Does anyone know what will be playing at the NT in 09? Will the show that MG was supposed to direct now be done by somebody else?

No doubt some improvised stuff from Katie Mitchell and Kneehigh, a Guardian based headline play, contemporary dance and least 3 things with Simon Russell Beale in

Sorry I don’t know

Amongst other things:

Alls Well That Ends Well directed by Marianne Elliott
Mother Courage
Dido, Queen of Carthage by Christopher Marlowe
Phaedra

There is a press release on the website for the NT

Good Lord - is the National determined to continue doing Shakespeare plays which have only recently been done by the RSC ? ( previously Much Ado )
Anyone know who is likely to play Mother Courage?

Last RSC was 2003, so fair distance between two shows.

Think is supposed to be Fiona Shaw as Mother Courage

yep - Fiona Shaw will be playing Mother Courage

Since the RSC do about 10 Shakespeare plays a year, it's not surprising that many also crop up in other major theatres at similar times (look at Hamlet for example). In fact they announced their own Rupert Goold Romeo and Juliet recently, whilst they are opening a different production of the same play next month...

I think it has been pretty well proven that Shakespeare sells, regardless of abundance.

To me it seems a magical combination of director and play, Elliott's Much Ado was a dream production of a popular Shakespeare, now she is turning her hand to one of his rarest, bring it on! I'll be booking as soon as it is announced.

Other interesting point, talking of 2009 is of course the temporary defection of Lucy Bailey to the RSC to complete her trilogy of Roman plays with Caesar.

Sorry classical Shakespeare as Timon isn't Rome set, before I get shot down in flames

From the aformentioned press release:

At a press conference to mark the publication of the Annual Report, Nicholas Hytner, Director of the National, also announced some forthcoming productions in the 2009 repertoire. Travelex £10 Tickets continue for a seventh year in the Olivier; the season will include a new play by Richard Bean, England People Very Nice directed by Nicholas Hytner; Death and the King’s Horseman by Wole Soyinka, directed by Rufus Norris; Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well, directed by Marianne Elliott; Buchner’s Danton’s Death, directed by Michael Grandage; and Brecht’s Mother Courage, with Fiona Shaw in the title role, directed by Deborah Warner.

Helen Mirren returns to the National in June 2009 in the title role of Racine’s Phèdre, directed by Nicholas Hytner in the Lyttelton Theatre, in a production sponsored by Coutts & Co. Also in the Lyttelton, Rupert Goold will direct Time and the Conways by JB Priestley. In the Cottesloe, Dido, Queen of Carthage by Christopher Marlowe will be directed by James Macdonald.

Public booking for England People Very Nice and Death and the King’s Horseman will open in November; public booking for later productions will be announced next year.

So, at the moment not much like the satirical list posted by Reich earlier. However, I am eagerly awaiting what angle the NT critics on this board will adopt in their pre-season sniping and outraged calls for Hytner's head. Too many old plays, perhaps? We demand more devised pieces involving puppetry, and we demand them now? I can't wait.

This NT critic thinks it looks terrific. (Unlike the Almeida programme, Backdrifter.)

Job

That's what intrigued me - given that it seems to satisfy the wishes of some of those here who express disquiet about the NT's rep, but that there's always someone who's hacked off by what they're doing, I'm wondering if the criticism will swing the other way to those who want the puppets and the "Guardian headline" pieces etc. "Shakespeare? Marlowe? Brecht? Racine? How dare the NT foist this old stuff on us!"

Why this compulsion to fit us all into neat pigeon holes? I prefer to react according to my instincts rather than follow some political dogma that allows you to stick a label on me. I go to the theatre because I want to, not in order to strengthen my credentials with anyone else. I am not a number, I am a free man.

Job

P.S. Oedipus is great. Go go go!

Ahem .... loads ... fires ....

There isn't even a trilogy of Roman plays, there are four: Julius Caesar, Titus Andronicus, Coriolanus and Antony & Cleo. I would rather see Deborah Warner complete her tetralogy by directing the latter (with Fiona Shaw and Brain Cox) than treating us to Mother Courage, though I suppose that at least will be better than the truly rotten last NT production of that tedious Brecht piece with Dame J. Dench in an orange wig.

Wasnt the last NT one with Diana Rigg? Jonathan Kent production and not a great one either.

The Judi Dench one was at the Barbican wasnt it? With Tilda Swinton as well? I'm not sure so happy to be corrected.

