Bobbing for Apples (Stage, 2019) Mature

Four tasty tales of love and revenge laced with dark humour and unpleasantness. If you like your theatre funny, unsettling, and a tad absurd, then this is for you. If you don’t, then God bless you.

Bobbing for Apples

Maria wants a new lover and she’ll try anything to find one – even bobbing for apples in a dark forest close to midnight. But as her friend George looks on and the veil between worlds parts, the urge to find your soul mate is revealed as something altogether more sinister.

The Barmbrack Curse

It’s a harmless Irish tradition, the 'barmbrack cake'. What you find in it determines your future. So when Tom gets a red thread in his slice he knows it’s a bad omen. Something really bad is going to happen to him. He knows. He just knows. Because he deserves it.

Soul Cakes

As far back as she can remember Emma has sung for the souls of the dead. Now she just wants to have fun. That’s why she is wearing a lovely stolen dress. That’s why she is in her lover’s flat. That’s why she wants to kiss him. But sometimes you really do have to be careful what you wish for. 

Cheesy Twist

It’s not quite a Halloween party but the guests seem dressed for it. Apart from Rose and Andy. As they wait for Dave to arrive they admire the hostess' desire to move on from her failed relationship. Penelope is right - it’s time to let bygones be bygones. It’s time to forgive and forget. It’s time for a cheesy twist. 

This evening contains strong language and nibbles.

The players:

• Lisa Stapleton has been acting since leaving school about 100 years ago. She's has performed in a variety of roles from Viola in 'Twelfth Night' to Sybil Fawlty in 'Fawlty Towers' and most recently, Amanda in 'Private Lives'.
• Josie Lauren Ellis
• Callum Lloyd https://www.mandy.com/uk/a/callum-lloyd
• Amy Baker
• Jim Coupland: Spotlight Pin: 3414-5616-5553

A bit about bobbing:

British author WH Davenport Adams saw connections between a popular belief in the divination power of apples and what he called 'old Celtic fairy lore'. He described the bobbing game as it existed around the turn of the 20th century in his 1902 book 'Curiosities of Superstition':

'[The apples] are thrown into a tub of water, and you endeavour to catch one in your mouth as they bob round and round in provoking fashion. When you have caught one, you peel it carefully, and pass the long strip of peel thrice, sunwise, round your head; after which you throw it over your shoulder, and it falls to the ground in the shape of the initial letter of your true love's name.'

Other divination games traditionally played on Halloween in Great Britain included 'snap apple' — similar to bobbing for apples except the fruit is hung from a string.