This week's big theatrical news emerged from the unlikely centre of Bridlington, East Yorkshire. Beached, a new community opera featuring 280 schoolchildren, will after all open there next week, having been cancelled last Friday after the school and local authority objected to some of its references to homosexuality. Writing in Monday’s Guardian, the show’s librettist Lee Hall explained his refusal to tone down a gay character’s “straightforward defence of his sexuality.” Following outrage over Twitter and on Facebook, yesterday Opera North announced that a compromise had been reached – Hall will replace the word ‘queer’ for ‘gay’ – and the show would go ahead as planned Photograph: Felix Clay
Legendary French ballet dancer Sylvie Guillem took to the London stage this week, appearing in two new contemporary dance pieces – and one slightly older one – at Sadler’s Wells. The 46-year-old might have hung up her pointes, but critics were wowed, with the Guardian’s Judith Mackrell describing her as “one of the most astonishing dancers on stage today.” After an international tour, the show returns to Sadler’s in the autumn
Photograph: Lesley Leslie-Spinks
The songs are unlikely to recall either good times or better times, but British band Chumbawamba, best known for their 1997 Number 2 Tubthumping, will star alongside comedian Phil Jupitus in a new musical called Big Society: A Music Hall Comedy. Telling the story of an Edwardian music hall under pressure from the Ministry of Taste, Big Society marks the third collaboration between lead guitarist Boff Whalley and Red Ladder Theater Company. It is set to premiere at the City Varieties Music Hall in Leeds in January Photograph: Ollie Millington / Redferns
Julie Walters will return to London's National Theatre for the first time in over a decade. The Harry Potter and Billy Elliot star will lead Stephen Beresford’s new play The Last of the Haussmans next summer in a role written specifically for her. Her last appearance at the National won her the Best Actress Olivier for her performance as Kate Keller in Howard Davies's revival of All My Sons Photograph: Richard Saker
Meanwhile, at the National, it's been a long week for the cast of One Man, Two Guvnors. The company had their knuckles rapped by director Nicholas Hytner, who ordered his actors to tone down their ad-libbing. If that wasn’t enough, after last Saturday’s show James Corden tweeted that he 'may have snapped a cartilage in my knee.' Nonetheless, he was back onstage the next day, albeit with the offending joint 'strapped within an inch of its life' Photograph: Tristram Kenton
Madani Younis has been announced as the new artistic director of the Bush theatre in London, four months after Josie Rourke’s switch to the Donmar Warehouse was revealed. Younis, who has been artistic director of Freedom Studios in Bradford, will take over the theatre’s new home in Shepherds Bush library in the new year. In a Q&A he named Chicken Soup with Barley, Blasted and Edward Bond’s Lear among the sort of plays he gets on with Photograph: PR
Anyone know the Mandarin for Dancing Queen? We'll soon find out, with an adaptation of Mamma Mia! set to open in Shanghai on Sunday. The Abba musical, conceived by producer Judy Craymer, can now be watched in 15 different languages, including Portuguese, Indonesian and Danish. Since its West End premiere 12 years ago – seen above in a 2009 incarnation – more than 42 million have seen the musical Photograph: Tristram Kenton
