Redgrave Entertainer Launches New Liverpool LifeDate: 16 December 2003
The jointly managed Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse have announced an expansionist strategy aimed at repositioning the Merseyside venues at the forefront of regional producing theatres operating on a 'national stage' as well as increasing drama as part of the mix on offer during Liverpool's year as a European Capital of Culture in 2008 (See News, 4 Jun 2003).
At a press conference held yesterday in London, artistic director Gemma Bodinetz and executive director Deborah Aydon, both newly appointed in September, announced their first season for spring/summer 2004, which will see the number of in-house productions across the two theatres increase from one to six in the first year as well as the launch of collaborative relationships with Oxford Stage Company, Manchester's Royal Exchange and London's Donmar Warehouse.
Highlights of the pair's inaugural season include a revival of John Osborne's The Entertainer, starring Corin Redgrave (whose parents Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson Redgrave first met on stage at the Playhouse in 1935); August Wilson's modern African American classic Ma Rainey's Black Bottom; and the UK premiere of Dael Orlandersmith's Yellowman.
Speaking at yesterday's event, Sir Bob Scott, chief executive of The Culture Company, which was behind Liverpool's successful bid to become a Capital of Culture, praised the new "courageous" programming for the two theatres. "Six years ago, they were both for the scrap heap. Now there's a real sense of excitement in Liverpool that things are really on the up."
Bodinetz admitted that "the theatres need to do a very big sprint to catch up with the other big arts centres in Liverpool", but felt confident that the new season - which will also introduce £5 Monday evenings for all shows - would start to lure more audiences in. As part of the fresh approach, she and Aydon have sought to programme according to the individual identities of the 800-seat proscenium arch Playhouse and the 400-seat, semi-round Everyman. The former will focus on "bold and creative productions of great plays" and the latter on "putting the writer back at the heart of what we do".
In the Playhouse
The Playhouse season opens with The Entertainer, directed by John Tiffany (The Straits, Gagarin Way) and running from 20 January to 7 February 2004 (previews from 16 January). Written in 1957, the play followed Osborne's groundbreaking earlier hit Look Back in Anger. Laurence Olivier originated the role of Archie Rice, a sleazy, tax-dodging music hall comedian in the Royal Court premiere. In the new production, Redgrave (as Archie) is joined in the cast by Paola Dionosetti (Further Than the Furthest Thing), Mark Rice-Oxley (The Dwarfs), Eileen Walsh and former variety artist Leslie Randall.
The second Playhouse production is a double bill of two Noel Coward plays about adultery - Still Life, which inspired David Lean's film classic Brief Encounter, and The Astonished Heart. The rarely performed one-acters will be directed by Philip Wilson, running from 19 March to 10 April 2004.
The in-house schedule in the Playhouse concludes with Bodinetz's own production of Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, running from 28 May to 19 June 2004. Ma Rainey was the first of Wilson's decade-by-decade dramas about the 20th-century Black American experience to play on Broadway, where it was first seen in 1984 and was revived earlier this year with Whoopi Goldberg. The play tells the story of blues singer Ma Rainey and the effect that racism has on the lives and careers of her and her fellow musicians.
In the Everyman
At the Everyman, the in-house season begins with Bodinetz's production of Calderon de la Barca's The Mayor of Zalamea, adapted by Adrian Mitchell. Roy Marsden will star in the story about a peasant and his daughter who provide shelter for a bawdy troop of soldiers in 17th-century Spain.
The Mayor of Zalamea runs from 13 February to 6 March and is followed by the UK premiere of American dramatist Dael Orlandersmith's 2002 play Yellowman, from 16 April to 8 May 2004. Set in 1960s South Carolina, it follows Eugene and Alma who, from childhood playmates to teenage sweethearts, have struggled for acceptance.
The final in-house production at the Everyman will be Fly, a first play about small town relationships written by Katie Douglas, who was developed via the theatres' Writers on Attachment programme. It runs from 18 June to 10 July 2004. From 31 May to 5 June, the Everyman will also host a series of readings and other events for other emerging Liverpudlian writers.
Visiting productions
In addition to the in-house offerings, visiting productions will include: in the Everyman, Nitro's hip-hop musical Slamdunk, Northern Broadsides' The Merchant of Venice, the Royal Exchange's Basil and Beattie; Paines Plough's The Straits, and the Donmar's Henry IV, in a new version by Tom Stoppard and starring Ian McDiarmid; and in the Playhouse, Oxford Stage's revival of Brendan Behan's The Quare Fellow, directed by Kathy Burke; Adrian Dunbar's production of Brian Friel's Philadelphia, Here I Come!, Sweeney Todd care of the Watermill; Nottingham Playhouse's revival of Brecht's Mother Courage and Her Children and Out of Joint's premiere of David Hare's The Permanent Way.
- by Terri Paddock
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