Musical artwork by Shaun Bracey, inspired by original paintings by Gary Cook, Ann Bracey and Andrew Bracey, and photographs by Jamie Randall and Pete Bracey.

Shaun will be playing piano regularly throughout the exhibition with a free concert on Saturday 27th September from 11am to midday.

Open 10am to 4pm daily. Free admission.

Alice, a reclusive writer living on the windswept cliffs of Southern England during World War II, has her quiet world turned upside down when she is unexpectedly tasked with caring for Frank, a young London evacuee.

Initially resistant, Alice soon finds that she and Frank share more in common than she ever imagined. Together, they must weather the storms of war and solitude, discovering the enduring power of love in the darkest of times.

Director: Jessica Swale

Featuring: Gemma Arterton, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Lucas Bond, Penelope Wilton, Tom Courtenay

Details: UK | Language: English | 2020 | 1h 39m

Showings:

30th September – 2pm Tuesday Matinée

Please note: Our Tuesday Matinées feature subtitles for the hard of hearing and will include an interval.

Tickets: £5.

 An exhibition of paintings and drawings.

Open 10am to 4pm daily. Free admission.

In war-torn Rome, Floria Tosca and Mario Cavaradossi live for each other and for their art. But when Cavaradossi helps an escaped prisoner, the lovers make a deadly enemy in the form of Baron Scarpia, Chief of Police.

At the mercy of Scarpia’s twisted desires, Tosca is forced to make a horrific bargain: sleeping with the man she hates in order to save the man she loves. Can she find a way out?

A star-studded cast includes soprano Anna Netrebko performing the role of Tosca, tenor Freddie De Tommaso as Cavaradossi, and bass-baritone Gerald Finley as Scarpia, with Music Director of The Royal Opera Jakub Hrůša conducting his first new production in the role. An alternative, modern-day Rome provides the backdrop for Oliver Mears’ unmissable, gripping new production of Puccini’s thriller.

Duration: 3h 30m (to be confirmed) | Sung in Italian with subtitles

Cast:
Floria Tosca ANNA NETREBKO
Mario Cavaradossi FREDDIE DE TOMMASO
Baron Scarpia GERALD FINLEY
Spoletta CARLO BOSI
Cesare Angelotti OSSIAN HUSKINSON
Sacristan ALESSANDRO CORBELLI
Sciarrone SIPHE KWANI

Creatives:
Music GIACOMO PUCCINI
Conductor JAKUB HRŮŠA
Director OLIVER MEARS
Set Designer SIMON LIMA HOLDSWORTH
Costume Designer ILONA KARAS
Lighting Designer FABIANA PICCIOLI
Movement Director ANNA MORRISSEY

Tickets: £15. Members, Friends and under 18s £12.50.

After moving from Africa to the American suburbs, Cady Heron enters the intimidating world of high school and quickly becomes entangled with a popular but ruthless clique known as The Plastics.

As she infiltrates their group, Cady is drawn into their web of gossip, manipulation, and social warfare, ultimately risking her own identity and values.

Director: Mark Waters

Featuring: Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams, Tim Meadows, Ana Gasteyer, Amy Poehler, Tina Fey

Details: USA | Language: English | 2004 | 1h 37m

Showings:

Friday 3rd October – 7.30pm

Tickets: £7.50. Members & Friends £6.50. Under 18s £5.50.

A struggling screenwriter accidentally stumbles into the decaying mansion of Norma Desmond, a faded silent film star desperate for a return to glory.

Norma enlists Joe to help her with a screenplay she believes will be her comeback, and as he becomes entangled in her delusions and manipulations, he finds himself caught between ambition and morality.

It’s the 75th anniversary of this biting critique of Hollywood.

Director: Billy Wilder

Featuring: William Holden, Gloria Swanson, Erich von Stroheim, Nancy Olson, Fred Clark, Lloyd Gough, Jack Webb

Details: USA | Language: English | 1950 | 1h 50m

Showings:

Tuesday 7th October – 2pm Matinée

Please note: Our Tuesday Matinées feature subtitles for the hard of hearing and will include an interval.

