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Keith & Stubbs Display Star Quality on Tour

Penelope Keith (pictured) and Una Stubbs are to star in a new version of Noel Coward's comedy Star Quality. The production opens at Guildford Yvonne Arnaud Theatre on 20 August 2001 before heading out on an autumn tour.

The play, adapted from Coward's story and directed by Christopher Luscombe, relates the battle of egos that accompanies the staging of a new work. A backstage world of talent and treachery is revealed, peopled by a temperamental leading lady, a ruthless director and a jaded set of old troupers.

Penelope Keith trained at the Weber Douglas Academy and soon embarked on a career in repertory theatre. Keith was already successful on stage, and a member of the RSC, when she was cast in the major television comedy The Good Life as snobbish Margo Ledbetter. Another sitcom, To the Manor Born, followed later - also for the BBC. The actress appeared as Queen Elizabeth I in The Regina Monologues at the Covent Garden Festival earlier this year.

Una Stubbs is a Leicester-born dancer turned actress, who came to public prominence via the controversial television comedy series 'Till Death Do Us Part. She played the part of Sandy in the 1963 film Summer Holiday and her numerous stage credits include An Ideal Husband at Manchester's Royal Exchange, and Coward's The Young Ideal at Guildford.

Other members of the cast include Russell Boulter, who is familiar to TV audiences as DS John Boulton in The Bill. Also starring is Nick Fletcher, who appeared in The Globe's 1997 productions of Henry V and Middleton's A Chaste Maid in Cheapside. Following the Guildford dates, Star Quality will call at Milton Keynes, Richmond, Malvern, Nottingham, Bradford, Cardiff and Bath.

- by Gareth Thompson

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