A gameshow unlike any other is set to take local actors to the world stage. The Wharf Theatre is proud to present the debut of a brand-new show, “Whose Play is it Anyway?”
Set to enjoy a week-long run at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2026 from August 17th to the 22nd, this innovative original production offers a fresh perspective on contemporary storytelling, using a gameshow format to explore a range of devised, scripted and improvised pieces, many created by the talented cast themselves. As part of the game, each performance order will be left to chance, creating a unique experience every time.
Join your host, Barry Ruffles and his glamorous assistant, Jenny Flannel as they present 18 pieces of theatre in 50 minutes; all you have to do is guess the genre, playwright or year to win a speedboat, cuddly toy or a holiday for two on the Isle of Fernando!
Prior to the Fringe, the show will preview at the Wharf Theatre, Devizes, running from 29th to the 30th May, Bristol’s Alma Tavern and the Shaftesbury Art Centre; giving West Country audiences an opportunity to experience the production ahead of its official festival run.
Whether you’re a seasoned Fringe attendee or a first-time visitor, Whose Play Is It Anyway promises to entertain. The show will be performed at the SpaceUK, located at the heart of Edinburgh’s bustling festival district. Tickets are available from [Ticket Provider] and can be purchased online or at the venue box office.
Lou Cox, director of The Wharf Acting Company, who perform & devised this show, is also taking her solo show, Having a Baby and The Sh!t They Don’t Tell You in Books, for a week at the Edinburgh Fringe. Inspired by the loss of her baby girl, Lou described the play as a “comedic and brutally honest one-woman show which gifts audiences an emotional, and at times highly entertaining, whirlwind of witty anecdotes and graphic storytelling, with an ending no mother could ever imagine.” And this one too will be performed at The Wharf Theatre, also running from 29th to the 30th May, of which the previous run was reviewed by Helen, HERE.
Popular award-winning artisan chocolate business Hollychocs has announced that its Beanery Café will close on Saturday 23rd August, marking exactly two years since its opening in Poulshot, near Devizes….
Founded by award-winning chocolatier Holly Garner, Hollychocs has become a much-loved fixture in the local community, known not just for its handcrafted chocolates but for creating a warm, welcoming space for chocolate lovers to connect, indulge and experience the very best chocolate in the Southwest.
“This decision hasn’t come lightly,” said Holly. “Sam and I have poured so much into the café—working long days, championing other small businesses and suppliers and welcoming thousands of people through our doors. The support from our community has meant everything.”
The closure comes amidst rising costs that have impacted many small businesses across the country. “We’ve tried everything—from constantly creating new menu offerings, to introducing special offers,” Holly added. “In the end, the increased labour costs paired with price increases across the board, have made it time to focus our energy on a future that’s sustainable for us, our chocolate, and the people behind it.”
Yet this opens a new chapter for Hollychocs. Although the café will no longer offer drop-in visits, Hollychocs will continue to host a wide range of bookable chocolate experiences from their studio just outside Devizes. These include guided tastings, chocolate-making workshops, and sit-down afternoon teas—already popular with locals and visitors alike.
Hollychocs’ full product range will also remain available for UK-wide delivery and click & collect. She’s just released a Hollychocs version of the viral sensation Dubai Bar and has plans to increase her postbox-friendly chocolate gifts which are an increasingly popular way of sending a thoughtful gift.
They will also be focusing more on Corporate Gifting and Wholesale opportunities both locally and nationally.
“We’re not going anywhere,” Holly assured. “We’re simply shifting focus—putting our efforts into the parts of the business we know can sustain us in the long term.”
The final day of trading at the Beanery Café will take place on Saturday 23rd August, and the team welcomes the community to pop in for one last drink or treat.
“We’d love to see some familiar faces before we close the doors,” said Holly. “We’re so proud of what we’ve built—and incredibly grateful to everyone in Wiltshire who’s supported us on this journey.”
Devizine wishes Holly and the team all the best with progressing this delicious brand. It’s a shame to hear about The Beanery but I believe they’ve made the sensible decision.
It seems Shrove Tuesday celebrations in Devizes have fallen as flat as a….well, you get the gag… Traditionally organised by Age Concern Wiltshire, and often…
The mighty mighty Minety Music Festival announced The Bluetones as their Sunday headliner at their Eames Laurie Main Stage, and The Dub Pistols on the…
The celebrated Shindig Festival at Malmesbury’s Charton Park announced their headline act for May bank holiday 2026, and being that it’s Bob Vylan, it is…
Wiltshire residents are being asked to donate their old Laptops, PCs & Mobile phones in the new year, as part of the 3rd annual Donate Your Digital Day…..
Taking place just after Christmas on Friday, January 10th, 2025, Donate Your Digital Day was created by Wiltshire Digital Drive (WDD) to encourage people to donate any tech they had replaced over the festive period such as laptops and tablets, to reduce the amount of technology that goes to landfill and to address digital poverty in the county.
Once donated, devices will be refurbished and handed back out to schools, organisations, and charities, to help people access the benefits that technology affords such as education, employment and better wellbeing.
Natalie Luckham, Chief Executive at Wiltshire Digital Drive, said: “We had such a positive response to previous Donate Your Digital Days. In 2022 we received 1,000 donated devices in just one day! We had a break last year but we’re back for 2025. So many people receive new laptops and tablets for Christmas, or treat themselves in the Black Friday or Boxing Day sales, now is the perfect time to let us have your old tech. By giving it to us, not only will the device help another member of our community, but it will also stop it going to landfill.”
“The figures speak for themselves. Since we began our mission in 2020, we’ve given more than 3,500 school children, families and organisations a laptop or computer. Imagine how many more we could help if we all worked together. And it’s not just members of the public that can get involved; we’re also asking businesses who are looking at upgrading their IT to consider donating their old tech to us.”