Tickets: £5

An exhibition of paintings by Jenny Luck.

Open 10am to 4pm daily. Free admission.

The arrival of army deserter Pietro in a remote village in the Italian Alps in 1944 upturns the life of the village schoolteacher and his family, especially his daughters, bringing to the surface many family secrets.

This prize-winning film evokes past rural life with compassion and acute observation.

Director: Maura Delpero

Featuring: Giuseppe De Domenico, Tommaso Ragno, Martina Scrinzi

Details: Italy/France/Belgium | Subtitles | 2024 | 1h 59m

Tickets: £7.50. Members & Friends £6.50. U18s £5.50. Film Society members free.

See here for details of Film Society membership.

Housewife Pansy is not happy. She is agoraphobic, a hypochondriac and paranoid about animals, birds, insects, plants, and flowers. She is confrontational with everyone, especially her plumber husband Curtley and her unemployed son Moses, whom she thinks is wasting his life.

Acclaimed filmmaker Mike Leigh’s new film explores family relationships in the post-pandemic world. After over a decade spent making his two epic period films Mr. Turner and Peterloo, Mike Leigh returns to his ongoing exploration of the contemporary world with this tragi-comic study of human strengths and weaknesses.

Director: Mike Leigh

Featuring: Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Michele Austin, David Webber, Tuwaine Barrett, Ani Nelson, Sophia Brown, Jonathan Livingstone

Details: UK/Spain | Language: English | 2025 | 1h 37m

Showings:

Tuesday 14th October – 2pm Matinée

Please note: Our Tuesday Matinées feature subtitles for the hard of hearing and will include an interval.

Tickets: £5.

A solo exhibition of work by Phoebe Ridgway.

Phoebe Ridgway (b.1994, Dorset) lives and works in London. Using walking as a methodology, Ridgway seeks to explore the relationship between inside and outside. Ridgway contemplates how through the act of walking, one is made aware of these physical sensations of movement, memory and interconnectedness and how these can be translated into marks, shapes, colour fields, motifs that map that journey.

These moments are entwined with our presence on the land, forever following and altering, interrupting and intruding into the ever-changing rhythmic arrangement of the natural environment. The function of varying the tempo of paint presents to the viewer a physical experience, holding an assorted assemblage of instances of note, and drawing on occurrences that generate an overwhelming sensation.

Open 10am to 4.30pm daily. Free admission.

Get ready for the ultimate rock experience as Bat Out of Hell roars onto the big screen this Halloween! 

The cast of the West End production will bring Jim Steinman and Meat Loaf’s iconic anthems to life, including I’d Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That), Paradise By The Dashboard Light, Two Out of Three Ain’t Bad, Dead Ringer For Love, and, of course, Bat Out of Hell.

Bat out of Hell – The Musical promises a spectacle that will leave you breathless! This heart-pounding experience, with a powerhouse eight-piece live band on stage, delivers a new production with sprawling multi-level platforms to transport you from Raven’s bedroom to the underground world of
the Lost in a visual feast that pushes the boundaries of live theatre.

Tickets: £15. Members, Friends and under 18s £12.50.

Dorset Visual Arts has worked with four artists who were awarded bursaries to make new work about Cranborne Chase.

This group exhibition presents a fresh body of work which represents different facets of
the Chase’s ecology as well as telling its story as a place of inspiration, including aspects of its human history and importance now as a National Landscape. The artists were encouraged to explore the Chase, in dialogue with field experts, to develop new work and evolve their practice.

The project is a collaboration between Dorset Visual Arts and Cranborne Chase National Landscape and is supported by Community and Culture funding from Dorset Council.

Open 10am to 4pm daily. Free admission.

Legendary magician the Great Baldini and his unruly magical menagerie explodes chaotically across the stage with this all-ages magic show.

It’s a family theatre experience, full of magic, puppetry, slapstick and clowning. It’s fast-paced, interactive, uplifting, and hilarious, leaving audiences happy, exhausted,
bewildered and amazed. Daftly brilliant… with sweets!

The Great Baldini is an award-winning member of the Magic Circle, and President of the Bristol Society of Magic. Age 3+.

