IELTS General Training Reading Practice Test 38

Text A — KINGSGATE THEATRE: TICKETING INFORMATION FOR PATRONS

Welcome to the Kingsgate Theatre. Please read the following information carefully before purchasing tickets for our 2026 spring season. The theatre has been argued to offer some of the best-value seats in the city's West End fringe.

Box Office hours: - Monday to Friday: 10:00 - 18:00 - Saturday: 11:00 - 20:00 - Sunday: Closed (online sales only)

Performance prices (per ticket, including booking fee): - Stalls (rows A-J): £42.00 adults, £32.00 concessions - Royal Circle (rows K-P): £36.00 adults, £28.00 concessions - Upper Circle (rows Q-V): £24.00 adults, £18.00 concessions - Standing tickets (rear of stalls, limited view): £15.00 - released two hours before curtain - Student rush tickets: £12.00 - released 45 minutes before curtain, photo ID required

Group bookings of ten or more generally receive a 15% discount when booked at least four weeks in advance. School parties typically receive a further 10% reduction on weekday matinées only. Wheelchair spaces are available in the Royal Circle at the Upper Circle price; one companion ticket is provided free of charge.

Latecomers will not normally be admitted to the auditorium until a suitable break in the performance, typically the interval. Front-row stalls patrons should note that on certain productions (marked with an asterisk in the brochure) the action extends into the first three rows; loose belongings should be stored under the seat. Photography, video recording, and the use of mobile telephones are strictly forbidden during performances. Patrons who repeatedly disturb others may be asked to leave without refund.

Refunds are not normally given except in the case of cancellation by the theatre. Tickets may, however, be exchanged for another performance of the same production up to 48 hours before curtain, subject to a £3.50 administration fee per ticket. Lost tickets can be reprinted at the box office on production of photo ID and the original booking reference.

Text B — UNDERSTUDY RULES: KINGSGATE THEATRE COMPANY HANDBOOK

Every principal role at the Kingsgate Theatre is covered by at least one understudy. Understudies are drawn from the existing ensemble cast and rehearse separately under the resident director. The system has been argued to be the company's main insurance against a cancelled performance.

When an understudy is required to perform, the following procedures apply:

1. Notification: The stage manager must be informed by the principal performer no later than 14:00 on the day of an evening performance, or no later than 10:00 on the day of a matinée. Earlier notification is strongly preferred, particularly where overnight illness is foreseeable.

2. Public announcement: A printed slip will normally be inserted into each programme. In addition, a verbal announcement is made by the front-of-house manager five minutes before curtain. The names of the understudy and the role covered are clearly stated.

3. Refund policy: A change of cast does not generally entitle the ticket-holder to a refund. This is in line with industry practice across the West End and regional theatre. However, if the principal performer is named on the front of the printed marketing material as the sole reason for the booking (so-called "star vehicles," currently restricted to productions led by a named actor of international standing), a 25% goodwill refund may be claimed within fourteen days of the performance.

4. Costume and movement: Understudies typically use the same costumes as the principal where possible, but minor alterations (typically of hems and waistbands) are permitted. Choreography must remain unchanged so that the rest of the cast can perform safely; any deviation requires the resident director's written approval.

5. Multiple absences: Where two or more principals are absent from the same performance, the resident director has discretion to cancel the performance entirely. In this case, ticket-holders are entitled to a full refund or an exchange to any future date in the same production's run.

Text C — KINGSGATE THEATRE: BACKSTAGE CREW TRAINEE PROGRAMME

The Kingsgate Theatre is currently recruiting for its annual backstage crew trainee scheme, which runs from September to July. This is a salaried twelve-month training position, with the possibility of moving onto a permanent staff contract on completion. The scheme has been argued to be one of the best entry-level routes into technical theatre in the country.

The trainee scheme rotates participants through four departments: - Stage management (10 weeks): cueing, calling shows, prompt-book maintenance - Lighting (10 weeks): rigging, focusing, programming the lighting desk for in-house and visiting productions - Sound (10 weeks): microphone fitting, mixing live performance, radio-mic management - Wardrobe (12 weeks): dressing, quick-changes, basic costume repair, laundry

Each rotation ends with a written assessment and a practical observation by the head of the department. Trainees must pass both elements to progress to the next rotation. A failed assessment may be retaken once after one further week of supervised practice.

Working hours during the scheme are normally 35 hours per week, distributed as required across day and evening shifts. Saturday and Sunday working is normal during production weeks. Trainees who work on a public holiday typically receive an additional day off in lieu, to be taken within two months. Annual leave is 20 working days plus bank holidays, pro rata, with at least ten days to be taken during the summer break in August.

Trainee pay is £21,500 for the year (currently under review for the 2027 intake). All necessary safety equipment — including steel-capped boots, ear defenders, and a basic crew radio handset — is provided. Trainees are expected to supply their own black clothing for shifts on stage and a small toolkit (a list is sent with the offer letter).

Eligibility: Applicants must be 18 or over and hold the right to work in this country. Previous theatre experience at amateur or student level is desirable but not essential. We particularly welcome applications from candidates underrepresented in the technical theatre profession.

