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Finborough Announces New Season, Apr-Jun 09

The Finborough Theatre has announced its second 2009 season, featuring three new plays as well as Sunday and Monday runs of three revivals. The Earls Court venue will introduce a new sceheme as its April to June season commences by offering £5 tickets to anyone under 30 who books online for the first week of any main production.

Starting off the season is Country Magic (14 April – 9 May), which tells of the redemptive power of love. Directed by Phil Wilmott, Country Magic is adapted from Arthur Wing Pinero’s classic fable, The Enchanted Cottage, and receives its world premiere at the Finborough.

The premieres continue as Craig Higginson’s new play, Dream of the Dog (12 May – 6 June), gets its European debut as the second show of the second season. Under the direction of James Albrecht, this South African production features Academy Award, BAFTA and Golden Globe nominee Janet Suzman in a play that centres on the emerging democracy in South Africa.

Closing out the Finborough’s second season is S-27 (9 June – 4 July), the inaugural winner of Amnesty International’s Protect the Human Playwriting Competition. Sarah Grochala’s award-winning production receives its world premiere with its Finborough summer run. Based on the creative work of Nhem En—a prison photographer under Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge— S-27 is directed by Stephen Keyworth.

The Sunday and Monday mini-seasons, interspersed amongst the main productions, showcase the revival of three plays that haven’t been onstage since their original runs.

The first show, The Killing of Mr. Toad (19, 20, 26, 27 April and 3, 4 May), recalls a timeless classic and the story which inspired it. Written and directed by David Gooderson, The Killing of Mr. Toad celebrates the 101st anniversary of The Wind in the Willows ’ publication and the 150th birthday anniversary of its author, Kenneth Grahame.

Painting a Wall (17, 18, 24, 25, 31 May and 1 June) continues the season with the revival of award-winning playwright David Lan’s first play. Directed by Titas Halder, this production is set in South Africa during the apartheid and follows four artists as they’re instructed to recover public walls with government-regulated white; however, they’ve been given the wrong colour paint.

The final Sunday/Monday production - the first revival of Nick Ward’s Apart from George (14, 15, 21, 22, 28, 29 June) - sheds a dark light upon a family facing unemployment. Ward’s acclaimed story is a previous winner of the George Devine Award. Live music accompanies this performance directed by Ben Kidd.

Other Finborough productions currently running elsewhere include the West End run of Nicholas de Jongh’s Plague Over England, showing through 16 May; and, hosted by Islington’s King’s Head Theatre is Joe DiPietro’s Fucking Men, booking until 9 June following a third extension.

- by Katie Blemler

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