New Bristol film company Redcliffe Films unveils its debut offering this winter – and it’s chosen both an evocative subject matter and an atmospheric setting. Severn and Somme is a 50-minute documentary about the remarkable life of Ivor Gurney, the World War One poet and composer. Born in Gloucester in 1890, Gurney began composing at the age of 14, with his work largely inspired by the Gloucestershire countryside around him. He later fought in the trenches of WWI where, in 1917, he was the victim of a gas attack and was discharged from the army. Despite suffering from shell shock and bipolar disorder, Gurney continued to write poetry and compose music until his death, from tuberculosis, in 1937. The genius of the “country boy they called Schubert” has been rediscovered in recent years, and Redcliffe’s film, shot on locations in Bristol and Gloucestershire using Bristolian actors, tells the tale of his creative yet tragic life. The film premieres at Bristol Cathedral on Sat 21 Jan as part of an evening that also includes a live performance of Gurney’s works by the Bristol Classical Players.

MORE redcliffefilms.co.uk

This much-loved paean to comedy’s silliest side returns once again to guide us through the dark days of January. Programmed across four key Harbourside venues – Arnolfini, Bristol Old Vic, Colston Hall and Watershed – Bristol Slapstick Festival is a four-day homage to the joys of silent comedy. Highlights this year include a screening of Buster Keaton’s seminal silent The General (pictured), introduced by Griff Rhys Jones (Fri 27, Colston Hall), a screening of Monty Python’s Life of Brian, introduced by Python Terry Jones (Sat 28, Colston Hall) and a double bill of vintage Harold Lloyd comedies (Sat 28, Arnolfini).

More: slapstick.org.uk

From tales of foundling children to a life-changing fall 
from a Cornish wall, Bristol Old Vic’s winter season 
is packed with goodies

There’s still time, if you’re reading this good and early, to book tickets for Coram Boy, Bristol Old Vic’s swashbuckling Christmas show. It’s a stage adaptation of Jamila Gavin’s Whitbread Award-winning tale of two cities (Bristol and London), two orphans and two conjoined destinies. First adapted for the National Theatre by Helen Edmundson, the show has been further developed by BOV’s feted Artistic Director Tom Morris, whose War Horse recently scooped six prestigious Tony Awards. The show features a vast cast of adults and children, a community choir and orchestra – and it’s being performed not at BOV, currently knee-deep in its massive regeneration project (see page 34 for more), but across at Colston Hall, from 21-30 Dec.

Into the new year, an early highlight down in the BOV Studio (unaffected by the current building works) is Mayday Mayday (pictured), actor Tristan Sturrock’s account of an extraordinary period of his life. Sturrock is best known to Bristol audiences as a regular with Cornwall’s Kneehigh Theatre, and for his starring role as Long John Silver in last summer’s superb Treasure Island, staged alfresco on King Street. Mayday…, meanwhile, uses music, slapstick and more to tell the tale of how Sturrock fell headfirst off a wall in Padstow on the first day of summer… and how he rebuilt both his neck and his life.

More: bristololdvic.org.uk

After an energetic trek around the Harbourside, sampling its many cultural and historic delights, where better to unwind than at the Lido, Clifton’s relaxed and pampering spa and restaurant?

Relax, reach for the Sunday papers and let the Lido take the strain out of your weekend. Catch the afternoon sun and a glimpse of the swimmers ploughing up and down from the floor-to-ceiling windows in the first-floor restaurant, where the Lido’s set lunch (£15 for two courses, £20 for three: 12-3pm) features such delicacies as crispy pumpkin, goat’s curd, honey and oregano, and wood-roasted hake with Portuguese caldo verde.

And it gets better: the restaurant is offering a complimentary glass of fino sherry or Bloody Mary for all Shipshape readers pitching up on a Sunday. Just reserve in advance, quoting Shipshape when you do.

More: lidobristol.com

Adventurous contemporary dance troupe Fleur Darkin Company want you up on stage with them at Arnolfini on Fri 10 Feb… Staged within an immersive light set and with a score featuring music by the masters of electronic abstraction and minimalism, Plastikman and Four Tet, FDC’s DisGo creates close proximities between performer and audience, as dancers and audience members collaborate to create something together. Expect a riot of choreography – and a uniquely intimate piece of dance.

More: arnolfini.org.uk

With a returning Old Vic, a flourishing Tobacco Factory and an ever-adventurous Alma Tavern Theatre, Bristol’s theatre scene has been in rude health of late – and the local landscape gets a further shot in the arm this winter with the arrival of the Bierkeller Theatre, a 400-seat playhouse in the legendary Bierkeller music venue in the centre of town.
A landmark music venue for decades, the Bierkeller is now adding regular theatre productions to its repertoire. And the team behind the new theatre plan to transform the building for each visiting production, immersing audiences into the world of each performance. Plans for the next few months include a lesbian Romeo and Juliet courtesy of local company Thrice Three Muses (Feb) and, in early Apr, a promenade performance of Moby-Dick: Inside the Belly of the Beast, which will see the Bierkeller transformed into a 19th-century ale house, Captain Ahab’s ill-fated whaling ship and, indeed, the belly of the great whale.

