Ellen Cheshire

Nestled innocently within my main bucket list are four entries that could each stand as their own separate quests. Since they all share a similar goal - exploring the UK and Ireland through their cinematic venues - I’ve combined them here for convenience. These are: visiting the other six cinemas in the small chain that my local Bognor Picturedrome belongs to; ticking off all independent cinemas in Sussex; seeing films or concerts at venues with cinema organs (from the Cinem

I first drew this up in January 2022, as the world was emerging from the long shadow of lockdowns. I realised how easy it is to take experiences for granted, and I didn’t want to keep putting things off “for another time.” So, I began a bucket list - part wish list, part reminder - and since then I’ve been adding to it and crossing things off as I go. It’s a mix of theatre, film, concerts, museums, places and the occasional wild card. Some items are big dreams, others are mor

When I decided to spend June (and a bit of July) exploring the films of Gene Tierney, I knew I was revisiting one of Hollywood’s most fascinating screen presences. Tierney’s career is often defined by a handful of iconic roles: the haunting mystery of Laura, the obsessive darkness of Leave Her to Heaven, the romantic melancholy of The Ghost and Mrs Muir. But between those celebrated performances lies a much wider and more varied career: Westerns, wartime adventures, romantic

Two theatre visits have been ticked off my bucket list over the past few weeks, and they sit neatly alongside each other, even if they come from very different theatrical worlds: Grace Pervades by David Hare at the Theatre Royal Haymarket (27 June 2026), and Grayson, a new musical about Grayson Perry, seen in a work-in-progress presentation at Soho Theatre Walthamstow (18 July 2026). The coincidence is almost comically neat: both share the initials GP, but they also form an u

Looking back over the past few years, I have set myself annual challenges that combine theatre and film in ways that push me to see work I might not ordinarily seek out. In 2024 I undertook a project revisiting all the productions I had seen at the theatre and cinema in 1984. In 2025 I focused on filling in gaps in my Sondheim knowledge, watching musicals live and exploring his top forty films. Both years encouraged me to view familiar works differently, to take risks and to

Over the years, I’ve occasionally ventured into the world of theatre reviews, but a covert assignment with The Spy in the Stalls reignited my passion for this undercover craft. Since then, I’ve been regularly donning my disguise and stepping into the shadows, where every review is a stealth mission—uncovering the brilliance (or the flaws) hidden within each performance. This page serves as my secret dossier: a direct link to the operations I’ve carried out in the name of thea

June's A Year in Gothic live theatrical performance around which the the month's films and fiction spun, was Beetlejuice: The Musical which reframes death not as solemn inevitability but as meta-theatrical spectacle shaped by grief, family and disruption. At the Prince Edward Theatre, Beetlejuice establishes its tone immediately through its opening number “Being Dead”, which playfully undercuts mortality itself. Everyone dies, it suggests, regardless of effort, discipline or

Very excited to share that my essay, Beyond the Blonde, has been published in Encounters with Marilyn Monroe: Celebrating 100 Years. A hundred years after her birth, Marilyn Monroe remains an obsession: endlessly reproduced, discussed, mythologised, rediscovered and reinterpreted. Few screen stars have lingered in the cultural imagination quite like Marilyn, who continues to exist simultaneously as Hollywood legend, fashion icon, tragic figure, comic genius and symbol of mode

If April explored the vampire as a figure of psychological instability and shifting identity, May returned to Dracula in a more recognisable form. Yet even within adaptations that remained closer to Bram Stoker's novel, the Gothic continued to reveal its capacity for reinvention. Across ballet, film and fiction, I found myself less interested in Dracula himself than in the different ways artists chose to reshape his world and those who inhabit it. May's central production was

Seeing Northern Ballet's production of Gentleman Jack at Sadler's Wells Theatre and visiting Queer Britain, the National LGBTQ+ Museum both went onto the bucket list the moment I heard about them. With the ballet only having a limited run at Sadler’s Wells, I took a day off work and nipped up to London for the Thursday matinee. The two felt like an obvious pairing: matinee in Angel, then a bus down to King’s Cross afterwards. Thematically and geographically connected. The onl

