Off-West End Announcements – 27 November 2009
Midsummer Night’s Greig
Soho Theatre seems to have become the unofficial receiving
house for Edinburgh’s Traverse. Following on from the successful transfers of Orphans
and A Life in Three Acts, Soho’s 2010 season will open with another
Traverse hit in Midsummer (12 Jan – 6 Feb), a romantic
comedy co-written by the award-winning David Greig and Gordon McIntyre of
Edinburgh band ballboy. Matthew Pidgeon and Cora Bissett play Bob and Helena,
an unlikely pairing caught up in a lost weekend of bridge-burning, car chases,
wedding bust-ups and bondage, complete with original songs performed live.
Full Cast Announced for Rose Dream
From Midsummer to A Midsummer’s
Night Dream, the Rose Theatre Kingston has announced the full cast
for their spring production of Shakespeare’s comedy, which runs from 9 February
to 20 March. Starring alongside Dame Judi Dench will be Charles Edward as
Oberon, television faces Oliver Chris (Green Wing) as Bottom
and Ben Mansfield (Primeval) as Lysander, and Rachael
Stirling (Diana Rigg’s daughter) as Helena. Director Peter Hall celebrates his
80th birthday next year.
Donmar’s Elliot Cowan To Direct
Fresh from his stint in A Streetcar Named Desire
at the Donmar, actor Elliot Cowan makes his directorial debut this December
with David Mamet’s Edmond at Wilton’s Music Hall (14-16
December). Investigating what makes a man a man, this new production of Mamet’s urban min-epic will feature Tobias Menzies (Rome) in the lead role of American
Everyman, alongside a top-rate cast including Kate Sissons and Colm Gormley. Local bluesgrass trio, The
Bonfire Band, provide the music.
Play Pacman at Old Red
Lion
Award-winning poet
and journalist Ross Sutherland will be bringing his darkly comic one man show
to the Old Red Lion in early 2010. Set amid the backdrop of mid-recession
Britain and a decaying newspaper industry,
The Three Stigmata Of Pacman, (12-30
January) combines poetry, stories and animation in Sutherland’s trademark way to investigate
the media’s self-fulfilling prophecy. As Sutherland sees it, journalists are reporting science fiction while poets bury themselves in the garden.
Cock Theatre Chooses A Ward
Fringe stalwart Nick Ward has been named playwright in residence at Kilburn’s Cock
Tavern Theatre. A past winner of the George Devine Award for Apart From
George (revived in June 2009 at the Finborough), Ward worked
extensively at the National Theatre Studio in the eighties alongside Peter Gill.
August saw the revival of his play The Present at the Cock and
future projects include a retrospective at Riverside Studios and the world premiere
of his first musical.
And
finally…
Theatre 503 is hosting a performed reading of Flycatcher,
written and directed by Gregg Masuak in his UK theatre debut this week. A former music
video producer, Masuak worked with Take
That, Spice Girls, Joe Cocker, Celine Dion, Kylie Minogue and Brand New Heavies
in his old life. Away from the fame game, his new play follows ill-fated waitress
Madelaine in her attempts to draw happy-go-lucky salesman Bing into her world.
See it first on either 3 or 4 December.
