Re-cycling a familiar French adventure: Le Navet Bete in The Three Musketeers. Picture: Mark Dawson
AFTER Dracula: The Bloody Truth and
Dick Tracy, travelling players Le Navet Bete come armed only with a baguette and
a questionable steed on their latest adventure.
The award-winning Essex physical comedy
troupe ride into York Theatre Royal on February 7 and 8 with The Three
Musketeers: A Comedy Adventure.
The main-house stage transforms into
the French countryside as hot-headed D’Artagnan travels to Paris full of
childish excitement and misplaced bravado to become a Musketeer. Will things go to plan? Unlikely, but at least this
chaotic caper will be in the hands of four actors wholly assured in taking on
more than 30 character portrayals.
“Sorry, I’m tied up for February 7 and 8 already. I’ll be at York Theatre Royal”. Picture: Matt Austin
Billed as their biggest and most
riotous show to date, The Three Musketeers: A Comedy Adventure is the sixth
time Le Navet Bete have worked with comedy director John Nicholson, co-artistic
director of Peepolykus and regular comedy writer for television and radio.
“This time we’ve collaborated on a
comedy version of Alexander Dumas’s classic French tale, turning it on its head,”
say Le Navet Bete, who have worked on the show with choreographer Lea Anderson
and set designer Ti Green too. “Expect all the main characters from the book,
but in ways you wouldn’t expect to see them,” they tease.
Le Navet Bete and Exeter Northcott Theatre present The Three Musketeers: A Comedy Adventure, York Theatre Royal, February 7 and 8, 7.30pm and 2.30pm Saturday matinee. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk. Suitable for age seven upwards.
Barrie Rutter after receiving his OBE on June 25 2015 at Buckingham Palace. Picture: Nobby Clark
BARRIE Rutter, award-winning Yorkshire actor, director and founder of Northern Broadsides, has been diagnosed with throat cancer.
In an official statement, 73-year-old Rutter is “in the good care of the mighty NHS and will begin his treatment very shortly”.
Born in 1946, the son of a Hull fish
worker, Rutter grew up in a two-up, two-down in the fish dock area of
Hull.
Barrie Rutter as Lear in King Lear in 2015. Picture: Nobby Clark
At school, an English teacher
frogmarched him into the school play because he had “the gob for it”, and
feeling at home on stage, Rutter chose his future direction.
There followed many years in the National Youth Theatre, culminating in The Apprentices, with a role written specially for him by Peter Terson: a practice to be repeated later in his career.
Seasons at the Royal Shakespeare
Company in Stratford, London and Europe completed the 1970s. In 1980, he joined
the National Theatre, a formative period when he met and worked closely with a
poet who was to become his guru, Leeds writer Tony Harrison.
Rutter performed in three of
Harrison’s adaptations, all written for the Northern voice: The Mysteries, The
Oresteia, and The Trackers Of Oxyrhynchus, wherein he played Silenus, a part
penned for Rutter.
Barrie Rutter as flash banker Fuller in Northern Broadsides’ For Love Or Money in 2017. Picture: Nobby Clark
This experience was the spark for actor-manager Rutter setting up Northern Broadsides in 1992, the Halifax company noted for bringing the northern voice, song and clog dancing to Shakespeare, classical theatre and new works alike.
Frustrated by what he perceived to be
inadequate Arts Council funding for Broadsides, he stepped down from the artistic director’s post in
April 2018. By then he had received the OBE for services to drama in 2015.
He last appeared on the York Theatre Royal stage in November 2017, when the quizzically eye-browed Rutter was at his most Rutter in his farewell Broadsides tour, For Love Or Money, a typically anarchic theatrical double act with Blake Morrison.
YORK’S
grand old dame, Berwick Kaler, is back in panto. Oh yes, he is.
At York
Theatre Royal, his “beloved home” for 41 years? Oh, no he isn’t.
Dame
Berwick is switching to the other side, the Grand Opera House, to become the
Grand’s old dame. What’s more, he will be bringing the rest of the Not Famous
But Famous In York Five along for the ride in Dick Turpin Rides Again: villain
David Leonard; sidekick stooge Martin Barrass; ageless principal girl Suzy
Cooper and luverly Brummie A J Powell.
Tickets for the December 12 to January 10 run will go on general sale on February 14, Valentine’s Day, when fans can have a love-in with Dame Berwick in the box office, when he sells the first tickets at 10am.
A delighted Kaler
says: “Qdos Entertainment have come to the rescue of the most lauded pantomime
in the country, having found us a new home at the Grand Opera House in our
beloved City of York.
“To make this a success we need
you – the most articulate and loyal audience in the entire country. We can go
forth with a management that believes we have enhanced the reputation of a
local pantomime that has caught the imagination of young and old, from all
walks of life.”
