Musical Play)

Thursday 24 April, 7.30pm

Full Circle Theatre Company (Isle of Man) present Hansard by Simons Woods

It is a summer’s morning in 1988 and Tory politician Robin Hesketh has returned to the Cotswold house he shares with his wife of 30 years, Diane. But all is not as blissful as it seems. Diane has a stinking hangover, a fox is destroying the garden and secrets are being dug up all over the place. As the day draws on, what starts as the familiar rhythms of marital sparring turns to blood sport. 
(Comedy)

Friday 25 April, 7.30pm

Garden Suburb Theatre (Isle of Man) present Holding the Man by Tommy Murphy

Based on the popular autobiography – in a 1970’s Melbourne High School, Tim falls hopelessly in love with John, the captain of the football team. A unconventional love story through fast changing times. With a cast of six playing 43 unique characters between them, a high energy take on the heart warning comedy of their early life, the activism and exploration of their university days and finally tragedy that unfolds when they both contract HIV in the mid-eighties.
(Tragedy)
*this play contains graphic scenes and offensive language

Tickets will be on sale shortly via the Villa Gaiety and we look forward to a varied and exciting week!