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Equus Tours to Oldham

The London Classic Theatre Company bring the controversial play Equus to the Oldham Coliseum next month. The play centres on happenings within a Hampshire stable, as a youth blinds six horses with a metal spike.
 
Convicted of this appalling crime, seventeen-year-old Alan Strang is sent to a secure psychiatric hospital. Martin Dysart, the child psychiatrist assigned to him, begins to probe Alan’s past in an attempt to understand his motives. Initially the boy is silent and uncooperative, but as Dysart digs deeper, he gradually gains Alan’s trust and the truth begins to emerge. As Alan struggles to be free of his demons, he must first relive the events of that terrible night.
 
Inspired by a true story, Peter Shaffer's unique psychological thriller explores the complex relationships between worship, myth and sexuality.Following in the footsteps of the immense success enjoyed by the play’s West End revival in 2007, Shaffer’s powerful, absorbing drama tours the UK in Autumn 2011, with a vibrant new ensemble breathing fresh life into this theatrical masterpiece.  
 
Equus was originally staged in 1973 at the Royal National Theatre, London.  In 1977, a film adaptation of the play was released starring Richard Burton and Peter Firth.  In 2007, the play was revived in the West End for the first time since its première, in a critically-acclaimed production starring Daniel Radcliffe and Richard Griffiths. It also toured featuring Alfie Allen in the lead role.

Peter Shaffer was born in 1926. His award-winning plays include The Royal Hunt of the Sun (1964), Black Comedy (1965) and Amadeus (1979). Equus won the Tony Award and New York Critics Circle Award for Best New Play in 1977.

In 2010, London Classic Theatre celebrated ten years on tour, having performed to over 300,000 people at more than 150 theatres and arts centres around the UK and Ireland. The company, led by founder and Artistic Director Michael Cabot, produces challenging, accessible drama for audiences in London and the regions.

London Classic Theatre returns to the Oldham Coliseum Theatre following their previous tours The Beauty Queen of Leenane and Harold Pinter’s The Caretaker.

Equus stars Matthew Patimore in the lead role and Malcolm James as the psychiatrist and it runs from 4 - 8 October.

- by Glenn Meads

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