Coventry UK City of Culture 2021’s Festival Hub returns for another fantastic summer season. After calls for the communal social space and arts venue to return last year, the Assembly Festival Garden will reopen on Thursday 14 April bringing five months of world class entertainment to the centre of Coventry.
News of the programme has already been announced, with Olivier nominated family show Dragons and Mythical Beasts (15 Apr), supersized drag show Queenz – The Show with BALLS! (14 Apr), and acapella supergroup The Magnets: Legends (14 Apr) leading the line-up in the show-stopping Queens of Flanders spiegeltent. And there’s plenty more to dive into in the opening weeks as the Garden returns just in time for the Easter holidays.
They were the surprise hit of Coventry UK City of Culture 2021, The Choir of Man (18 May) are back, direct from a smash-hit run on London’s West End and with an Olivier nomination for Best Entertainment. And new for 2022, the hilarious boundary pushing phenomenon Bernie Dieter’s Club Kabarett (11 May) comes to Coventry fresh from a smash-hit season in Sydney.
The close of Coventry’s year as UK City of Culture 2021 just got a whole lot hotter, and sexier, with über-award-winning German kabarett superstar Bernie Dieter, bringing her infamous troupe of bombastic Bohemians to the Assembly Festival Garden. For the first time Coventry audiences are invited into the darkest, funniest and most debauched kabarett show East of Berlin! A gin soaked, Weimar-punk jazz band soundtracks a hazy, immersive night of dangerously funny kabarett, gender-bending circus and fire-breathing sideshow at its most inappropriate, provocative and hilarious best.
Across the Garden in the Piccolo the whole family will be entertained with a brilliant line-up of children’s entertainment; Nick Sharratt’s Shark in the Park (14 Apr), children’s comedy and cabaret in Comedy Club 4 Kids (16 Apr) and Variety Club 4 Kids (7 May), the ever-entertaining Bubble Show (21 Apr), and interactive jokes, silly billyness, beatboxing, and epic sounds in Mighty Kids Beatbox Comedy Show (30 Apr).
In the evenings, the Piccolo transforms into a comedy pop-up club with some of the best comedians on the UK comedy circuit bringing their newest work to Coventry for a sneak peek. Catch ‘The Brian Cox of Comedy’ (The Guardian) Rob Auton and his brand new The Crowd Show (Work in Progress) (23 Apr); Perrier award nominee Glenn Moore (Mock of the Week, Stand Up Central, The News Quiz) (23 Apr); one of The Sunday Times’ Top Ten Female Stand Ups To Watch, Eleanor Tiernan (Stand Up for Live Comedy, The Alternative Comedy Experience) (24 Apr); one of the UK’s best up-and-coming comedians Pierre Novellie (The Mash Report, Stand Up Central, The Now Show) with his new show Why Can’t I Just Enjoy Things (WIP) (24 Apr); a taste of Coventry's unique comedy flavour, Sophie Duker: Hag (Work in Progress) (8 Out of 10 Cats, Frankie Boyle’s New World Order, Jonathan Ross’ Comedy Club) (6 May); the debut solo stand up show from Lindsey Santaro (The Joy of Missing Out, BBC Radio 4) (8 May); and the Best Scottish Headliner and the fastest-selling Glasgow Comedy Festival act Susie McCabe (8 May) with a brand-new work in progress show.
Plus, the entire 144 episodes of the hit 90s TV show, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, in 70 minutes, as told through the eyes of Spike in Buffy Revamped (28 Apr), from master of comedy craft Brendan Murphy. Funny, satirical and bursting with 90s pop-culture references, it’s the perfect parody for Buffy aficionados and those who never enrolled at Sunnydale High alike.
Elsewhere in the theatre programme, TV’s Tim Marriott (Brittas Empire) re-enacts the last Sherlock Holmes adventure from the perspective of unsung hero, Dr John Watson in Watson: The Final Problem (10 May). There is a shadow in the gutters, a spider’s web of poisonous intrigue plagues the city and Dr John Watson must face his greatest ever challenge. Created in collaboration with the BBC’s Bert Coules (The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes).
All this is in the first six weeks of the Garden reopening; with plenty more music, theatre, circus, comedy, and children’s shows to be announced throughout Assembly Festival Garden’s season in Coventry City Centre.
The gates of the Assembly Festival Garden will open on Thursday 14 April providing an unrivalled programme of live entertainment in its two spectacular performance spaces, the Queen of Flanders and Piccolo spiegeltents. In addition to the live events, the Garden will once again provide a bustling social hub for residents and visitors of Coventry to enjoy the finale of the city’s year as Coventry UK City of Culture 2021.
To keep up to date with dates and programme announcements please visit www.assemblyfestivalgarden.com.
Find on social @AssemblyGardens.
For full information about Coventry UK City of Culture programme visit www.coventry2021.co.uk.
Caption - Bernie Dieter’s Club Kabarett from 11 May, photo by Clinton Bradbury