Qdos Entertainment’s managing director Michael Harrison enthuses: “We are absolutely delighted to be embarking on an all-new pantomime partnership with our colleagues at the Ambassador Theatre Group, Grand Opera House and, of course, Berwick and the gang.
“Berwick is an undeniable master in the world of pantomime, with his own inimitable style and approach and we are delighted to be working closely with him and the cast to bring back the magic for which they are best known.”
Kaler, 73, retired from playing the Theatre Royal’s dame after 40 years last February, but has signed a three-year contract with Qdos Entertainment, the pantomime powerhouse of British theatre, who are taking over the Grand Opera House panto from Three Bears Productions from Winter 2020.
Dame
Berwick will write and direct the show, as well as pulling on his trademark big
boots, unruly wig and spectacular frocks again, after regretting his decision
to retire, breaking his run as Britain’s longest-running dame, from the moment
he announced it.
Fully
recovered from his double heart bypass in the summer of 2018, It was a
sentiment he repeated regularly, not least on the last night of The Grand Old Dame
Of York on February 2 last year, saying he “would be back like a shot” if
asked.
Now the veteran dame does return, but across the city, where he has chosen Dick Turpin Rides Again for his first Grand Opera House pantomime, revisiting a show that brought him his highest ever audience figures at the Theatre Royal: 54,000 for Dick Turpin in 2008-2009.
He last appeared on the Opera House stage as fey drag artist Captain Terri Dennis in Peter Nichols’ Privates On Parade in 1996.
Kaler made
an emotional, provocative speech at the finale to last Saturday’s final night
of Sleeping Beauty, the troubled Theatre Royal pantomime he had written and
co-directed this winter, but whose progress was jolted by executive director
Tom Bird’s confirmation, with a fortnight still to run, that Dame Berwick would
not be back, as writer or director, let alone as dame.
BERWICKXIT: Berwick Kaler playing the dame in his last York Theatre Royal pantomime, The Grand Old Dame Of York, last winter. Picture: Anthony Robling
Suzy Cooper
and Kaler in The Press splash had called for the dame to return, David Leonard
later backed that campaign, while Martin Barrass addressed the audience at each
show post-announcement to say “this cast and this band” would not be returning.
A public petition was launched too.
“I’m b****y
furious,” said the dame, back on his old stamping ground, in a highly charged Saturday
atmosphere, full of cheers for Kaler and boos for new panto villain Bird.
Kaler could
not reveal “the truth”, but said Bird – or “one man” as he called him throughout
without naming him once – was “wrong” in his decision to move on to a new
creative team when the Theatre Royal pantomime “didn’t need fixing”.
“I’ll give them three days,” he said in a cryptic ultimatum that set tongues wagging that Kaler must have something up his sleeve, while Barrass rubbed his hands when reading out a letter in the shout-outs that suggested the Panto Five should move to “the Grand”.
Those three days passed, but now Dame Berwick rises again, linking up with Qdos Entertainment, whose production facilities are based in Scarborough and Beverley, 100,000 costumes et al. Billed as “the world’s biggest pantomime producer”, with 37 years behind them, they present such big-hitting pantos as the London Palladium and Newcastle Theatre Royal shows, as well as, closer to York, Hull New Theatre.
Welcoming the new partnership of Qdos and the Kaler crew, Grand Opera House theatre director Rachel Crocombe-Lane says: “Qdos bring both world-class expertise and also a Yorkshire heart, being based in Scarborough; the perfect combination together with this talented cast.
“As a venue team, pantomime is our favourite time of year because of the friendship with the company and also the joy and devotion of our audience. We are proud of these new partnerships, excited for the future of our pantomime and will be ready altogether to really blow your Christmas socks off!’
Qdos Entertainment chairman, Nick Thomas, from Scarborough, is excited too. “I am thrilled to welcome Berwick, a true Yorkshire theatre legend, to the Qdos family. Qdos Entertainment has had a long association with Yorkshire, it is my home county, and with our production and wardrobe teams based in Scarborough and Beverley, forming this new relationship with Berwick and the Grand Opera House is especially exciting.”
Meanwhile, York Theatre Royal will be launching its 2020-2021 pantomime on Monday at high noon. Rather than declaring a pantomime civil war in York, executive director Bird says: “We wish the Grand Opera House the very best of luck. As we’ve always said, we’ll be announcing our new pantomime on Monday”.
On Tuesday
this week, Bird told a City of York Council meeting that no performance of Sleeping
Beauty had sold out, save for the traditional last night pandemonium,
compounding a decline in attendances that had started 11 years ago.
He said the
Theatre Royal would “build a new pantomime for the city that to some extent doesn’t
rely on you having been to the pantomime for 30 years in order to get it”.
“I know how much affection there is
for our pantomime in the city. What’s prompted us to make this change is that
that affection isn’t necessarily translating into popularity,” he added. “It’s
with a very heavy heart that we make changes but it’s not something we can
leave.”
