MILLER AND SONDHEIM CLASSICS, A VICTORIA WOOD PLAY WITH SONGS AND A SIMON STEPHENS WORLD PREMIERE AMONG HIGHLIGHTS OF ROYAL EXCHANGE THEATRE’S NEW AUTUMN – WINTER 2013 / 14 SEASON
The season kicks off with Miller’s masterpiece ALL MY SONS - a co-production with Talawa Theatre Company - which runs from Wednesday 25 September to Saturday 26 October 2013.
Set in 1947, the play centres on Joe and Kate Keller, an all-American couple who have the ghosts of World War II living in their own backyard. Joe is a successful, self-made businessman, a loving family man and a pillar of the community. He is a partner in a machine shop building fighter plane parts. One thing overshadows Joe and Kate’s happiness - their son is missing in action, presumed dead by all but his mother.
A searing investigation of honesty, guilt and the corrupting power of greed, the play was Arthur Miller’s first success, establishing him as a leading voice in theatre.
This collaboration features Don Warrington, who first rose to TV fame as Phillip Smith in RISING DAMP. The cast also includes Doña Croll, whose many television credits include long-running roles in CASUALTY and DOCTORS.
The production is directed by Michael Buffong, Artistic Director of Talawa Theatre Company. His previous credits for the Royal Exchange include the multi award-winning A RAISIN IN THE SUN and PRIVATE LIVES. Talawa Theatre Company is Britain’s primary Black-led theatre company, producing work that has had a major impact on the British theatrical landscape since 1987.
AUTUMN – WINTER 2013 / 14 SEASON / 2
The season continues with the Royal Exchange joining forces with West Yorkshire Playhouse in Leeds to present a new production of Stephen Sondheim’s musical theatre classic SWEENEY TODD – The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street.
Packed with Sondheim’s characteristic wit and dark humour, SWEENEY TODD is a heart-poundingly entertaining musical thriller about a man driven mad by injustice. Widely acknowledged as Stephen Sondheim’s masterpiece, it is a razor sharp tale of vengeance and true love - featuring some of the finest music ever written for the theatre.
This spine-chilling contemporary version will be directed by West Yorkshire Playhouse Artistic Director, James Brining. It will be his first production since joining the WYP and will mark the beginning of a creative partnership with the Royal Exchange.
The show will open in Leeds from Thursday 26 September to Saturday 26 October before being re-worked for the Royal Exchange, where it will run from Friday 1 November to Saturday 30 November 2013. Originally staged in Dundee in 2010, Brining will revisit his TMA Award-winning production for two very different and iconic theatre stages.
This is followed by THAT DAY WE SANG by Victoria Wood which runs from Thursday 5 December 2013 to Saturday 18 January 2014.
Reinvented and re-orchestrated for the Royal Exchange’s unique space, THAT DAY WE SANG is a big-hearted and nostalgic Manchester love story for all the family, written by one of the country’s most distinctive and well-loved comedic voices.
Set in the summer of ‘69, insurance clerk Tubby and secretary Enid are back on stage at the Free Trade Hall. Granada Television are recording a documentary celebrating the forty years since they first stood there as children, singing their hearts out with fellow school pupils and accompanied by the Halle Orchestra.
This is the humorous, warm and uplifting story of two people who are trying to reconnect with who they were then and who they could be now. The show was commissioned for the Manchester International Festival 2011 and was one of the must-see events that year.
The production is directed by Royal Exchange Artistic Director Sarah Frankcom. Her recent RET successes include PUNK ROCK, WINTERLONG, THE LADY FROM THE SEA, A VIEW FROM THE BRIDGE, MISS JULIE, BLACK ROSES: THE KILLING OF SOPHIE LANCASTER and OPRHEUS DESCENDING.
AUTUMN – WINTER 2013 / 14 SEASON / 3
The season concludes with the world premiere of BLINDSIDED by Simon Stephens, which runs from Thursday 23 January to Saturday 15 February 2014.
The drama centres on a girl growing up in a battered part of Stockport at the end of the seventies. She falls in love with the man who will break her heart into a thousand pieces. BLINDSIDED is an unexpected and romantic play about murder, spanning from the beginnings of the Thatcher Government in 1979 to the birth of New Labour in 1997.
Simon Stephens is one of the most prolific contemporary writers in the UK. His acclaimed adaptation of Mark Haddon’s novel THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE DOG IN THE NIGHT and his play PORT, which premiered at the Royal Exchange in 2002, have both recently enjoyed hugely successful runs at the National Theatre.
