Mid-summer Party at the RAF club -
128 Piccadilly, London W1J 7PY

Tickets £42 (£38 members)
Send cheques payable to the Players' Theatre club, 12 Bentinck Mansions, Bentinck Street, London W1U 2ER

Artistes will be drawn from:
Loraine Hart, Jan Hunt, Maria St.Clare, Helen Watson,
Peter Charlton, Peter John, Royston Kean, Ben Stock, Richard Winch,
David Wykes will be the Orchestra, and Dominic Le Foe will be sometime Chairman

FREE SHOWS:

SHOWS AT THE VENUE THEATRE continue, as it has been acquired by Martin Witts of the Arts Theatre. However, it will be renamed 'The Leicester Square Theatre

Enough is enough!
For several years the 'New Players' and ourselves have co-existed without any need for conflict. They have used the term'Joys', though strictly speaking that is part of our brand, but it would have seemed petty to object.
They chose to go for occasional spectacular shows; we concentrated on more frequent, smaller scale events, and - extremely important - we maintained both a major London and National presence through working with Westminster City Council (see above), and various festivals and other events that we were invited to. We shared artistes to a great extent, and it was very gratifying that there was no partisanship (or very little) at the artiste level.
They had one of the same expressed goals as ourselves: to achieve a permanent home for a successor club to our original version, and had they succeeded before us, we would have seen no further need for two separate organisations. It was not clear whether their aims included - as ours do - to revert to the charitable activities of our former existence.
However, a show has now been aranged at the Duchess theatre, and a flyer states that it is presented by "The World Famous Players' Music Hall Company". This company was registered in February 2008; its objectives are those of a property company, and it is obviously not world famous. The expression "The World Famous Players' Theatre", has formed part of our Logo and Trade Mark, for many years. A website put up by the Players Music Hall Company, after three paragraphs accurately describing the origins of the Players' concludes by saying: "By early 2008, the company had regained enough momentum to return in full glory to the West End Stage and a much-loved former home; the Duchess Theatre."
Clearly the inference to be drawn is that the 'Players Music Hall Company' is the same as the Players' Theatre company (which has indeed performed at the Duchess Theatre).
To add insult to injury,the people behind this activity have been 'cold-calling' members of the Players' Theatre club inviting them to join them. This demonstrates their possession of the Players' Theatre club's database, which, as intellectual property, was legitimately purchased along with the other assets of the club.
They have also, without the consent of the artistes, shown archival videos of shows performed at Villiers Street. These videos were taken on the express understanding that they would not be shown without the artistes' onsent, and are also our property.
We have been advised by learned counsel, that these actions cannot and should not be ignored - not least because they are likely to cause a great deal of confusion. We much regret being placed in this position - but as we indicated above, enough is enough.

May I encourage you to do two things:
1 Click on http://www.playersmusichall.co.uk/ and tell me whether or not you think that casual visitor would consider that they had reached the website of the Players' Theatre club?
2 Tell me if you have been cold-called by someone claiming to represent the Players' Theatre club.

My email is Bill@Playerstheatre.co.uk

Any questions or suggestions, contact Bill or Mike Halson

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