Application: Submit a CV and a one-page statement (no more than 500 words) explaining your interest in technical theatre to crew-training@kingsgate.example. Applications normally close on 30 April. Shortlisted candidates are invited to a half-day practical workshop in late May; offers are made by the end of June. Successful applicants begin on the first Monday of September.

Text D — KINGSGATE THEATRE: HEALTH AND SAFETY INDUCTION (FIRST WEEK)

Every new member of crew, including trainees, completes a five-day induction in the first week of employment.

Day 1 — Tour and policy: A guided tour of the building (front of house, auditorium, backstage, paint frame, fly gallery, dock door) followed by a presentation of the theatre's safety policy. Trainees must read and sign the Crew Safety Handbook before the end of the day.

Day 2 — Working at height: Practical training on the fly gallery and the lighting bridge. No trainee is permitted to work above ground level until this module has been completed and signed off. A separate refresher is required every twelve months.

Day 3 — Manual handling and rigging: Lifting techniques, the use of trucks and trolleys, basic flat-pack scenery handling. The afternoon session covers the safe use of stage weights and rigging cleats; this is essential for any subsequent work in the fly tower.

Day 4 — Fire, evacuation, and dressing-room safety: The theatre's fire-evacuation plan, the role of the duty fire officer, and dressing-room-specific hazards (irons, naked flames in performance, costume storage). All crew are issued with a personal evacuation card showing their station.

Day 5 — Emergency first aid at work: A one-day course delivered by an external provider. Successful candidates receive a certificate valid for three years. Trainees who do not achieve the certificate may retake the course at no cost within six months.

After induction, trainees are placed with a mentor — a senior member of crew with at least three years of experience — for the duration of the scheme. The mentor normally meets the trainee weekly for the first month and fortnightly thereafter.

A British pantomime — known affectionately as "panto" — is a peculiar theatrical form. It is staged almost exclusively at Christmas, mixes spoken comedy, music, slapstick, audience participation and pointed satire, and has principal female characters played by men ("dames") and principal male characters played by women. To many overseas visitors it appears bewilderingly British, but the form generally has a long history with roots stretching back several centuries to mainland Europe, and a more recent commercial transformation that has made it one of the most reliable earners of the British theatrical year.

B Pantomime's earliest theatrical ancestor is widely regarded as the Italian commedia dell'arte, which flourished from the sixteenth century. Travelling troupes performed improvised scenarios using a fixed set of masked characters: the romantic lovers, the cunning servant Harlequin, the elderly miser Pantalone, the boastful soldier, and others. Stock comic business — the chase, the disguise, the beating with a stick — recurred in countless plots. When commedia troupes toured into France and England in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the broad style and the masked characters were absorbed by local performers and adapted for English audiences.

C The figure of "Pantomime" as a named theatrical form, distinct from commedia, dates from early eighteenth-century London. John Rich, the manager of Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre, staged a series of entertainments from 1717 onwards in which a mythological or classical story was told in formal verse, interrupted by silent harlequinade scenes derived from commedia. Rich himself played the Harlequin under the stage name Lun. The two halves — serious mythological "opening" and comic harlequinade — coexisted within a single evening for over a century.

D During the Victorian era pantomime took on most of the features that audiences would recognise today. The harlequinade gradually shrank to a token closing scene before disappearing altogether by the early twentieth century. In its place, the mythological "opening" grew into a full-length show, almost always based on a familiar fairy tale: Cinderella, Aladdin, Dick Whittington, Jack and the Beanstalk, Mother Goose, Sleeping Beauty. Songs from the popular music hall were interpolated; topical jokes were inserted; the audience was invited to boo the villain and to shout warnings to the hero. The role of the dame, played by a male comic, became firmly established as a vehicle for outrageous costume changes and exchanges with the audience.

E By the late nineteenth century pantomime had become a national institution. Provincial theatres opened their Christmas run on Boxing Day and continued for many weeks; the box-office takings often paid for the rest of the year's serious repertoire. The principal boy — the heroic male lead played by a young woman — was a deliberate vehicle for displaying the legs of a glamorous female performer at a period when this was otherwise risqué. The dame, the principal boy, and the increasingly elaborate "transformation scene" between acts became the three structural pillars of the form. The pillars have been argued to be what most clearly distinguishes pantomime from other Victorian forms.

F The twentieth century brought a long stretch of relative decline. Variety theatre, the cinema, and later television offered cheaper Christmas entertainment, and the production values that audiences expected from pantomime — large casts, live orchestras, lavish sets — became hard to justify outside the largest regional theatres. By the 1970s several long-running pantomime traditions had quietly closed. The remedy, when it came, was largely commercial. Pantomime promoters began to cast celebrities from television, sport, and reality programmes alongside the traditional comic dame; cheaper LED and projection effects replaced expensive painted transformations; and runs were normally shortened to a tight four to six weeks straddling Christmas itself.

G The commercial recovery has been strong. By the 2010s pantomime was once again the single largest source of revenue for many regional British theatres, with attendance figures often exceeding those of the rest of the season combined. Critics have sometimes complained that the celebrity casting and pre-packaged scripts have homogenised the form; defenders reply that the underlying conventions — the dame, the principal boy, the audience shouts of "he's behind you!" — remain intact, and that the genre has survived precisely because it adapts. Pantomime today is therefore both deeply traditional and unashamedly modern: an old theatrical form held alive by commercial reinvention.