Theatre on tour around Warwickshire

The sound of a bomb exploding startled several visitors to the Compton Verney art gallery on Sunday - especially as it closely followed the whine of an air raid siren.

But there was no need to take cover. The sound effects were simply the start of Coventry’s Belgrade Theatre Unplugged series of rehearsed readings which are on the road this week,

Actors due to appear in four of the autumn season’s productions offered a flavour of the plays to come, including One Night in November, the Coventry Blitz play which is back by popular demand and includes several highly realistic sound effects.

Did Winston Church really know Coventry city centre was going to be almost obliterated in 1940 but feared he give too much away by offering a warning? Well, the boffin boyfriend of one character certainly has a view on that

Directed by the Belgrade’s artistic director, Hamish Glen, the play runs from September 28 to October 19 and is such a powerfil piece I’m tempted to go and see yet again.

New for this year is The Prodigals, a musical which runs for two weeks from August 30 and follows the fortunes of two brothers, one a soldier fighting to destroy the poppy fields in Afghanistan, the other fuelling his pop band’s gigs with heroin.

The extract I saw with young actor Barrett Robertson and his military father, played by Michael Bott, looked intriguing.

And Michael Bott also appears in the title role of the third offering, Charlie Peace: His Amazing Life and Astounding Legend, which looks absolutely riveting.

This play is based on the real-life story of Victorian criminal and master-of-disguise Charlie Peace. Again there is music as we meet the villain who can steal pearls from the neck of a sleeping maiden – who may awake to find him irrestibly attractive – not least when he turns out to be not only a thief, but also an accomplished musician. Directed again by Hamish, this modern musical melodrama can be seen from October 26 to November 16.

Finally there’s The Alchemist, Ben Jonson’s satire which the Belgrade is producing in partnership with the Riding Lights Theatre Company next February.

Paul Burbridge directs this wordy tale - which is not for the theatrically faint-hearted, as you really have to concentrate on the comedy text. Two conmen take over a house – miraculously relocated into Coventry city centre – to wreak havoc on their gullible, vain and feeble-minded visitors.

The last extracts of the Belgrade Unplugged series are on Saturday at 1pm at Draycote Water visitors’ centre or at 6pm at the medieval Charterhouse off London Road, Coventry.

The plays are also on at the Butchers Arms restaurant, Priors Hardwick, on June 12, at Rugby School’s Lewis Art Gallery on June 13 and a free performance at Foleshill Road’s Edgewick Play Centre, Coventry, at 1pm on June 14.

For more details visit www.belgrade.co.uk/unplugged or call the Belgrade box office on 024 7655 3055.