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Shaw Joins Connery's Son in Blue Room Tour, 3 Feb

Coronation Street's Tracy Shaw (pictured) will make her dramatic stage debut next year playing opposite Jason Connery (son of Sean) in a new touring production of David Hare's two-hander The Blue Room. The tour will open at Cambridge's Arts Theatre on 3 February 2003 before continuing until 24 May to 15 further venues ahead of an expected West End transfer.

In The Blue Room, freely adapted from based on Arthur Schnitzler's controversial La Ronde, ten different characters, involved in a series of sexual liaisons, are played by just two actors. If this new production makes it into town, it would be The Blue Room's third West End outing in less than five years.

Hare's play was first seen in 1998 at the Donmar Warehouse where Sam Mendes' acclaimed production featured a briefly disrobed Nicole Kidman who the Daily Telegraph critic deemed "pure theatrical Viagra". That production subsequently transferred to Broadway. Two years later, Chichester Festival Theatre mounted its own production, starring Camilla Power and Michael Higgs, which transferred to the West End's Theatre Royal Haymarket in October 2000.

Shaw - who has confirmed that, like Kidman, she too will be baring all - is best known as for her role as Maxine Peacock in TV soap Coronation Street. She's been playing the role since 1995 but leaves the show next month. Connery's screen credits include Robin of Sherwood, Bullet to Beijing, Macbeth, Shanghai Noon and Urban Ghost Story. He appeared on the London stage last year in Faithful Dealing at Soho Theatre.

The new production of The Blue Room is directed by Joe Harmstone and designed by Simon Scullion, with lighting by Robin Carter and sound by Ian Horrocks-Taylor. It's produced by Julius Green.

Following Cambridge, The Blue Room continues to Richmond, Dartford, Guildford, Lincoln, Cardiff, Eastbourne, Londonderry, York, Brighton, Milton Keynes, Edinburgh, Wolverhampton, Stoke, Birmingham and Manchester.

- Terri Paddock

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