TheMet Online’s guide of cultural things to do in Leeds this week (Monday 22nd – Sunday 28th October 2012).

Theatre

Lady Boys of Bangkok  continue performing their  new show ‘Carnival Queens‘ on Millennium Square. Be enticed to join the festivities by the entourage as they parade through comedy, cabaret, capers and carnival beats all under the specially erected Sabai Pavilion. Marvel at the perfect makeup, stunning costumes and fabulous choreography with added surprises.

Showing at Leeds Grand Theatre this week are three productions by Opera North. Faust; a man of middle age who has grown tired of life and yearns only for sensual pleasure and for his lost youth. The Makropulos Case; both a mystery thriller and a meditation on immortality and desire. Don Giovanni; as he seduces his way across Europe, bedding 1003 women in Spain alone, Don Giovanni’s libertinism is a challenge not only to human morality, but also to God. Dark comedy vies with tense drama, and the beauty and terror of the score are evidence of a supreme musical dramatist at the height of his powers, divinely (and perhaps diabolically) inspired.

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof continues at West Yorkshire Playhouse until Saturday 27th. Brimming with emotional intensity, family politics, greed, hypocrisy and suppressed sexuality, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof won the Pulitzer prize in 1955 and was made into a film starring Elizabeth Taylor and Paul Newman.

Furnace is the West Yorkshire Playhouse‘s ongoing programme to develop new work, where artists work with the theatre to trial and test out new projects. Friday 26th and Saturday 27th there will be the chance to see some of the works they’ve been nurturing or supporting begin to take shape. Catch works in progress, be a part of new collaborations, and be the first to catch a glimpse of new projects in development. At the end of both evenings there will be music and discussion in the Playhouse bar. So stick around, have a drink, and meet the artists.

Comedy

Monday see’s the arrival of Sean Hughes at City Varieties. This hilarious yet poignant tale is a beautiful insight into the lighter side of dying and getting older, going to places that comedy rarely goes, highlighting how ridiculous life is and how quickly it can be taken away.

Award winning comic Andy Osho (Live At The Apollo ,BBC1, Mock the Week, BBC2, Stand Up For The Week, Channel 4) takes the stage at City Varieties on Tuesday with ‘All The Single Ladies‘. Andi presents a brutally honest dissection of the perils and pitfalls of dating reporting her findings to the audience in this hilarious and heart-warming show.

Rob Rouse (star of Mad Mad Mad World (ITV1), 8 out of 10 Cats (C4), Dave’s One Night Stand (Dave), The Comedy Store (Comedy Central) & Spoons (C4)) will also be performing at the Varieties this week on Wednesday with ‘Life Sentences’. Honest, frank, seriously funny stand-up. A father for the second time, to a baby girl, Rob is now a radical feminist – but this is not a show about men vs women, more humanity vs insanity.

Film

On The Road (15)

Starring Garrett Hedlund, Kristen Stewart, Sam Riley and Viggo Mortensen, Directed by Walter Salles

Plot: Just after his father’s death, Sal Paradise, an aspiring New York writer, meets Dean Moriarty, a devastatingly charming ex-con, married to the very liberated and seductive Marylou. Sal and Dean bond instantly. Determined not to get locked in to a constricted life, the two friends cut their ties and take to the road with Marylou. Thirsting for freedom, the three young people head off in search of the world, of other encounters, and of themselves.

Showing at: Hyde Park Picture House

Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel (PG)

Documentary starring Diana Vreeland, Directed byLisa Immordino Vreeland, Bent-Jorgen Perlmut, Frédéric Tcheng

Plot: Vogue’s Anna ‘Nuclear’ Wintour may have inspired ‘The Devil Wears Prada’, but before her there was Diana Vreeland, the witty, imperious and supremely well-connected editrix of Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar, and head of costume collection at New York’s Metropolitan Museum. Author Lisa Immordino Vreeland clearly felt that her grandmother-in-law deserved a movie memoir to complement her 2011 biography, and the result is a riveting patchwork of interviews with many of the fashion glitterati of her era, including the designers Calvin Klein and Hubert de Givenchy, the photographers David Bailey and Richard Avedon, and the models Twiggy, Penelope Tree and Veruschka. Equally entertaining are the views of her former staff, including a young Ali McGraw, and the overall impression is of a woman well aware of her own keen eye and great influence, and unafraid to use them.

Showing at: Hyde Park Picture House

Also this week…

Hyde Park Picture House is hosting a free open day on Sunday from 12:30pm, to give visitors the chance to look around outside of normal screening hours. Guided tours of the projection room, self-guided tours of the auditorium, an exhibition of poster art and rolling screenings of three short films are all on offer and are free to all. Leeds-based Box-head Media will screen three films on the theme of ‘independent Leeds’ one of which is about the Picture House itself.  The shorts will be on a loop throughout the event giving everyone the chance to enjoy them. The gas lighting will be raised slightly and an exhibition of posters designed by local artists and commissioned by the Picture House will hang in the auditorium.

Also of interest

Kirkstall Abbey Deli Market is a monthly event running until November, set in the picturesque 12th century ruins of Kirkstall Abbey.  Have the chance to buy good quality food and local goods, from local and northern producers and suppliers at one of Leeds’ most beautiful outdoor venues. The market runs from 11am – 3pm on Saturday.