Theatre News

New work and established favourites at the New Wolsey Theatre for Spring 2013

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29 October 2012

Pantomime glitter and gloss will have
faded from the memory by the time February 2013 fills the ditches and
floods the fields, so it’s perhaps appropriate that the new season at
Ipswich’s New Wolsey Theatre opens with the world première
of a psychological thriller by Michael Lesslie, And Then
The Dark. This runs from 8 February until 2 March and will
be directed by Peter Rowe, the theatre’s artistic director.

By
contrast, a co-production between the New Wolsey, Birmingham
Repertory Company, the Nottingham Playhouse and Teatro Kismet
introduces the stage version of Peter Pullman‘s I Was a
Rat! adapted and directed by Teresa Ludovico. This has a
week’s run between 12 and 16 March in Ipswich. The third major
co-production is Miss Nightingale, a burlesque
musical in association with Mr Bugg Presents, from 2 to 11 May.

Visiting
productions are equally varied. There’s a return visit from Opera
della Luna on 30 and 31 January; The Parson’s Pirates
is The Pirates of Penzance but not quite as Gilbert
and Sullivan conceived them. LipService’s Maggie Fox and Sue
Ryding offer Inspector Norse between 5 and 7
March. The stage presentation of Sebastian Faulks‘ Birdsong
comes to Ipswich after its West End run from 25 to 30 March.
Ockham’s Razor is an aerial physical theatre company making a return
visit – this time with Not Until We Are Lost
from 11 to 13 April.

Miss
Julie in the new UK Touring Company production is on 16 and
17 April; the new translation is by Denis Nooman. Another West End
success, Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn‘s updating of their classic
Yes, Prime Minister, follows between 22 and 27
April. English Touring Theatre and the Liverpool Playhouse offer
Roger McGough‘s version of Molière‘s Le misanthrope
for the week 14 to 18 May.

Fresh
Glory and the Newbury Watermill revive their small-scale touring
production of Richard Hurford‘s Some Like It Hotter
– yes, this is the one which gives the characters created by
Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon an unusual
after-life. 2 to 25 May reveals all. Studio shows include a rehearsed
reading of John Binnie‘s Killing Me Softly on 23
February, Whole by Philip Osment (12 and 13
March) and the Dan Canham creation Ours Was the Fen
Country on 3 and 4 May.

As
always, there’s a good mix of shows for younger audience members in
the studio. The main Easter offering is We’re Going on a
Bear Hunt adapted from the Michael Rosen book, between 2
and 5 April. Nottingham Playhouse brings White Peacock
by Gill Brigg for young people with learning difficulties,
including autism, to the High Street Exhibition Gallery (HEG) from 7
to 11 May. And of course, the Pulse Fringe Festival takes over
theatre, studio and a whole host of other spaces between 30 May and 8
June.