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Studs, Lover & Elvis Headline Hull Truck Season

Hull Truck Theatre launches its autumn/winter season this week with the return of Gordon Steel's sell-out footballing romp, which embarks on a two-month national tour after its Hull engagement. Other season highlights include two new comedies by Hull artistic director John Godber, and fresh revivals of DH Lawrence's literary classic Lady Chatterley's Lover and Lee Hall's recent award-winning West End hit Cooking with ElvisStuds, running from 5 to 28 September, tells the story of Beckham wannabes and the trouble they have on and off the pitch, particularly when it comes to their few non-football relationships. It's directed by Gareth Tudor Price and designed by Pip Leckenby. The play was first seen at Hull Truck in spring 2001 when it sold out.

Written in 1925, DH Lawrence's controversial novel, Lady Chatterley's Lover, was banned from sale until 1960. It made headlines for its frank and explicit depiction of sex and its portrayal of a passionate and adulterous love affair. Lady Constance Chatterley is a woman trapped in a loveless marriage; in her desperation, she breaks the conventions of her class and society to start an affair with Mellors, the gamekeeper. The stage play, adapted by Nick Lane and directed by Lane and Gareth Tudor Price, runs at Hull from 3 to 26 October.

John Godber's latest comedy, Men of the World, runs from 28 October to 9 November. It will also launch an extensive tour before returning to Hull once again from 16 January to 8 February. Long-suffering coach drivers Frank, Stick and Happy Larry have seen and done it all. As they head towards the Channel Tunnel en route to the Rhine Valley with 30 OAPs, what could possibly go wrong? In the style of Godber's Bouncers, three actors will play 30 characters in this production, directed by Godber himself.

It's followed by Reunion, which lifts the lid on the shameful world of the college get-together in the cyber age. Also written and directed by Godber, it plays 28 November 2002 to 11 January 2003. This year's Christmas play at Hull will be The Hunchback of Notre Dame, from 2 to 24 December 2002. Victor Hugo's story has been rewritten for the stage by Nick Lane, who also directs.

The first new production of the new year will be Lee Hall's Cooking with Elvis, playing 13 February to 15 March 2003. It revolves around a cooking-mad teenage girl, her promiscuous mother and her paralysed Elvis impersonator father. In 2000, the black comedy had a successful run at the West End’s Whitehall Theatre, where it starred comedian Frank Skinner.

- by Sarah Beaumont

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