First look at Edinburgh Filmhouse £2m refurb ahead of anticipated reopening this week
The cinema's sudden closure in October 2022 prompted a grassroots campaign to save the beloved venue and established the new charity, Filmhouse (Edinburgh) Ltd, set up by a group of former staff. The group's Open The Doors campaign launched in September 2023 and saw huge public support, generating more than £325,000 to refurbish the venue, with the charity also securing £1.4million from the UK Levelling Up Community Ownership Fund and £60,000 from the Edinburgh City Council.
The Filmhouse will re-open its doors with a hand-picked programme of films the cinema missed out on playing during the venue's two-and-a-half-year closure. The programme will have a strong emphasis on films that did not screen in the city because of its absence.
For more information you can visit the Filmhouse website.
1 . Edinburgh Filmhouse
Landmark cinema, the Edinburgh Filmhouse will reopen on Friday, June 27 | Kat Gollock Photo Sales
2 . Screen 1
Screen 1 has a capacity of 186 seats and 2 wheelchair spaces. The screen has Dual 35mm/70mm film projectors, 4K digital projection and 5.1 audio | Kat Gollock Photo Sales
3 . Screen 2
Screen 2 has a capacity of 70 seats and 1 wheelchair space. The screen has dual 35mm film projectors and can screen 2K digital projection with 5.1 audio | Kat Gollock Photo Sales
4 . Screen 3
Screen 3 has a capacity of 57 and 2 wheelchair spaces. The screen has dual 35mm film projectors and a 16mm film projector and can screen 2K digital projection with 5.1 audio | Kat Gollock Photo Sales
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Sherlock Holmes adaptation gives feminist twist to classic stories
Botanic Gardens, Glasgow BARD In The Botanics (BiB) – the annual summer theatre programme held in Glasgow's Botanic Gardens – has, for some years, broadened its remit to encompass not only the plays of Shakespeare, but also works by other classical authors. In recent years – to take three examples – we have been treated to adaptations of works by such theatrical luminaries as Euripides, Henrik Ibsen and Christopher Marlowe. I am, I admit readily, open to accusations of intellectual snobbery in suggesting that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle – creator of the famous, and enduringly popular fictional detective Sherlock Holmes – is not a natural bedfellow of the dramatists named above. Nevertheless, it is to the Edinburgh-born doctor and writer that BiB's associate director Jennifer Dick turns for the company's latest play in the Botanics' splendid Kibble Palace glasshouse. READ MORE: Scottish tourist attraction wins prestigious award after 11,000 five-star reviews The lovely venue shares its Victorian provenance with Doyle (and, indeed, with Holmes). As such, it proves to be a good fit for this play about Baker Street's most famous fictional resident. Dick – who is both the adapter and the director of this drama – ensures that many of the established pillars of the Holmes myth are resolutely in place. Of course, Holmes (played with the necessary alertness and condescension by Adam Donaldson) has Dr John Watson (played with affection and resignation by Stephen Arden) as his long-suffering sidekick. James Boal (who has a busy evening, playing no fewer than four characters) takes on the role of the befuddled police inspector Lestrade. There are even references to the off-stage escapades of the Baker Street Irregulars. Dick does innovate, however, when it comes to the character of Irene Adler, aka 'The Woman'. As with Lara Pulver's performance (opposite Benedict Cumberbatch's Holmes) in the BBC series Sherlock, Rebecca Robin's clever and glamorous Adler has a seductive power over Holmes. However, here, she is not only a criminal mastermind but a determined champion of the rights of women who is bent on revenge. The truth and justice of the play's contemplation of misogyny are unarguable, as is the pleasure of seeing powerful male chauvinists getting their just desserts. However, Dick has a tendency to write for Adler speeches that are occasionally more polemical than they need to be. This is a pity, as Robin blesses the character with a darkly compelling and sympathetic performance. Boal is required to play central casting archetypes in the rough, but decent, sailor Captain Crocker, the arrogant King of Bohemia and the pernicious blackmailer Milverton. Each character is managed with colourful aplomb in both of his dimensions. Holmes isn't Holmes without his weakness for narcotics, and Donaldson plays the scene depicting the detective's dependency on cocaine with a believable exhilaration and anguish; even if the decision to illustrate the episode by way of the well-worn song The Windmills Of Your Mind is a tad obvious. This is, then, a nicely put together adaptation of Doyle's tales, which has been given a satisfying feminist twist. What it sometimes lacks in subtlety, it makes up for in theatrical brio. Until August 2:
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The National
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These small working class, post-industrial towns are underrepresented and get an unfair public image. 'I want to celebrate where I'm from and the cool, kind, good natured and sometimes dark sense of humour of the area. 'The Fringe felt like a great opportunity to take my regional work to a national level. By fundraising, it allowed the local community to support a local artist to come up to Edinburgh.' (Image: PA) Surreally Good is at Summerhall (Former Women's Locker Room) July 31 to August 25 (not 11,18) Milly Blue and Jessie Maryon Davies have spent around £10,000 so far, without counting unpaid writing and rehearsal time to bring Elysium to the Fringe. 'It's kind of eye watering. But we really believe in our show and are excited beyond belief to be coming to Edinburgh. We're realising some huge dreams. But they're not messing about when people warn you it's pricey! 'We only recently launched our Crowdfunder as we had really hoped we could manage without it. 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