”Brokeback Mountain” stage adaptation to run in the West End with Mike Faist and Lucas Hedges
© Photography by Mark Seliger, graphic design Feast Creative
The world premiere stage adaptation of Annie Proulx’s Brokeback Mountain will open in the West End.
A new play by Ashley Robinson, with songs by Dan Gillespie Sells, the piece will be directed by Jonathan Butterell. Butterell is reuniting with Gillespie Sells and producer Nica Burns, the team behind the hit musical Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, for the piece.
Proulx said: “Brokeback Mountain has been recreated in several different forms, each with its own distinctive moods and impact. Ashley’s script is fresh and deeply moving, opening sight lines not visible in the original nor successive treatments.”
Robinson added: “I’m honoured to be entrusted by Annie Proulx to bring new life in new form to her timeless and universal story. A story that means so much to so many, and will surely mean as much to a whole new generation.
Dan Gillespie Sells’ powerful and beautiful songs, sung by “The Balladeer,” give voice to the tumultuous inner landscape of our wannabe cowboys (both young men of few words), and provide the scope of our vast and brutal outer landscape, not to mention allowing Proulx’s poetic prose to literally sing.
“Grateful as all hell to reunite with Jonathan Butterell and to put this piece in his skilled and sensitive hands—what lucky actors, what a lucky team, and what a lucky production, all coming together under Nica Burns, in her marvel of a new space, @sohoplace. Let’s ride.”
The play is designed by a team including Tom Pye for set and costumes, David Finn for lighting, and Christopher Shutt for sound.
Brokeback Mountain will see Tony and BAFTA Award-nominated Mike Faist (Dear Evan Hansen on Broadway, West Side Story film) star as Jack, alongside Academy Award-nominated Lucas Hedges (Manchester By The Sea) as Ennis. Gillespie Sells’ original songs will be performed by Eddi Reader (Fairground Attraction) who plays the Balladeer (guitar/vocals).
Reader will be joined by an on-stage band made up of Sean Green (piano/MD), Meelie Traill (upright bass), Julian Jackson (chromatic harmonica), BJ Cole (pedal steel guitar).
Gillespie Sells commented: “I have loved working on this project with Ashley and Jonathan. The material and this complex story is inspiring to compose for. I’ve really enjoyed reconnecting with a genre of music I grew up with and using it to serve the drama of each moment. Plus I get to work with some legendary artists which is such an honour and a joy.”
The play tells the intense tale of an irresistible and hidden love spanning twenty years. The production is set in Wyoming in 1963, where people live in extreme rural poverty in tight, insular, and conservative communities. Ennis and Jack take jobs on the isolated Brokeback Mountain, which changes their certainties of life forever.
Brokeback Mountain is to be the first world premiere play to be originated at @sohoplace and the fourth production to open at the new venue, following Marvellous, As You Like It, and Medea.
The play is produced by Nica Burns with Adam Blanshay Productions, Lambert Jackson Productions, and Katy Lipson for Aria Entertainment. Tickets for the limited season, which runs from 10 May until August 12, 2023, are currently on sale.
Butterell said: “When Ashley approached us about collaborating on Brokeback Mountain we were struck immediately by his deep connection to the world and community that Annie has so brilliantly written about over the years. He brought to the adaptation an authenticity and an understanding of these working class men, scraping to survive the harsh brutality of their environment and the insularity of thinking surrounding them, which ultimately leads to their tragedy.”
Burns added: “I am excited that our fourth production @sohoplace, Brokeback Mountain, is our first world premiere. In the intimate, intense auditorium that is @sohoplace, our production concentrates on the relationship between our two lead characters with Eddi Reader’s memorable voice adding to the heartbreak as the soundtrack of their lives.
“To have Mike Faist and Lucas Hedges, two outstanding young American actors playing Jack and Ennis is a real coup. We are thrilled.”
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