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WOS TV: Up Close With … Betty Blue Eyes‘ Reece Shearsmith

Cameron Mackintosh‘s first original musical production in over a decade, Betty Blue Eyes opened at the Novello Theatre on 13 April 2011 (previews from 19 March) starring Reece Shearsmith as a chiropodist Gilbert Chilvers.

Based on the Alan Bennett-penned film A Private Function the musical is set against the backdrop of the 1947 royal wedding and a northern English town who decided to illegally raise a pig for a celebratory feast.

Shearsmith appears alongside Sarah Lancashire, David Bamber, Jack Edwards, Ann Emery, Mark Meadows and Adrian Scarborough.

Best known for his work with The League of Gentlemen – fellow performers Mark Gatiss, Steve Pemberton and co-writer Jeremy Dyson – Shearsmith has made frequent television appearances.

His stage credits include playing Leo Bloom in the 2006 West End production of The Producers and a stint in the lead role of Dyson and Andy Nyman’s Ghost Stories at the Duke of York’s Theatre.

Betty Blue Eyes, which has music and lyrics by George Stiles and Anthony Drewe and a book by American writing duo Ron Cowen and Daniel Lipman, will play its final performance on 24 September 2011 after a six-month run.