Coliseum in running for six stage awards

Steven Arnold and Jonny Dixon in Hard Graft’s Thick as Thieves.

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. . . and Hard Graft pays off for pram shop production

Oldham theatre productions have been nominated for seven trophies in this year’s Manchester Theatre Awards.

This year shows at Oldham Coliseum have been joined by locally-based Hard Graft Theatre Company, which performed in an empty pram shop opposite the Mumps Metrolink car park!

The Coliseum is nominated in six categories: best actress in a visiting production, best production, best design, best newcomer, best new play and best ensemble, while Hard Graft’s “Thick as Thieves” is nominated for best fringe production.

Visiting show “An August Bank Holiday Lark”, written by award-winning Deborah McAndrew for Northern Broadsides, is nominated in two categories — best actress in a visiting production (Emily Butterfield) and best new play.

The Coliseum’s revival of “Close the Coalhouse Door” is nominated for best production, while the show also brings a nod for Maeve O’Sullivan as best newcomer, and the entire cast for the best ensemble award.

The high-tech set of the theatre’s “The Life and Times of Mitchell and Kenyon” is nominated for best design.

Hard Graft is run by Springhead man Mark Whiteley, who wrote “Thick as Thieves” — about two inept burglars — which starred former Corrie actors Stephen Arnold and Jonny Dixon.

This year’s awards — for which public tickets are available — have been chosen by a panel of top Manchester reviewers and will be hosted by top comedian Justin Moorhouse at Manchester’s newly-refurbished Royal Northern College of Music on Friday, March 13.