Cast & Dates for NT Spring Rep Shows Confirmed
The National Theatre have today (4 November 2011) confirmed the line-up for their repertory season through to March 2012.
Nicholas Hytner‘s production, which is set in a remote Eastern European village around 1900 and sees an American film director look back on his early life and confront the cost of fulfilling his dreams, will also tour to Salford, Leeds, Aylesbury and Newcastle from 13 March to 7 April 2012.
The full cast for Travelling Light were today announced as Mark Extance, Colin Haigh, Paul Jesson, Sue Kelvin, Abigail McKern, Damien Molony, Lauren O’Neil, Karl Theobald and Alexis Zegerman. The production will have set designs by Bob Crowley, costumes by Vicki Mortimer, lighting by Bruno Poet, video and projection design by Jon Driscoll, music by Grant Olding and sound by Rich Walsh.
Dates have also today been confirmed for Jamie Lloyd‘s production of She Stoops To Conquer which, as previously reported, will star Steve Pemberton, Sophie Thompson and Coronation Street‘s Katherine Kelly.
Oliver Goldsmith’s classic 18th-century comedy of manners will open in the NT Olivier on 31 January 2012 (previews from 24 January) where it will play in rep.
The cast for She Stoops To Conquer will also include David Fynn, Harry Hadden-Paton, John Heffernan, Cush Jumbo and Gavin Spokes. The production is designed by Mark Thomson, lighting by Neil Austin, sound and music by The Ringham Brothers and movement by Ann Yee.
Errol John’s 1953 play Moon On A Rainbow Shawl will open at the NT Cottesloe on 14 March (previews from 7 March) directed by the newly appointed artistic director of Talawa Theatre Company, Michael Buffong.
Set in Port of Spain, Trinidad, the play follows Ephraim as he trys to escape his dead-end job for a fresh start in England.
Michael Buffong recent productions include A Raisin in the Sun for the Royal Exchange, Manchester and Little Sweet Thing at the Hampstead Theatre and on tour as well as television work on Holby City, EastEnders, Hollyoaks, Casualty and Doctors. For Talawa he has helmed productions of Long Time No See, Unfinished Business and Brother to Brother.
As previously announced, acclaimed physical theatre company DV8 will return to the National Theatre next year, bringing director Lloyd Newson‘s new work about freedom of speech, Islam and multiculturalism, Can We Talk About This?, to the NT Lyttelton from 12 to 28 March 2012 (previews from 9 March).
The production tackles issues such as the 1989 book burnings of Salman Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses, the murder of filmmaker Theo Van Gogh and the controversy of the ‘Muhammad cartoons’ in 2005.
The piece premiered at Sydney Opera House and will tour to West Yorkshire Playhouse and Warwick Arts Centre in this month prior to dates in Brighton, the National and the Lowry next spring as part of an international tour schedule.
The National Theatre’s Learning programme will present Island, a new play for young audiences written by Nicky Singer and directed by Adam Penford, which will play the NT Cottesloe from 15 to 25 February before touring to primary schools in the Spring Term.
In the middle of the Arctic Ocean lies an island where it is always day. The ice groans and cracks, the ground shifts under your feet, and skies flash with ice storms that freeze flesh in thirty seconds flat. Little wonder Cameron is reluctant to spend a week of his school holidays there.