The new season sounds interesting, if a bit conservative; although given the current financial situation this is probably a typically deft move by Nick Hytner. And given that All's Well is so rarely done who cares if the RSC did it 5 years ago? Its the perfect combination of director and play as well if you ask me.

What makes this otherwise bland list of plays exciting - is the choice of directors, Im actually thinking at £10 id see most of these!

Not bad, but it would be nice to see *a* musical in the next year's lineup. Last one in memory was "Caroline, or Change."

Oh yeah, RSC, you are right. WIth Zoe Wanamaker too. How come this awful play gets done so often ?

Eh....? You're the one who labelled yourself an "NT critic"! I think some people here put themselves in pigeonholes - not you though, I'm sure. Re Oedipus, I'm indeed going, going, going, looking forward to it

Thank you Jan, how I managed to forget that I do not know, I stand humbly corrected. Better not tell my parents who have paid for me to see every Shakespeare play at least once, if not twice or more. Alls Well at the NT will mean I'll have seen them all at least twice, cannot wait.

I think I meant Lucy Bailey seems to be on to doing a trilogy of Classical Shakespeare's.

I'm still trying to work out the logic of this riposte. The phrase 'NT critic' pigeon-holes me? It might do if all I did was carp about the place, but for every time I moan about, say, David Hare, there's a rave from me about something else. I love the NT - it's my spiritual home.

Job

Job dear, you're not making any sense to me either. I too thought you were labelling yourself with that phrase as someone who criticises the NT a lot.

War Horse until mid March
McBeth in February...

Hi Alexandra! Why so?

Job

All's Well isn't done much so looking forward to this one.

"Hi Alexandra! Why so?"


Job, I fear the moment has passed, but this was what you said in response to Back:

"QUOTE(Backdrifter @ Oct 24 2008, 01:30 PM)
I am eagerly awaiting what angle the NT critics on this board will adopt in their pre-season sniping and outraged calls for Hytner's head. Too many old plays, perhaps? We demand more devised pieces involving puppetry, and we demand them now? I can't wait."

"This NT critic thinks it looks terrific."

So Back and I, quite reasonably I think, took you to be suggesting that you were one of those who habitually criticised the NT, even though you liked the look of this season. So that when you then objected to being pigeonholed as an NT critic, Back pointed out that your stance appeared to be a little inconsistent.

However, I see that in fact you approach everything with a splendidly open mind and without preconception, so that's all right then.

as do we all..

Naturally.

Well, Alexandra, I must be more careful what I say here in case it gets me pigeon-holed.

I called myself an NT critic because I have occasionally criticised the NT on this board. It was a kind of shorthand - a handy echo from a tag in a previous posting. It's all there in your own chosen quotation (three posts up). So no, 5/10 for effort, but I don't think you've proved that I've somehow surrendered the right to individualism.

I nearly added 'as you well know' at the end of that last paragraph. You'd have to be either mischievous or bone-headed - and you certainly aren't the latter - not to have worked that out for yourself.

Job (who only comes here for a chat - y'know - with friends, like.)

"5/10 for effort"

Old habits die hard don't they?

No, I wasn't being mischievous on this occasion, so I must have been being bone-headed. Actually I think we're at cross purposes - no-one was pigeon-holing you or even criticising you, just chatting as you say - but I honestly can't be bothered with any more quoting.

Me neither! (Sorry - had to do that.) But since you supplied the opening tickle on this sub-thread, Alexandra dear (nah - patronising, that - designed to annoy - not really my style - leave 'dear' to others), when you opted to muscle in following a reply I made to another poster, I think I'll allow myself the last word. And, since there are more important things in life than constantly seeking to top another poster's previous comment, my last word is 'Chill'.

Job

Actually Job, you've misunderstood my tone throughout I think - that "dear" was vaguely affectionate on my part since I quite like you from what I can tell of you from your posts (I might have written darling but that would have been a bit strong), and was not intended to be patronising. Ah well. There are clearly better targets for my affection.

Ah the joys of the all encompassing written word, the tone and clarity that rings true throughout!

Back on topic (!), can I just say how pleased I am that the very under-rated Richard Bean is at last being given a premier in the main house, and directed by Hytner too. I hope he can come up with an ensemble piece to do justice to the space (often a bone of contention on these boards). Elliot's All's Well sounds exciting too.