More bierkellertheatre.com

Still a bit of a way off, this one, but we reckon you’d be wise booking up now: on Wed 7 Mar, Colston Hall welcomes the legendary folk singer Joan Baez. For over half a century, since her debut at 1959’s Newport Folk Festival, Baez has been a huge presence in folk music circles and beyond. Her left-leaning political views and constant championing of society’s underdogs has seen her marching on the front line of the civil rights movement with Martin Luther King, singing on the first Amnesty International tour and standing alongside Nelson Mandela during his 90th birthday celebrations. Oh, and back in 1963, Baez also introduced the world to a callow young folk singer called Bob Dylan…

More: colstonhall.org

A brand new festival this winter explores the boundless intersections between music and film, particularly as seen (and heard) right here in Bristol

Filmic, a collaboration between St George’s and Watershed, aims to reflect Bristol’s rich cross-pollination across the two media (we’re a city where, the organisers tell us, “musical productions often suggest the filmic, even if there is no film involved”), and will mix work by local filmmakers and composers with that of major international figures.
February’s inaugural festival will feature four concerts at St George’s and a programme of screenings and talks at Watershed. It all kicks off on Thur 9 Feb with a performance by Australia’s Spaghetti Western Orchestra (pictured), who appeared at the Proms last summer, followed by an after-show party in the bar featuring composer Colin Tully and his band Sensorium playing Colin’s original music for the much-loved 1981 Britflick Gregory’s Girl.

Later, on Thur 23 Feb, St George’s will host a double bill of Rota/Morricone, with John Law performing solo piano versions of Nino Rota’s film themes followed by Looking for Ennio, a tribute to the great Westerns soundtrack composer Ennio Morricone from Bristol musicians’ collective The Greatness of the Magnificence. Thur 8 Mar, meanwhile, will see a visit from the Dodge Brothers, the rootsy country-cum-rockabilly outfit fronted by straight-talking film critic Mark Kermode. Cut!

More: watershed.co.uk, stgeorgesbristol.co.uk

The nights may be long, the weather moody and the post-Christmas coffers distinctively empty, but all is not bleak round these parts. No, indeed: the beginning of the year always brings one cast-iron cultural highlight to Bristol

Shakespeare at the Tobacco Factory’s winter/spring residency at their namesake theatre is a consistent highlight of Bristol’s, not to mention the UK’s, cultural calendar. And 2012 will be SATTF’s 13th season at the Tobacco Factory – they began back in 2000 with a season of King Lear and A Midsummer Night’s Dream that played, initially, to tiny crowds but became a crucial step in the cultural regeneration of Southville and Bedminster.

Every year since, SATTF have performed two of the Bard’s plays (although they’ve looked to other playwrights on one or two occasions) for six weeks each at the theatre, and every single one of these productions has been a triumph: clear-eyed, articulate, emotionally honest stagings of Shakespeare that replace pomp and finery with incredible acting and a faultless understanding of the great man’s emotional landscapes.

Hopes are high, then, for 2012’s season, which pairs (once again) King Lear (9 Feb-24 Mar) with Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard (29 Mar-5 May). Director Andrew Hilton showed with that first Lear back in 2000 that he understands the play’s complex emotional ties and betrayals like no one else – and SATTF also have form with Chekhov, having already given us brilliant renditions of the great Russian’s Three Sisters and Uncle Vanya (pictured). Expect great things – and book now.

More: sattf.org.uk, tobaccofactorytheatre.com

Muscadet, a white wine from the Loire region of France, which reached a zenith of popularity back in the 1980s, appears to be making something of a comeback. “It was Glassboat’s original house wine restaurant back in the 1980s, and we used to sell gallons of the stuff,” recalls Arne Ringner, owner and co-founder of the veteran Harbourside restaurant. “Glassboat opened when working lunches were still de rigueur among Bristol’s substantial financial services industry. Meals were often interrupted by financiers shouting into their brick-size mobile phones.” Made near Nantes in the far west of the Loire, most Muscadet is drunk young and fresh, a perfect accompaniment to a plate of seafood. This season, you’ll find Muscadets from three different decades among Glassboat’s extensive wine list – and, in honour of its original house wine, the restaurant is offering every diner a complimentary glass of the white nectar (lower-deck bookings, Jan and Feb 2012).

More glassboat.co.uk