Tickets for Dick Turpin Rides Again will be on general sale from February 14 on 0844 871 3024, at atgtickets.com/york and in person from the Cumberland Street theatre’s box office.ATG Theatre Card holders can buy from February 11.
Lips’ ink: Poet Laureate Simon Armitage with a pen for his thoughts
SIMON Armitage is the fourth Yorkshireman to be appointed Poet Laureate, in the wake of Laurence Eusden, Alfred Austin and the rather better-known Ted Hughes.
“I know bits and pieces of the other two,” says the 56-year-old Huddersfield poet, who succeeded Carol Ann Duffy as the 21st incumbent of the prestigious ten-year post last May.
Next Tuesday and Wednesday (February 4 and 5), he will be performing in York for the first time since his appointment, presenting Seeing Stars: An Evening With Simon Armitage at York Theatre Royal in two fundraising shows to support the theatre’s community work.
“But I don’t see myself as someone who speaks for the county,” says Simon, “Though I’m obviously from here and speak with the voice I grew up with, the noises and dialect I grew up with, and I certainly use Yorkshire in my poetry.”
Historically, the payment for the laureateship was a gift of wine until Henry Pye chanced his arm by asking for a salary in 1790 in the reign of George III. That all changed again when Ted Hughes became Poet Laureate, whereupon Graham Hines, director of the Sherry Institute of Spain, invited him to Jerez in 1986, and the traditional gift was re-constituted.
“They invited me over to Spain last year, and I did my tasting, educating my palate and getting to choose my sherry, and then effectively they send over a barrel every year.”
Do you like sherry, Simon? “I do now!” he says.
Meanwhile, let’s raise a glass to his shows in York next week when Simon will be joined by “well-known actors” for the Seeing Stars poetry readings. “The performance is devised around the shows we did at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse [at Shakespeare’s Globe in London], maybe four years ago, when Tom Bird [now York Theatre Royal’s executive director] was at the Glob,” says Simon.
“In fact, the first performance was just when Dominic Dromgoole was leaving the artistic director’s post, and we did Sir Gawain And The Green Knight and The Death Of King Arthur poems, and it will be something along those lines with four actors in York.”
As the show’s title indicates, Seeing Stars will feature selections from Armitage’s book of dramatic monologues, allegories and absurdist tall tales of that title. “That book is ten years old this year: it’s very dramatic, very theatrical,” he says.
The York show is being curated by Scarborough-born theatre director Nick Bagnall, with the actors involved yet to be confirmed at the time of going to press.
“I first met Nick when he was playing a monkey trapped in a bathroom in Huddersfield!” Simon reveals. What? “It was a promenade event in a house in Huddersfield in an area called The Yards that was being knocked down,” he explains.
“I’ve since done a couple of my plays with him directing them: first my dramatisation of Homer’s The Iliad, The Last Days Of Troy, at Manchester’s Royal Exchange and Shakespeare’s Globe.
“There are no rules really, no written spec, so it’s a question for each incumbent to decide how they will interpret it,” says Simon Armitage of his post as Poet Laureate
“Then the Liverpool Everyman did The Odyssey: Missing Presumed Dead, which ended up at the Globe.”
Looking beyond next week to Simon’s decade-long tenure as Poet Laureate, what does the role entail?
“There are no rules really, no written spec, so it’s a question for each incumbent to decide how they will interpret it,” he says.
“I’ve decided to do several projects: one of them will be The Laurel Prize: a prize for poems on the theme of the environment and nature and all that goes with that.
“It’s very prevalent in poetry now, and I’m delighted that the Yorkshire Sculpture Park [near Wakefield] will host the prize ceremony in May.
“I’m also making tours of public libraries this year,[The Laureate’s Library Tour], doing a week of eight readings from March 16 to 21 of A and B places: Aberdeen, Belfast, the British Library, Bacup, and several others.” A tour of C and D locations will follow in the autumn.
“This is to give some support to the pretty beleaguered library service because I believe it to be a really important institution,” says Simon.
His greatest wish is to introduce a National Centre of Poetry. “Not in London,” he says. “Poetry is one of our proudest traditions, and hopefully a national centre can be a place of writing, reading, research and residencies.
“It’s a huge capital funding project, a kind of legacy idea, not a one-year pop-up space but something that becomes part of the landscape.”
You may not know, but “there is no writing obligation associated with the role of Poet Laureate,” says Simon. “Wordsworth never wrote one poem in the post!”
The ever-prolific Simon, however, will be writing as prolifically as ever, having been appointed Poet Laureate by Her Majesty The Queen and the Prime Minister.
“The call came from Theresa May a week before she resigned,” recalls Simon. What did that involve? “It was a private call.”
