Hay Festival Winter Weekend 2023

Parish priest in Hay since 2001, Father Richard Williams trained as a professional musician at Trinity College of Music, London, studying piano, organ and composition.

In the late Georgian-Gothic setting of St Mary’s Church, Hay-on-Wye, he performs a live accompaniment on the Bevington organ to the classic 1923 silent film The Hunchback of Notre Dame, adapted from Victor Hugo’s novel of the same name.

Set in 15th-century Paris, the film follows Jehan, the evil brother of the archdeacon, as he lusts after a woman named Esmeralda and commands the hunchback Quasimodo to capture her. Military captain Phoebus also loves Esmeralda and rescues her, but an unlikely bond forms between Esmeralda and Quasimodo.

This is an extra performance due to popular demand

From the bestselling author, a blisteringly hilarious tour through the whirlwind of post-Brexit Britain, from the ousting of Boris to the dawn of a new era . . . sort of. Another month, another prime minister – how many have we been through now? Despite all the nonsense that has spewed forth from Westminster over the past two years, John Crace’s brilliantly lacerating political sketches have provided the nation with some desperately needed relief. In Depraved New World, Crace introduces a worryingly funny selection of his finest work, taking in everything from Partygate, BoJo’s farewell and Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng’s disastrous reign to the psychodrama of the Tory leadership contest(s), the return of Rishi Sunak, Suella Braverman’s hokey pokey and whatever lies ahead.