Brighton’s Lezzwood Players return to the stage after three long years

A company with close associations with Eastbourne over the years, they are hoping to find an Eastbourne opportunity this year. But in the meantime, they are offering A Comedy Of Errors Lezzers (or As You Dyke It) on Friday, March 3 at Ironworks Studios, Brighton; on Friday, March 10 again at Ironworks Studios, Brighton; and then Saturday, March 18 at Brighton’s Wagner Hall.

They are promising a brand-new, typically Shakespearean tale of lust, murder, magic, vegan rock buns and entirely implausible cases of mistaken identity…plus all the usual sapphic slapstick, says musical director Dungareen Jean: “Join us as we crush the codpiece of a cultural icon – and find answers to the questions that have eluded the experts for centuries.”

Jean added: “We normally include a 15 or 16-plus age rating for tickets because our shows include some adult themes, but the jokes are usually no ruder than your average panto! More info at www.Lezzwood.co.uk.”

A women's theatre group, they have been putting on their own original comedy musicals in and around Brighton and Eastbourne for the past ten years offering saucy satires of well-worn theatrical genres. Past shows have included: Murder at the Lezzwood Saloon (Wild-West parody); Lezzington Towers (Mallory Towers, 1950s girls boarding school parody); Lezzton Abbey (Downton Abbey parody); Lezzby Avenue (1970s cop show parody) and The Adventures of the Starship Lezzerprise (Star Trek/Star Wars parody).

“We also performed one of our shows at the annual summer L-Fest festival before the pandemic,” Jean said. “Shows and songs are all written, produced and performed by members of the group who are lesbian or bi-sexual women” – though not exclusively, and you certainly don’t have to be gay to enjoy the show, Jean stresses.

“I wasn't there at the beginning but my partner was and it all revolved around a wonderful script that our writer Kate came up with. She does all the scripts. And we discovered that we all had different abilities.

"It emerged from the Brighton queer scene and it must have been about 2012 and we all discovered that we could do all sorts of things, making props and make the set and so on. We used to joke that all we needed was someone who could act and someone who could sing! Some of us had been in a different show with a different group and there was a bit of cross pollination with a show that had been done before. I did the songs for that and it was just a natural progression.

"We managed to find people and we have stayed pretty much the same group of people ever since. Usually we do a production every year but sadly the pandemic stopped that. Our last production was March 2020.

"We often do something around the panto season, either just before or just after Christmas and sadly we have been out of action since then. We had a script ready to go and that we were hoping that things might open up again but sadly theatres had closed by the time we were ready or we weren’t able to get the bookings.

"So it is really great to be back now.”

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