Also (puts head above parapet), I find it extraordinary that Jan describes Brecht's Mother Courage as an 'awful' play but rates Pinter so highly. I saw and thoroughly enjoyed the Diana Rigg production (excellent work from David Bradley in that, too, incidentally). Surely the reason it is performed so often is that it contains a commentary on war which is relevant at any time. (Oh, and it used to be on the German A-level syllabus, but nobody takes that any more, do they?)

Its also often used as the AS text in theatre studies to look at Brecht

NT have now put the first batch of shows on their website with dates etc

Thanks for this...am quite tempted by Dido. Anyone think it will be any good? Opinions welcome...I find the board are rarely wrong and really enjoyed The White Devil recently after people here got excited at the prospect of it!

Isn't it funny that the NT can give you the poster of a play with all that it conveys before they can tell you who is in it? Makes you wonder why they don't introduce a conceptual art type thing - the director can tell us how he would do it and leave it at that. No actors, save lots of money.

That's definitley what they should have done with In-i. Actually that's more or less what they did do.

Come on, they've got to be able to sell tickets somehow. Perhaps you'd suggest they don't write about the play either: just give the title and author.

Directors have often been working on the concept for a production for months before anyone even thinks about casting, so I really don't see the problem here.

Maybe we should buy a ticket for a theatre on a day, turn up and see what we get - serendipity..o come on, I was kidding, kinda...

Just booked for Dido, England People, Stovepipe (I'm still a complete sucker for odd locations, etc) and Time & Conways. Other years I might have slung a couple or 3 more in but have decided, after a manic 2008, to slow down a bit in 09. Fewer NT/Barbican/West End, more fringe, and away from theatre use my BFI membership a lot more.

Anyone else delving into the NT09 schedule?

I'm still trying to decide what to see. The Dido might be good - but who is in it? Seems odd to me - weirdly egalitarian. Come and see this play , never mind who's in it. Maybe that's a good thing.

The programme for later in the year, All's Well, Mother Courage [ and we know that's Fiona Shaw, yes? presumably giving her time to learn the lines] and Phedre, looks more appetising. And I must be one of the only people left on the site here who rates David Hare but to go and listen to his reading of a 55 minute meditation on Berlin. Is this a wind up? What's wrong with the radio? [ shades of Rita, eh?] His one man ' thing ' about the Middle East was just about ok, much better read , than delivered, I thought at the time. So what is this all about? And think of the number of aspiring actors who would kill to get 55 minutes on the stage at the National.

My last gripe and I hope I shall be proved wrong, is the publicity quote for England people Very Nice; Irish and Jewish, that's the worst mix. You end up with a family of pissed up burglars run by a clever accountant. Does this bode well? Come back Jonathan Ross, all is forgiven.

Yes, I think there's something to be said for cast having no bearing on your choices - based on your not knowing who they are. I completely agree about the Hare Berlin thing, it held absolutely no appeal whatsoever for me. I'm assuming the pull-quote from England People is the voice of some character who's brutally stereotyping those nationalities in the context of the play. Well, you'd hope so. I've booked for that on the strength of Bean's earlier work, rather than that recent dire political comedy.

Id like to go to a few things - but have to wait until public booking opens in 10days by which time 90% of the tickets will have already been sold and the likleyhood of me getting £10 tickets are going to be next to zero!

The irony being that you have to have the money to stump up to be a priority member to get the cheap tickets. Although this time, I've gone for early previews when I can get the reduced price nice seats - those £10 ones do my back in.

It's always worth regularly checking back on the NT website, seats often suddenly reappear on sale.

If there is a priority member that wouldnt mind booking for me then I will be more than happy to sort out Payment ASAP

I'm generally less interested in the cast than the director (the cast will be fine anyway at the NT). McDonald's an interesting director and Dido's an interesting play - I'll go.

Not certain about in the Olivier, but in the Lyttelton, row A is never put on sale until general booking goes on sale. The 2 new Olivier shows are £10 season ones anyway, so you won't have any trouble there. Your only issue may be with the War Horse extension, and since so many people have already seen it (either this or last year), you might get lucky there. As I said I don't know for sure about the Olivier - they may also keep some £10 back for the general booking, and I've got circle row G seats well past the general public booking date before (they really aren't as bad as that sounds, particularly for a tenner, and the physical seat is much bigger than those in the front 3 rows of the stalls) so don't give up hope yet.

Also, it might be worth you buying membership - its only £12.50 for a year and pretty much guarantees you £10 tickets for everything...

What do you suppose the chances are of Dido being extended into the following booking period? March to early May is virtually impossible for me to get away from work and head over to London, and I desperately want to see that one.