The White Bear Theatre Club is a fringe theatre venue, established in 1988 in the White Bear pub in Kennington

Kennington

Kennington is a district of South London, England, mainly within the London Borough of Lambeth, although part of the area is within the London Borough of Southwark....

, London Borough of Lambeth

London Borough of Lambeth

The London Borough of Lambeth is a London borough in south London, England and forms part of Inner London. The local authority is Lambeth London Borough Council.-Origins:...

. It is run by Artistic Director Michael Kingsbury. Theatre practitioners who have worked at The White Bear include Joe Penhall

Joe Penhall

Joe Penhall is a British playwright and screenwriter.Born in London, his first major play was Some Voices for the Royal Court Theatre, London, in 1994, which won the John Whiting Award. It has twice been revived off Broadway...

, Hugh Allison, Mark Little

Mark Little

Mark Little may refer to:* Mark Little , Australian actor, television presenter and comedian* Mark Little , Irish journalist, television presenter and author...

, Emily Watson

Emily Watson

Emily Watson is an English actress. She gave an acclaimed debut film performance in Lars von Trier's Breaking the Waves.- Early life :...

, Tamsin Outhwaite, Kwame Kwei-Armah

Kwame Kwei-Armah

Kwame Kwei-Armah, is a British actor, playwright, singer and broadcaster. In 2005 he became the second black Briton to have a play staged in the West End...

, Vicky Featherstone, Torben Betts

Torben Betts

Torben Betts is an award-winning English playwright and screenwriter.A consistently controversial dramatist, who has written heavily naturalistic plays as well as epic, poetic works, he has been hailed as a successor to writers as diverse as Alan Ayckbourn, Edward Bond and Howard Barker...

, Lucinda Coxon

Lucinda Coxon

-Plays:Coxon's plays include Nostalgia and Vesuvius at South Coast Repertory, California; Improbabilities at Soho Poly; Wishbones and Waiting at the Water's Edge at the Bush Theatre, London; Three Graces at Lakeside Theatre, Colchester and the Haymarket Theatre, Leicester...

, Adam Spreadbury-Maher

Adam Spreadbury-Maher

Adam Spreadbury-Maher is a multi-award winning Australian/Irish theatre artistic director, producer and translator. He is the founding Artistic Director of London's Cock Tavern Theatre from January 2009 until the venues closure in April 2011. He became Artistic Director of the Kings Head Theatre...

 (Associate director 2008 - 2009) and Chris Loveless (Associate Director, 2009 - ). It is said to be one of the most interesting fringe theatres due to its small size and the intimacy of the acting space.

Productions

Previous productions include: Bodyclock (Time Out Critics Choice), Cosi

Così

Così is a play by Australian playwright Louis Nowra which was first performed in 1992. Set in a Melbourne mental hospital in 1971, Così is semi-autobiographical.- Plot summary:Lewis is always desperate for work as he states "I need the money"...

, Dracula

Dracula

Dracula is an 1897 novel by Irish author Bram Stoker.Famous for introducing the character of the vampire Count Dracula, the novel tells the story of Dracula's attempt to relocate from Transylvania to England, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor...

 (A new musical by Alex Loveless adapted from the original story by Bram Stoker

Bram Stoker

Abraham "Bram" Stoker was an Irish novelist and short story writer, best known today for his 1897 Gothic novel Dracula...

), Life's A Dream, Feathers

Feathers (play)

Feathers is the debut play by Eliza Power, based on the story of Tereus, Procne and Philomela from Ovid's Metamorphoses. It is a contemporary reworking of the original myth. The play's title come's from the ending of the original myth, where the lead characters metamorphose into birds.The play...

, The Return of the Soldier, The Card Index, Spin and I Only Want To Be With You.

Critical acclaim

The theatre has been described by London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 review magazine Time Out as 'Fringe Theatre of the first order, The White Bear must be saluted for staging such work' and Michael Billington

Michael Billington

Michael Billington may refer to:* Michael Billington , British film and television actor* Michael Billington , drama critic of The Guardian* Michael Billington , author and activist in the LaRouche movement...

 from The Guardian

The Guardian

The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...

 was quoted as saying 'Fringe theatre at his best.'

Awards

The White Bear has received numerous awards including Time Out Best Fringe

Fringe theatre

Fringe theatre is theatre that is not of the mainstream. The term comes from the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, which name comes from Robert Kemp, who described the unofficial companies performing at the same time as the second Edinburgh International Festival as a ‘fringe’, writing: ‘Round the fringe...

 Venue, Peter Brook

Peter Brook

Peter Stephen Paul Brook CH, CBE is an English theatre and film director and innovator, who has been based in France since the early 1970s.-Life:...

Empty Space Award for Best Up and Coming Venue, Carling London Fringe Awards for Best Actor and Best Production.