“Incredible” – Front Row, BBC Radio 4

“Charming, engaging and charismatic. A pleasure.” – FringeReview

Tickets: £10 grown-ups. £7 under 16s. £28 Family (1GU+3U16s or 2GUs+2U16s).

• Latecomers welcome.
• Babies in arms (i.e under 9 months):
  • May be admitted
  • Sitting on parents/carers lap-able admitted for free
  • The venue may (at its discretion) ask that children or babies causing a disturbance to the performance be removed from the auditorium.

Legendary magician The Great Baldini (The Emperor of Illusion, The Prince of Prestidigitation, The Maharajah of Mystery) presents a cabaret of magical illusions.

From his first illusion on his twelfth birthday, to seizing control of the ILLUSIONATI (a shadowy cabal of Magicians) and culminating in his attempt at Houdini’s greatest escape, this is a joyously silly romp through magic.

Baldini is a Member of the Magic Circle and an award-winning Stage Magician. Age 7+.

“Incredible” – Front Row, BBC Radio 4

“Charming, engaging and charismatic. A pleasure.” – FringeReview

“Wonderful, a joy” – Pick of the Week, BBC Radio 4

Tickets: Adults £15. Under 18s £10.

Lise, the only daughter of Widow Simone, is in love with the young farmer Colas, but her mother has far more ambitious plans for her.

Simone hopes to marry her off to Alain, the son of the wealthy proprietor Thomas. Desperate to marry Colas rather than Alain, Lise contrives to outwit her mother’s plans.

65 years after its premiere, The Royal Ballet presents Frederick Ashton’s La Fille mal gardée. This affectionate portrayal of village life combines exuberant good humour and brilliantly inventive choreography in what is undoubtedly Ashton’s love letter to the English countryside. La Fille mal gardée whisks us away into pastoral bliss with Ferdinand Hérold’s cheerful score and Osbert Lancaster’s colourful designs.

Duration: 3h 30m (to be confirmed)

Cast:
To be confirmed.

Creatives:
Choreography FREDERICK ASHTON
Music FERDINAND HÉROLD
Conductor JONATHAN LO
Arrangement and Orchestration JOHN LANCHBERY
Scenario JEAN DAUBERVAL
Designer OSBERT LANCASTER
Lighting Designer JOHN B. READ

Tickets: £15. Members, Friends and under 18s £12.50.

Winner of numerous awards, significantly the Grand Prix at Cannes in 2024, this beautiful film shows us the loves, the hopes, the desires of three women, from three different generations, working in Mumbai Hospital.

Struggling to deal with their own personal problems, they find mutual support.

Director: Payal Kapadia

Featuring: Kani Kusruti, Divya Prabha, Chhaya Kadam

Details: India/Netherlands/France/Luxembourg/Italy | Subtitles | 2024 | 1h 58m

Tickets: £7.50. Members & Friends £6.50. U18s £5.50. Film Society members free.

See here for details of Film Society membership.

One 85-year-old man, five countries, sixteen cities, twenty-three shows, six weeks. Will he make it home… or is this the end of the road?

One of the most recognisable figures in British comedy, John Cleese’s career spans six decades – from his early days with the Cambridge Footlights to co-founding Monty Python, co-creating Fawlty Towers, and writing and starring in the Oscar-nominated A Fish Called Wanda. His unique brand of black humour has made him a global icon and intergalactic treasure.

At the age of 85, John Cleese sets off on what might be his final European tour – five countries, sixteen cities, twenty-three shows, and retaining just two original body parts. John Cleese Packs It In is a wry, behind-the-scenes portrait of a comedy legend on the road, battling various ailments, chaotic travel, and his own stubborn refusal to stop.

Spanning six weeks on the road, the film captures Cleese unfiltered and on the move – riffing on life, fame, and the absurdity of getting old in front of thousands of fans. As he reflects on a stage career that began in 1963, the question lingers: is this
the end of the road? With unique and intimate access and showing unexpected tenderness, this is a documentary about legacy, laughter, and the dignity of bowing out… however reluctantly.

