Book tickets: The Lowry’s Week 53 festival ft. Nigel Slater’s Toast on stage

Want to get ahead of the theatre crowd? You can now grab early tickets for The Lowry’s cross-arts festival Week 53. Enjoy the best cutting-edge stage shows as The Salford theatre hosts over 70 performances in May 2018. The programme includes special commissions – including an appearance by a foodie writer Nigel Slater. The Observer scribe will tell the story of a lifetime’s hunger when he brings his bestselling biography ‘Toast’ to the stage (Wed 23 – Mon 28 May, 7.30pm, £20, www.thelowry.com). From the playground politics of sweets to conflict over cake-making, his Week 53 show will tease the taste buds while telling all about a career that includes a nod for BBC Food Personality of the Year. Sticking with the book theme, Graham Greene’s underworld thriller ‘Brighton Rock’ will come to Week 53 as an adaptation by Tony Award-winning dramatist Bryony Lavery (Wed 23 – Sat 26 May, 7.30pm daily and 2.30pm Wed & Sat, £20, www.thelowry.com). The classic tale of teen gang war will be soundtracked by Hannah Peel, composer of space-age brass band piece Mary Casio. Or perhaps check out the Shonen dance group whose choreography is influenced by japanese butô. School of Moon is set on a luminous stage on which children dance with small robots and a grown-up couple caught in zero-gravity slow-motion (Sun 20 May, 2pm & 6pm, £20, www.thelowry.com). Plenty more performances are yet to be announced for Week 53 – tickets for these shows are on sale now.

wed 23 – Mon 28 May 2018, The Lowry, Pier 8, The Quays, Salford M50 3AZ. Tel: 0843 208 6010, www.thelowry.com