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Next Play 
22-27 JUNE 2026 Book Tickets
Playhouse Creatures
by April De Angelis
The year is 1669, a bawdy and troublesome time. Theatres have just reopened after seventeen years of Puritan suppression. There is a huge surge in dramatic writing and the first English actresses appear on stage!
Playhouse Creatures focuses on five of these women - Nell Gwyn, Elizabeth Farley, Rebecca Marshall, Doll Common and Mary Betterton - to provide a moving and often comic account of the precarious lives of these pioneering actresses.
An incredible ensemble piece with 5 powerhouse female roles!
“With deliciously absurd extracts from the heroic repertory and frantic dressing-room scenes, the prevailing tone is comic but you are not allowed to forget the gutter waiting to reclaim these glittering figures." - Independent on Sunday
Next Jazz 
5 JUNE 2026 Book Tickets
Derek Nash with the PJC Quartet
- Derek Nash saxophones
- Terry Hutchins guitar
- Jim Pollard piano
- Stuart Barker bass
- Brian Greene drums
British Jazz Award-winning Derek Nash – bandleader, composer, arranger, record producer and engineer – is one of the UK’s busiest jazz musicians. He is leader of six bands, each with its own unique sound and featuring some of the top jazz musicians in the UK today.
Since 2004 Derek has been a full-time member of the Jools Holland Rhythm & Blues Orchestra of which he is Musical Director and Principal Saxophonist and he is also a member of the Ronnie Scott’s Blues Explosion. With these bands, he has enjoyed sharing the stage with many great UK and international artists. He is one of the most in-demand and respected guest instrumentalists for jazz clubs across the UK and has received numerous nominations in the British Jazz Awards.
Derek is supported at this gig by the PJC Quartet. This is the terrific house band of Pangbourne Jazz Club which was co-founded in 2016 by the present guitarist Terry Hutchins and the original bassist: the late Keith Howard. Apart from Terry the rest of the quartet is Jim Pollard on piano, Stuart Barker on bass and drummer Brian Greene who co-hosts the club with Terry Hutchins.
Derek is the ultimate showman and entertainer quite apart from being an incredibly talented musician who regularly brings along and plays between five and seven saxophones of various types and we are truly delighted to be bringing Derek and this great supporting quartet to Progress Theatre in Reading.
Our Open Air Production
15-25 JULY 2026 Book Tickets
HAMLET
by William Shakespeare
Progress brings a fresh and fast-paced interpretation of Shakespeare’s greatest play, Hamlet in the atmosperic setting of Reading Abbey Ruins.
Aged just 20, Prince Hamlet is clever and funny, yet tormented. His father has died in suspicious circumstances, his widowed mother has remarried his uncle, who has seized the Danish throne, and the woman he loves, Ophelia, is heading towards a tragedy of her own. Their two families are bound together in a relentless descent from which no one will escape unscathed. It's a world of spies, lies, and pretences. Dark humour intermingles with grief, betrayal, and madness, culminating in a conclusion as devastating as any in theatre.
Next Art Exhibition
Available for viewing during events throughout May 2026
Douglas Watson: Unity out of fragmentation
Douglas Watson works in oils for their brilliance and subtleties of colour. He is interested in the effect of colour on feeling and emotion, and for him the close correspondence between music (especially jazz and classical) and his painting, which he sees rather like musical compositions. A general theme is finding unity out of fragmentation.
For most of Douglas' career he has been engaged with making and painting ceramic tiles for his business, The Douglas Watson Studio in Henley-on-Thames, while also finding time to paint and draw.
Douglas has his my own gallery in Henley-on-Thames where his work is permanently on show. He is a member of the Henley Arts and Crafts Guild with which he regularly exhibits. He has also taken part in Oxford Art Weeks, the Henley Art Trail, and in a group show in New York in 2014.
[email protected]
www.douglaswatsonart.com
@douglaswatsonart
07720 510187