Local businesses across Wiltshire will be opening their doors to become drop off points for the donated items. They can be taken to:
Naturally Social, Melksham Aster Housing, Devizes Ford Dealership, Trowbridge Hearing & Mobility Store, Marlborough/ Swindon/ Wroughton Household Waste & Recycling Centre, Swindon Castle Sundborn, Malmesbury Godolphin School, Salisbury Retro Relics Games Café, Market Lavington The Mind Tree Café, Rowde Town Councils in Bradford On Avon, Tidworth and Calne The Home Guard Club, Warminster
Anyone wishing to help who doesn’t have a device to give can donate to the non-profit’s Gift of Tech Crowdfunder page. A £45 donation will cover all the parts needed to refurbish one laptop, with all donations match funded by the Aviva Community Fund. www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/the-gift-of-tech
The CIC ensures that every piece of technology donated is tested and securely wiped. If a machine isn’t feasible to upgrade, it will remove all reusable parts and recycle the rest, so nothing goes to waste.
It could be bigger than Diggers! See what I did there? Okay, you youngsters might need Google, but while you’re researching Chippenham’s hedonistic past, a…
There’s no sophomore slump for Monkey Bizzle; prolific in their art, these rural chav-choppers return with a second album, Agricultural Appropriation, only five years and…
Featured Image:@jenimeadephotography Just another rainy Saturday afternoon in Devizes, whereby I watched a profound fellow dramatically sacrifice himself to the devil, then popped to Morrisons…
Devizes Arts Festival has already got off to a storming start over this last weekend, with performances on Friday from Jolly Roger, Saturday from Lady Nade, and on Sunday from Adam Alexander and Eddy Allen. Some of these we’ve already reviewed here.
So now it’s rolled round to Monday, and it’s time to head out into the first mid-week dates, with a whole variety of stuff to choose from. Last night, and first up of the spoken word big hitters, it was the turn of Dr. Phil Hammond at The Corn Exchange.
I wasn’t sure if was a comment on the current difficulty of getting a GP appointment, but Dr. Phil’s waiting room was pretty full, with people eagerly awaiting a consultation with the famous doctor.
Phil is an NHS doctor, journalist, broadcaster, speaker, campaigner and comedian. He currently works at the Bath RUH in a specialist NHS team for young people with long Covid. Born in the NHS (a slogan emblazoned on his t-shirt, and frequently referenced throughput the set), and brought up in Australia (the Ozzie twang was unmistakeable), he worked in general practice for over twenty years, and has also worked in sexual health. A familiar voice on BBC Radio 4, he has also presented five series of “Trust Me, I’m a Doctor” on BBC2, encouraging patients to be more involved, assertive and questioning. And finally (a major feather in his cap in my book) he’s also Private Eye’s medical correspondent, where he broke the story of the Bristol heart scandal in 1992.
Phil’s “surgery” consisted of two sets – “How To Fix The NHS”’ and “The Ins And Outs Of Pleasure”.
The first half consisted of both commentary on the NHS, and Dr. Phil’s ideas on how it might be improved. Using both his own and patient-generated ideas, the best of which was “force all MPs and Health Service professionals receive all their treatment in the worst-performing hospitals”, and plenty of enthusiastic audience participation, he addressed current issues in a positive light. His key messages were “prevention rather than cure” (more investment needed upstream) and our individual responsibility for personal health. His model, and mnemonic for the night was (of all things) CLANGERS, which provides daily prompts on healthy behaviour. I might be making it sound a little dry, but it was very far from it. He often had the audience in stitches (is this allowed? – Ed. Ed’s note; any passing tumbleweeds are your own responsibility, Andy!), with his “hierarchy of cricketing euphemisms” for death (“taken the short walk to the pavilion”), and a gob-smacking tale of “euthanasia by cling-film”.
The delivery was fast, yet calm, with a take-no-prisoners attitude. He was self-deprecating, often admitting to his own mistakes (predicting that Covid would cause less deaths than people falling down the stairs) and failures (pronouncing a patient to be dead, who subsequently turned out to be very much alive). There were plenty of anecdotes from his times as a trainee and a junior whilst at Medical School, quite enough to shock the bejesus out of the audience.
If anything, the second half was even better. Having posted a trigger warning that it would be quite a bit more graphic and near the bone, it did not disappoint. “The Ins and Outs of Pleasure” did what it said on the tin, and addressed issues of sex, orgasms, masturbation and self-pleasuring. The language was fruity and devoid of euphemism, and soon had the audience squirming with embarrassed nervous laughter. Being a consummate professional performer, the doctor correctly “read the room” and sensing that he was perhaps pushing a Monday night audience in D-Town a little too far, very subtly applied the brakes to some of the tougher stuff. Side-stepping his material via some more personal history, we were soon transitioned into the slightly safer territory of “consensual cannibalism”, the value of having a dog for good mental self-pleasuring, and the joy of “fuck-it Fridays”. But there was still plenty of time on the side for useful medical advice on the use of cock-rings (get the ones with handles), and things not to put into human orifices.
The general prescription issued last night was for taking control of, and responsibility for, your own mental and physical health. And my personal takeaway arrived almost at the end of the set– “laughter is the best medicine – unless you have syphilis, in which case penicillin is a better bet”. Priceless.
A cracking night’s entertainment – informative, interesting, and absolutely hilarious. Another great choice by DAF to bring such performing talent to our town.
Stone Circle Music Events announced today that all proceeds of CrownFest will be donated to Wiltshire Hope & Harmony’s Dementia Choir. CrownFest is an…
devizine.com 