Stan’s Cafe is a theatre company (and charity). We make our work collaboratively, following exciting ideas wherever they take us, sometimes into theatres.
We love working in schools with students and teachers. Often we help out other people because we love seeing other people make great art.
We started in 1991 and we are more excited than ever before.
Please have fun zipping around our website.
- Notice Time Passing
If you came to see Time Critical at The REP this week they may have asked to complete an on-line survey about your experience. The early questions are quantitive and… Read more: Notice Time Passing - PET #1 August Retour
The Many Lives of PET #1 is back – check out the trailer for the show below! ♻️ Poor old PET #1. Distantly related to pre historical plankton, used and… Read more: PET #1 August Retour - Time Critical Returns!
Our “thought provoking and funny” show Time Critical will return this October for the first time since 2017 – updated for 2025 with a brand new cast! Two competing actors,… Read more: Time Critical Returns!
Diary
Time Critical
7 – 8 October
Birmingham Rep
10 October
Bath Spa University
16 – 17 October
Gulbenkian Arts Centre
Tickets on sale now
Time Critical
Two competing actors, tyrannised by a chess clock, struggle to compress 34 years of global vs personal history (1991 – 2025) into an allocation of just one minute each per year.
This funny and though provoking show bounces between international politics and stories from individuals’ lives. It accelerates through re-enactments of landmark moments in recent history and fragments of past Stan’s Cafe productions towards an exhilarating finale against the clock.
Time Critical is about how we live our lives in relation to the world around us. It gives us a new perspective on the spiralling nature of history.
River Tours
Guided tours of rivers, performed live, indoors or out, illustrated by especially commissioned textile ribbon maps. The library is growing three new maps are currently in various stages of research and preparation, one in Africa, one in the Baltic states and one in England. All due for completion in 2026..
Space Hire
We have spaces to hire for rehearsals and meetings. Our big hall (see photograph), plus two classrooms which are easily big enough to rehearse studio shows in. There is also a shared Green Room and hot-desking space. We’re running a ‘pre-Edinburgh’ special offer at the moment. We’re on Umberslade Road in Selly Oak, just 10 minutes walk from the train station, plus buses on Bristol & Pershore Road AND the Number 11, plus there is always parking round here. COME!
The Commentators
An improvised walkabout performance (unless they’re sat down) in which two sports commentators describe everyday life in too much detail. Catch them live in person or streamed live online.
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The Many Lives Of PET #1
A complicated comedy about a plastic bottle. When the newly appointed Minister for the Environment arrives at work he finds an anti-plastic protester aleady there making demands. Big Business (“Just call me Big”) is summoned but proves reluctant to do anything that will cost them money. It is only PET (the minister’s discarded water bottle) that can see a way through this crisis.
After audiences loved the initial community tour. This fast funny and informative show is coming back Summer 2025.