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Union Man of No Importance Transfers to West End

The Union Theatre’s acclaimed fringe production of A Man of No Importance, the award-winning Off-Broadway musical from the writers of Ragtime, will transfer to the West End next month, for a limited season at the Arts Theatre from 10 to 27 February 2010 (preview 9 February).

Based on the 1994 film of the same title starring Albert Finney, A Man of No Importance – with a book by Terrence McNally, lyrics by Lynn Ahrens and music by Stephen Flaherty, the same team behind Ragtime – was first seen Off-Broadway in 2002. This new production, which ran at the 80-seat Union Theatre in Southwark in November, marked the musical’s UK and European premiere.

In his off-duty time, poetry-loving Dublin bus conductor Alfie Byrne is as the director of the local community theatre, which operates out of a small parish hall in the neighborhood church. Alfie’s bus passengers are also his performers: amateur thespians that come to see the magic the theatre offers through Alfie’s eyes. Together, they are determined to present a version of Oscar Wilde’s Salome, despite church objections.

Paul Clarkson, who won an Olivier in 1984 for Howard Goodall’s The Hired Man, stars as Alfie, in a cast that also features Roisin Sullivan, Anthony Cable, [Dieter Thomas[ and Paul Monaghan.

The production is directed by Ben De Wynter, choreographed by Phyllida Crowley-Smith and designed by James Turner, with musical direction by Christopher Peake. Also in the cast are: Jamie Honeybourne, AJ O’Neill, Joanna Nevin, Ruth Berkeley, Kimberly Ensor, Emily Juler, Nicola Redman, Niall Sheehy, Daniel Maguire, Patrick Joseph Kelliher, Barra Collins and Adam Davenport.

- by Terri Paddock

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