Rewatched The Truman Show (1998, Peter Weir) after hearing the Blank Check boys talking about it. A film I already know and love, but always worth revisiting. Watched it over a couple of mornings. Then, in a slightly accidental double-bill situation, on the eve of the first day I went to Chichester Cinema at New Park for a screening of The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser (1974, Werner Herzog), which I went into knowing basically nothing about. Immediately struck by how similar they a

Oh, Vienna The music is weaving Haunting notes, pizzicato strings, the rhythm is calling This means [far from] nothing to me Without a fixed itinerary between the two Eurovision shows (read more here on why I was in Vienna) I decided simply to wander. Occasionally, when my feet objected, I jumped on a tram, which glide through the city with a calm efficiency that somehow feels entirely in keeping with the architecture around them. And what architecture. For a bit of fun I hav

On the bucket list: attending the Eurovision Song Contest 2026 live. I didn't make it to the Grand Final, but in some ways what I did do turned out to be something even more fascinating: the afternoon dress rehearsals for the first and second semi-finals in Vienna in May 2026. Enough of the atmosphere and spectacle to feel part of the event, but also enough distance to see how the whole extraordinary machine actually works. Opening video package from the first Semi Final And

World Premiere of David Haig's new play, Magic, at Chichester Festival Theatre, Directed by Lucy Bailey. David Haig as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Hadley Fraser as Houdini David Haig’s Magic brings together two towering figures of early 20th-century imagination and belief, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini, in a story shaped by illusion, grief and competing ideals. Set in a world still enthralled by spiritualism and spectacle, the play traces their unlikely friendship a

Here’s the 26th batch of #52FilmsByWomen watched since taking the pledge in 2016. This set of 52 films (1302–1353), watched between February and May 2026, continues the project’s ongoing exploration of women’s filmmaking across decades, genres, and formats. It includes 20 feature films, 1 full-length documentary, 1 event cinema screening, 21 shorts and 9 television entries, ranging from early experimental animation and classic rewatch favourites to recent releases and long-fo

In March, I was drawn to the body as a site of pressure, something shaped, disciplined and ultimately consumed by performance. In April, that focus shifted. The body remained central, but now as something more unstable, a threshold rather than a vessel. The Gothic moved outward into blood, desire and transformation. April’s theme, Vampires: Desire, Identity and Transformation (Part I), was shaped by a new stage reimagining of Dracula at the Noël Coward Theatre, adapted by Mor

With Mark Jenkin’s Rose of Nevada in cinemas now, let’s take a quick voyage through boats, time slips and strange currents where nothing quite behaves as it should. There’s something about boats and time travel that just works. Maybe it’s the isolation, the sense of being cut off from the world or the way the sea itself feels timeless, vast, unknowable and slightly threatening. Whatever it is, films that trap characters on the water and bend time around them tend to linger lo

Alongside my freelance writing about theatre, film and literature, my role as Fundraising and Development Manager at Chichester Cathedral gives me the chance to tell stories that are just as rich in history and creativity. Whether it’s celebrating the music that fills the Cathedral’s spaces or sharing the craft and care behind preserving its heritage, my work is about connecting people to the heart of this extraordinary place - and showing why we need support to keep its musi

Shakespeare's Birthday on 23 April has become my annual excuse to dip into Shakespeare, but this year I went slightly off piste. Instead of the “big” plays in their usual form, I opted for a triple bill of films that do something far more interesting: they hand the story to the people usually stuck at the edges. Three films, three very different tones, but all circling the same idea, what happens when Shakespeare’s minor or marginalised characters finally get their say? I sta

What I’ve so liked about my bucket list is that many of the items are achievable if I put my mind to it, rather than continually returning to favourite places. It was a day about heading further afield once again, incorporating the new while reflecting on how places shift, evolve over time and, comfortingly, sometimes stay the same. I began on the 123 bus towards Ilford, a route that once felt routine from North London round to the east, a regular journey in the 1970s and 80s