Christmas play with a difference comes to St Collen’s

* St Collen's Church. 

A maverick vicar who approaches large companies to sponsor the nativity play at the church school, gets more than he bargained for. 

A leading children’s clothing store asks him to create two Jesuses, a baby and a toddler variety, so that they can show case their whole range.

A large car salesroom also responds positively on condition that he gives the Holy Family a car.

These are just two of the problems faced by Vicar Joe in Peter Read’s fictitious comedy, The No No Nativity, which will be performed at St Collens Church Llangollen tomorrow (Friday) and Saturday. The play is a double hander between Vicar Joe (Dave Edgar) and the school governor Marjorie Pritchard (Paula Sutton).

It was first performed at the Grand Theatre Swansea in 2010 and has been reprised by The Grown In Wales Theatre Company in a mini tour throughout North Wales.

The two final performances will be at St Collen’s this weekend.

In the play, a school choir sings two Christmas songs and they will be performed by Gwernant Primary School on Friday and Ysgol Bryn Collen on Saturday.

Peter Read is a Wrexham-born playwright who has won awards for his work, including five-star reviews at the Edinburgh Fringe for his plays about Dylan Thomas.

He also wrote and directed the play about the Ladies of Llangollen performed at Plas Newydd this summer after being previewed at the Eisteddfod.

Grown in Wales present The No No Nativity is at St Collen’s Church Llangollen on Friday December 18 and Saturday 19 at 7pm. Tickets are £6 and £5 concessions. For advance tickets, call 01978 861768 or pay on the door.

Councillor's concern over Llan buses

One of the area’s county councillors has asked that issues related to the operation of some buses in Llangollen should be referred to a watchdog body.

Cllr Stuart Davies (pictured) said: “I am really concerned about the issues that are arising from GHA buses.

“I arranged for the operator to come to Llangollen last week to meet with passengers to discuss their issues and the attendance was very high.

“We were assured that the issues were being addressed but they seem to be on-going.

“Denbighshire County Council unfortunately no longer has control of bus companies and routes but can only point people to the Traffic Commissioners.

“I am asking our officers to put these concerns to the Traffic Commissioners and to ask that they be dealt with in a strong and forthright way.”

Llanblogger has asked GHA for a comment.

County's Christmas bin collections

Denbighshire households are being reminded of the Christmas bin collection times.

 

Refuse and recycling collection days over the festive period will remain the same unless the collection day is expected on  Christmas Day or New Year’s Day.

 

In these case the collections move to Saturday 26^th December and Saturday, 2^nd January the week after.

 

After Christmas, householders who pay for the garden waste collection service can dispose of Christmas trees in their green bins or sacks, but they may need some chopping up.

 

The three staffed recycling parks at Denbigh, Rhyl and Ruthin will all be accepting Christmas trees for recycling. Sites are open every day except Christmas day, Boxing Day and New Year’s Day.

 

Residents in the Corwen and Llangollen areas will be able to take trees to the Saturday morning recycling service at the Highways Depot at Corwen (16^th January) and the Pavilion, Llangollen (9^th January).

 

All residents were sent a new collection calendar in November and information will be available on Denbighshire County Council’s website.

 

 

Tae Kwon-Do club's fistful of medals in top competition

* Llangollen's medal winners Harry Milne (6), Dylan Milne (14),

Lauren Milne (11) Charlotte Milne (10) and Caitlin McCourt (10).

Llangollen Tae Kwon-do Club came away with a fistful of honours from the British Taekwondo Championships in Derby.

 

Five students from the club, formed earlier this year at Llangollen Leisure Centre, won eight medals between them in the competition which is the biggest in the sport's calendar and this year attracted over 1,300 competitors and instructors from across the country including many world champions. 

 

Six-year-old Harry Milne was Llangollen's first medal winner, taking a bronze in individual yellow and green belt sparring and later adding another bronze in the team sparring event.
 

Lauren Milne (11) competing in the blue belt lightweight division won gold in individual sparring to become a British Tae Kwon-Do champion.

 

She then joined Caitlin McCourt (10) who was competing for the first time, in the team sparring event and added two more bronze medals to the Llangollen clubs tally.
 

Charlotte Milne (10) claimed a further bronze for Llangollen in her own blue belt team category. 

Finally, Dylan Milne (14) finished off an excellent year of competitions in which he had previously won many regional competitions, become Welsh and Scottish champion and also won three world titles in Italy in July.

 

He continued his winning streak by topping a very tough junior blackbelt heavyweight division to become British champion and then later added another gold medal in team sparring to take the total to eight medals from the group of five competitors who had been entered into the competition by Llangollen Tae Kwon-Do club instructor Roddie Milne.
 

The club classes are held in Llangollen Leisure Centre on Mondays 6-7pm (mixed) on Wednesdays 5-6pm for juniors and 7-8pm (mixed) and tigers classes for early years aged 3-5 in the community hall Fridays 4-4.45pm.
 

* If you are interested in any of the classes you can call Mr Milne on 07756 286203,
 or email llangollentkd@yahoo.com

County bosses aim to spend more on schools

Following a meeting yesterday to consider the latest proposals to deliver a balanced budget for 2016/17,  Denbighshire County Council's political group leaders will be making a recommendation to the full council  in January to invest more money than planned in schools next year.

 

As a consequence of the better than expected revenue settlement from Welsh Government the council aims to provide additional funding of £853k directly to schools and says it will deliver the required national level of financial protection to school budgets.  

 

The council will also be continuing to invest in Welsh Government major capital improvement programme for schools with planned expenditure  of over £50m in the next three years, it says. 

Santa's quiz back at the Ponsonby

Alex Reid leads knockout cast in Stiwt panto

* The cast of Aladdin at The Stiwt.

Judging by their reaction as the final curtain fell, what quite a few ladies who watched the panto at the Stiwt in Rhos yesterday (Sunday) afternoon want for Christmas this year is … Alex Reid.

The cage fighter and former husband of Katy Price is starring in Aladdin at the famous old theatre just up the road and delivering the knockout punch to many female members of the audience in his role as the Genie of the Lamp.

As far as Alex is concerned it’s six-pack appeal all the way.

But aside from the obvious abs the lad can actually act and sing a bit too.

Backing him up every step of the way through Old Peking is a highly talented cast which also includes Sean Smith in the title role whose main claim to fame is that he finished third in the fourth series of The X Factor a few years back.

That means he has a powerful singing voice which helps provide loads of the musical momentum to the production.

He’s also no slouch when it comes to the honed torso himself, which was of significance to the ladies if not the hordes of kids who formed the main body of the highly appreciative packed house.

Carol Mourant, also something of a panto veteran, plays Princess Jasmin with suitable finesse and a sweet singing voice.

A little lady with a particularly big voice is Lucy Edge who was the perfect Slave of the Ring and Tom Morgan completely won over the kids with his neat blend of comedy and pathos as Wishee Washee, Aladdin’s less smart brother.

No panto line-up would be complete with a nasty villain, and this one was lucky enough to have the sneering services of Cooper Randle as Abanazer at its disposal.

The show is fast-paced and colourful and, most importantly, is a barrel of laughs from start to finish.

The whole delicious pre-Christmas treat is put together with real style by Michael Jenkins, who apart from directing the show also dons the dreadful frocks and bad wigs of Aladdin’s mum, Widow Twankey, and drives things forward from the front.

And as if all that isn’t enough he’s back on stage with Wishee Washee just before the end with two cute kids to lead a bit of community singing.

What more could you want from a panto?

* Aladdin runs at The Stiwt until December 30. For details see, www.stiwt.com. Box office: 01978 841300.