Showings:

Saturday 15th November – 7.30pm

Tickets: Adult £7.50. Members & Friends £6.50. Under 18s £5.50.

A pre-Christmas exhibition of affordable contemporary artwork.

Mainly grounded in the landscapes of the South West, but also including other subject areas such as portraits, wildlife and architecture, in both figurative and abstract genres.

Open 10am to 4pm daily. Free admission.

Come and explore The Studio 90 exhibition, which showcases a diverse range of work across drawing, watercolours, oils, collages, ceramics and photography, and is designed to inspire all artistic tastes.

This exhibition offers a chance to engage with art in a relaxed and welcoming setting.

Open 10am to 4pm daily. Free admission.

Come and join The Music & Drama Group for an immersive, interactive evening of ‘Who Dunnit’, written by Myra McDadd.

Murder At The KO Corral takes place in Dead Moose Gulch, where Polecat Pete has been found dead behind a heap of horse manure! Meet the suspects, question and quiz them, find out how they knew Polecat Pete and whether they might have been the one who killed him.

Meet Sheriff P Knutt and help him and Marshall Wyatt Twerp solve the crime throughout the evening. There will be a prize for the winning team as well as a prize for ‘The Best Dressed in the West’.

There will be a 2 course meal as part of the evening. Please advise of any dietary requirements to murdermystery@shaftesburyartscentre.org.uk.

Age 18+

Tickets: £20.

Tables will seat between 6-8 people and if you would like to be seated in a party of people, we would advise that the tickets are purchased under one name through the Box Office. We would encourage people to play as a team with their entire table on the evening.

Come and join The Music & Drama Group for an immersive, interactive evening of ‘Who Dunnit’, written by Myra McDadd.

Murder At The KO Corral takes place in Dead Moose Gulch, where Polecat Pete has been found dead behind a heap of horse manure! Meet the suspects, question and quiz them, find out how they knew Polecat Pete and whether they might have been the one who killed him.

Meet Sheriff P Knutt and help him and Marshall Wyatt Twerp solve the crime throughout the evening. There will be a prize for the winning team as well as a prize for ‘The Best Dressed in the West’.

There will be a 2 course meal as part of the evening. Please advise of any dietary requirements to murdermystery@shaftesburyartscentre.org.uk.

Age 18+

Tickets: £20.

Tables will seat between 6-8 people and if you would like to be seated in a party of people, we would advise that the tickets are purchased under one name through the Box Office. We would encourage people to play as a team with their entire table on the evening.

Based on Marcelo Rubens Paiva’s 2015 memoir of the true story of the abduction of his father, Rubens Paiva, by the Brazilian military dictatorship. 

Relates the family’s struggles to find out what had happened to him and their harassment and intimidation by the dictatorship. Best foreign film Academy Awards 2025.

Director: Walter Salles

Featuring: Fernanda Torres, Selton Mello, Fernanda Montenegro

Details: Brazil | Subtitles | 2024 | 2h 18m

Tickets: £7.50. Members & Friends £6.50. U18s £5.50. Film Society members free.

See here for details of Film Society membership.

The show where every child gets a present from Santa! Following last year’s sell-out performances, Honalee Media are delighted to present a brand new show this festive season.

Christmas is the busiest time of year at the North Pole, when Father Christmas makes presents to deliver across the whole world and when everyone gets ready for Santa’s Christmas Party! But this year somebody has been up to mischief…

Dotty the Elf’s decorations have gone missing, Dasher the Reindeer’s party games are broken, and what has happened to Pompom the Penguin’s Christmas music? It looks as though somebody wants to stop Santa’s Christmas Party – and that someone is Jack Frost!

Help get Santa’s Christmas Party back on track in an adventure full of fun, festive songs and party games. Then meet Santa at his home in the North Pole, where every child will receive a special present from him, after the most Christmassy Christmas show ever – HO-HO-HO!

Songs include festive favourites like Jingle Bells, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas, The Twelve Days Of Christmas, We Wish You A Merry Christmas and more!

