Key North East Openings this March

OPENING 4 March 2010, April in Paris is revived at the Hull Truck with a cast including John and Jane Godber. In their first stint on stage together in years, the couple bring a different nuance to the roles first played in 1992. Al and Bet leave England for Paris, where they not only see the sights and sample French cuisine, but also discover each other anew. John Godber writes and directs. The season continues until 27 March.

OPENING 5 March 2010, Rum and Coca Cola is at the West Yorkshire Playhouse with a cast including Victor Romero Evans and Marcel McCalla. Mustapha Matura’s 1976 two-hander is updated for modern audiences in Don Warrington’s directorial debut. On Trinidad’s beaches, ex-Calypso King Professor teaches aspiring young Slim the fruits of his heyday’s labour, in a gently bittersweet play. The season continues until 3 April.

OPENING 11 March 2010, Sisters world premieres at Sheffield Studio with a cast including Zahra Ahmadi, Denise Black and Lena Kaur. A verbatim piece based on dozens of interviews with women across the country, Stephanie Street’s first full length play explores the realities of life as a Muslim today. Ruth Carney directs. The season continues until 27 March.

OPENING 30 March 2010, The Canterbury Tales is at the West Yorkshire Playhouse with a cast including Richard Standing and Alan McMahon. In Chaucer’s lively, bold narrative poem which has been reworked for performance by Mike Poulton for the Northern Broadsides, a bunch of pilgrims share their stories, by turns bawdy, sentimental, or outrageous, on their way to Canterbury. Conrad Nelson, who recently played Iago alongside Lenny Henry in the Broadsides’ Othello, directs. The season continues at the Playhouse until 17 April, before continuing its tour.

– Vicky Ellis