Closer Replicates Stage Cyber-Chat

The innovative Internet chat scene staged in Patrick Marber s Closer will be recreated live on the Internet this Thursday, 25 June 1998 on the show's own website. Visitors will able to talk directly with award-winning playwright Marber for at least one hour from 8.00PM. Unlike in the stage version, however, organisers say the discussion must stay clean - any lewd comments will be banned.

The dedicated website, a complement to the show, gives visitors insights into the processes which went into the creation of the play as well as cast and creative team biographies.

The current cast of Closer (until 11 July) features Frances Barber, Neil Pearson, Lloyd Owen and Liza Walker. From 13 July, Imogen Stubbs will take over as ‘Anna , Tom Mannion as ‘Larry , and Kate Ashfield as ‘Alice ; Owen will remain as ‘Dan . The play is now booking until 26 September.

Closer, a ‘play for the 90s which examines a quartet caught up in a web of love, sex and betrayal, originally opened at the RNT's Cottesloe Theatre in May 1997 before transferring to its Lyttelton Theatre in October. After a sell-out run, it transferred to Shaftesbury Avenue's Lyric Theatre on 31 March 1998. Closer has won the Evening Standard Drama Award for Best Comedy, the Time Out Award for Best Play in the West End in 1997, the 1998 Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Play and the Critics Circle Drama Award for Best Play.

Closer is written and directed by Patrick Marber with design by Vicki Mortimer, lighting by Hugh Vanstone and music by Paddy Cuneen.

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