Santa’s Christmas Party is a 45 minute, interactive family show, particularly suitable for 2-8 year olds, after which the adventure continues as each child gets the chance to receive a special present from Father Christmas in our popular meet, greet and treat!

For more info, see www.santashows.co.uk.

Tickets: £11.50 adults, £10.50 under 18s, £42 families of 4 (2 adults and 2 under 18s).

The show where every child gets a present from Santa! Following last year’s sell-out performances, Honalee Media are delighted to present a brand new show this festive season.

Christmas is the busiest time of year at the North Pole, when Father Christmas makes presents to deliver across the whole world and when everyone gets ready for Santa’s Christmas Party! But this year somebody has been up to mischief…

Dotty the Elf’s decorations have gone missing, Dasher the Reindeer’s party games are broken, and what has happened to Pompom the Penguin’s Christmas music? It looks as though somebody wants to stop Santa’s Christmas Party – and that someone is Jack Frost!

Help get Santa’s Christmas Party back on track in an adventure full of fun, festive songs and party games. Then meet Santa at his home in the North Pole, where every child will receive a special present from him, after the most Christmassy Christmas show ever – HO-HO-HO!

Songs include festive favourites like Jingle Bells, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas, The Twelve Days Of Christmas, We Wish You A Merry Christmas and more!

Santa’s Christmas Party is a 45 minute, interactive family show, particularly suitable for 2-8 year olds, after which the adventure continues as each child gets the chance to receive a special present from Father Christmas in our popular meet, greet and treat!

For more info, see www.santashows.co.uk.

Tickets: £11.50 adults, £10.50 under 18s, £42 families of 4 (2 adults and 2 under 18s).

At one of her lavish parties, celebrated Parisian courtesan Violetta is introduced to Alfredo Germont. The two fall madly in love, and though hesitant to leave behind her life of luxury and freedom, Violetta follows her heart.

But the young couple’s happiness is short-lived, as the harsh realities of life soon come knocking.

As intimate as it is sumptuous, La traviata features some of opera’s most famous melodies, and is a star vehicle for its leading soprano role sung by Ermonela Jaho. In director Richard Eyre’s world of seductive grandeur, the tender and devastating beauty at the centre of Verdi’s opera shines bright.

Sung in Italian with subtitles | Duration: 4h (to be confirmed)

Cast:
Violetta Valéry ERMONELA JAHO
Alfredo Germont GIOVANNI SALA
Giorgio Germont ALEKSEI ISAEV
Annina VEENA AKAMA-MAKIA
Doctor Grenvil BARNABY REA
Flora Bervoix ELLEN PEARSON
Baron Douphol SAM HIRD
Gastone de Letorières GIORGI GULIASHVILI
Marquis d’Obigny OSSIAN HUSKINSON

Creatives:
Music GIUSEPPE VERDI
Conductor ANTONELLO MANACORDA
Director RICHARD EYRE
Designer BOB CROWLEY
Lighting Designer JEAN KALMAN
Director of Movement JANE GIBSON

Tickets: £15. Members, Friends and under 18s £12.50.

A panel of plucky defenders battles it out!

Four playwrights of the Baroque era – Aphra Behn, Ben Jonson, Thomas Otway and Susanne Centlivre – will be championed for the title of ‘Best’ by Diana Banham, Liz Foster, Sebastian Hayes and Catherine Simmonds. You will decide!

Tickets: £5. Under 18s free.

Picasso: A Rebel In Paris takes an unprecedented and alternative look at the
maestro of modernity.

The film focuses on the story of a young immigrant, poor but destined to become one of the most important icons of the 20th century.

The film moves continuously in and out of the Musée Picasso in Paris, which has the largest existing collection dedicated to the painter with 6,000 masterpieces and 200,000 pieces of archive material, and follows Picasso through the Parisian neighbourhoods where he lived, from the early days in ateliers with no heating to the large middle-class apartments where his success began: a physical and intellectual journey to gain a deeper understanding of his work and spirit.

Tickets: £15. Members, Friends and under 18s £12.50.

What happens when a cinema’s Lord of the Rings marathon goes terribly wrong?