BLINDSIDED is the fourth play he has written specifically for the Royal Exchange and follows the success of PUNK ROCK in 2009. The production is directed by Sarah Frankcom.
The cast includes Katie West (PUNK ROCK) and Julie Hesmondhalgh, best known for playing Hayley Cropper in CORONATION STREET and who last appeared at the Exchange in BLACK ROSES: THE KILLING OF SOPHIE LANCASTER (for which she recently won a Manchester Theatre Award).
Full details of the new season in The Studio at The Royal Exchange Theatre are still to be announced but the highlights include THERE HAS POSSIBLY BEEN AN INCIDENT by Chris Thorpe, and the world premiere of EDMUND THE LEARNED PIG by Mike Kenny.
THERE HAS POSSIBLY BEEN AN INCIDENT will premiere at this year’s Latitude Festival and play as part of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in August, before running in The Studio from Tuesday 3 September to Saturday 21 September 2013.
Chris Thorpe’s new piece tells a series of interlocking stories about the moments when life offers you a choice between heroism and compromise, and what happens after you choose.
EDMUND THE LEARNED PIG runs in The Studio from Wednesday 9 October to Saturday 26 October 2013.
This co-production between the Royal Exchange Theatre, Fittings Multimedia Arts and Krazy Kat Theatre Company fuses British Sign Language, puppetry, mime and music for audiences aged 8 and above.
AUTUMN – WINTER 2013 / 14 SEASON / 4
The play tells the story of Bonaparte's travelling circus show and marvellous menagerie. With just pigeons, an aerialist who won’t leave the ground, a chipped plate-spinning act and a Mr Memory who can hardly remember his own name, it is one its uppers. Then into their lives comes Edmund the Learned Pig!
Fittings Multimedia Arts is a disability led performance company who have been making work since 1995. EDMUND THE LEARNED PIG was written by Mike Kenny, an award-winning playwright, specialising in work for young people with songs and music by Martyn Jaques (The Tiger Lillies).
Tickets for the new season go on public sale Friday 3 May (Box Office: 0161 833 9833).
For further information, please contact JOHN GOODFELLOW (Press Officer) on 0161 615 6783 / john.goodfellow@royalexchange.co.uk
* Please note – Press Nights in The Theatre have been moved to Tuesdays
Royal Exchange Theatre Autumn - Winter 2013 / 14 Season
Tickets go on sale Friday 3 May – Box Office: 0161 833 9833
THERE HAS POSSIBLY BEEN AN INCIDENT
By Chris Thorpe
Directed by Sam Pritchard
The Studio
Tuesday 3 September - Saturday 21 September 2013.
PRESS NIGHT: WEDNESDAY 4 SEPTEMBER
ALL MY SONS
By Arthur Miller
Directed by Michael Buffong
A Royal Exchange Theatre and Talawa Theatre Company co-production.
The Theatre
Wednesday 25 September - Saturday 26 October 2013.
PRESS NIGHT: TUESDAY 1 OCTOBER
World Premiere
EDWARD THE LEARNED PIG
By Mike Kenny
Music and songs by Martyn Jaques of The Tiger Lillies
From an orginal idea by Garry Robson and Kinny Gardner
A Royal Exchange Theatre, Fittings Multimedia Arts and Krazy Kat Theatre Company co-production
The Studio
Wednesday 9 October - Saturday 26 October 2013.
PRESS NIGHT: THURSDAY 10 OCTOBER
The Royal Exchange Theatre and West Yorkshire Playhouse present:
SWEENEY TODD – THE DEMON BARBER OF FLEET STREET
A Musical Thriller
Music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim
Book by Hugh Wheeler
From an adaptation by Christopher Bond
Directed by James Brining
The Theatre
Friday 1 November - Saturday 30 November 2013.
PRESS NIGHT: TUESDAY 5 NOVEMBER
THAT DAY WE SANG
By Victoria Wood
Directed by Sarah Frankcom
The Theatre
Thursday 5 December 2013 - Saturday 18 January 2014.
PRESS NIGHT: TUESDAY 10 DECEMBER
World Premiere:
BLINDSIDED
By Simon Stephens
Directed by Sarah Frankcom
The Theatre
Thursday 23 January - Saturday 15 February.
PRESS NIGHT: TUESDAY 28 JANUARY
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