At the local cinema, all hell breaks loose when the ushers misplace the DVDs of The Lord of the Rings trilogy – every single copy! With only the soundtracks left in hand, the team of hapless ushers must somehow improvise an entire three-film saga in front of a live audience.

Get ready for an uproarious evening of comedy, chaos, and utter nonsense, as they attempt to recreate the epic tale of hobbits, elves, and orcs – without any visuals, any planning, or any clue what they’re doing.

Will Frodo ever make it to Mordor? Will Aragorn get crowned king? Will Gollum stop stealing the show? Will anyone even remember who’s supposed to be who?! It’s a show that’s more fun than a barrel of hobbits, and definitely more chaotic than a Gandalf speech.

If you’ve ever wanted to see Gollum fight a battle with sound effects, or Gandalf desperately trying to remember what happens next, then you’re in for a hilarious treat!

Tickets: £20. Members, Friends and under 18s £18.

Olivier Award-winner Hiran Abeysekera (Life of Pi) is Hamlet in this fearless, contemporary take on Shakespeare’s famous tragedy.

Trapped between duty and doubt, surrounded by power and privilege, young Prince Hamlet dares to ask the ultimate question – you know the one.

National Theatre Deputy Artistic Director, Robert Hastie (Standing at the Sky’s Edge, Operation Mincemeat) directs this sharp, stylish and darkly funny reimagining.

Tickets: £15. Members, Friends and under 18s £12.50.

Princess Pamina has been captured. Her mother, the Queen of the Night, tasks the young Prince Tamino with her daughter’s rescue.

But when Tamino and his friendly sidekick, Papageno, embark on their adventure, they soon learn that when it comes to the quest for love, nothing is as it really seems. Guided by a magic flute, they encounter monsters, villains, and a mysterious brotherhood of men – but help, it turns out, comes when you least expect it.

Mozart’s fantastical opera glitters in David McVicar’s enchanting production. A star cast including Julia Bullock as Pamina, Amitai Pati as Tamino, Huw Montague Rendall as Papageno, Kathryn Lewek as the Queen of the Night, and Soloman Howard as Sarastro, led by French conductor Marie Jacquot in her Covent Garden debut.

Sung in German with subtitles | Duration: 3h 30m (to be confirmed)

Cast:
Pamina JULIA BULLOCK
Tamino AMITAI PATI
Papageno HUW MONTAGUE RENDALL
Queen of the Night KATHRYN LEWEK
Sarastro SOLOMAN HOWARD
Monostatos GERHARD SIEGEL

Creatives:
Music WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART
Conductor MARIE JACQUOT
Director DAVID MCVICAR
Designer JOHN MACFARLANE
Lighting Designer PAULE CONSTABLE
Movement Director LEAH HAUSMAN

Tickets: £15. Members, Friends and under 18s £12.50.

Following her acclaimed 2024 company debut in Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, soprano Asmik Grigorian returns to the Met as Tatiana, the lovestruck young heroine in this ardent operatic adaptation of Pushkin.

Baritone Igor Golovatenko reprises his portrayal of the urbane Onegin, who realises his affection for her all too late.

The Met’s evocative production, directed by Tony Award–winner Deborah Warner, “offers a beautifully detailed reading of … Tchaikovsky’s lyrical romance” (The Telegraph).

Sung in Russian with English subtitles | Duration: 4h 5m with two intervals (to be confirmed)

Cast:
Tatiana ASMIK GRIGORIAN
Olga MARIA BARAKOVA
Filippyevna STEPHANIE BLYTHE
Lenski STANISLAS DE BARBEYRAC
Eugene Onegin IGOR GOLOVATENKO
Prince Gremin ALEXANDER TSYMBALYUK

Creatives:
Music PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY
Conductor TIMUR ZANGIEV
Director DEBORAH WARNER
Set Designer TOM PYE
Costume Designer CHLOE OBOLENSKY
Lighting Designer JEAN KALMAN
Projection Designer IAN WILLIAM GALLOWAY and FINN ROSS
Choreographer KIM BRANDSTRUP

Tickets: £15. Members, Friends and under 18s £12.50.