What did the Prime Minister say? “It was a private call!” Simon says again.
Seeing Stars: An Evening With Simon Armitage, York Theatre Royal, February 4 and 5, 7.30pm. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk
Customer experience manager Lauren Atkins, left, deputy customer experience manager Laura Castle, ticketing and sales manager Beth Scott and York Teaching Hospital Charity community fundraiser Joe Fenton with the Grand Opera House bucket collection cheque in the York theatre’s auditorium. Picture: David Harrison
THE Grand Opera House, York, is to donate £8,765 to the York Teaching Hospital Charity from bucket collections held at performances in 2019.
The donation will go towards “helping to fund the extras to improve
healthcare facilities above and beyond the NHS making patients feel better”.
Joe Fenton, the hospital charity’s community fundraiser, said: “We’d like to say a huge thank-you to the Grand Opera House and to everyone who generously donated at the bucket collections held across 2019.
“The incredible amount that has been raised is truly inspiring and will
go a long way in improving the staff and patient experience across our
hospitals.
“The money will be used benefit a number of wards, including the Children’s
Ward, Dementia, the Renal Unit and our Maternity Bereavement Suite, so thank
you for your fantastic support.”
Clare O’Connor, theatre manager at the Cumberland Street theatre, said: “We’re absolutely delighted to have contributed nearly £9,000 (£8765.17) to numerous departments – Renal Unit, Children’s Ward, Dementia Appeal and Butterfly Appeal – in the hospital over the past 12 months, in conjunction with the wonderful York Teaching Hospital Charity.
“Without the very generous donations of our audience members, and the time kindly given by volunteers for collections, we wouldn’t have achieved so great a figure, which means so much to all the staff at the Grand Opera House.”
Clare continued: “The patients and relatives who use these departments
at York Hospital will benefit greatly from these funds, which will improve
their experience during a difficult time, and we look forward to more
successful fundraising over the next 12 months. Thank you.”
York Settlement Community Players director Helen Wilson bonding with Cliff, the seagull from Dotty’s Vintage Tearoom in Staithes, ahead of her production pf The Seagull
CHEKHOV devotee Helen Wilson set herself the challenge of directing the 19th century Russian’s four greatest plays for York Settlement Community Players in ten years.
Next month, the project will be completed with his 1895 tragicomedy The Seagull, his most famous work, as Settlement celebrate their centenary by returning to the York Theatre Royal Studio.
First, however, Helen will give a library talk tomorrow (January 29) from 6pm to 8pm at York Explore to mark Anton Chekhov’s 160th birthday, under the title of Adventures In The Cherry Orchard: Chekhov And Me.
“Why is Anton Chekhov so beloved and called ‘the father of the modern theatre’,” Helen will ask herself. “I’ll seek to explain why through anecdotes and a little biography; casting a light on why he called his plays ‘comedies’.
“So, come and toast Chekhov’s 160th birthday with a glass of vodka or wine and be entertained by extracts of his work from The Seagull cast. As I direct the fourth of his major plays, I’ll share my enthusiasm for a great Russian dramatist.”
Chekhov And Me: Helen Wilson’s talk at York Explore
This will be York tutor, theatre director and actor Helen’s final Chekhov production as Settlement tackle the late 19th century work that heralded the birth of modern theatre with its story of unrequited love, the generation gap and how life can turn on a kopek: a raw tragicomedy of poignancy yet sometimes absurd playfulness.
She had not envisaged doing all the Chekhov quartet when she set out in March 2010. “I did Three Sisters in the Theatre Royal Studio, and I thought that would be that, as it was my ambition to do that play,” recalls Helen.
“But then I did The Cherry Orchard at Riding Lights’ Friargate Theatre in September 2015, and I was on a roll, so we did Uncle Vanya in the Theatre Royal Studio in March 2018 and now The Seagull in the Studio again. Two actors have been in all of them: Maurice Crichton and Ben Sawyer. They just keep auditioning!”
Helen can see patterns in Chekhov’s work when putting the four side by side. “Chekhov has both ensemble text and ‘duo-logue’, where there’s so much going on and so much subtext too,” she says.
“So for The Seagull, I’m having to hold both ensemble rehearsals and separate rehearsals for the main characters.
Helen Wilson and seagull Cliff in Staithes
“And having done the three other plays, I can point to the pattern where Act One is always a souffle, with plenty of laughing at these slightly inept characters thinking they are something they’re not, and the audience having that delicious moment of thinking, ‘well, actually that’s not going to happen’. Then Chekhov likes to lob a bomb into the room in Act Three.”
Helen has “always felt that The Seagull has never fully made sense on stage” when she has seen past productions. “Like Irina Arkadina has always been seen as a monster, when she’s not,” she says.
“It’s important to show what’s beneath that, and Chekhov always gives you the opportunity to see the other side of the character. That’s what I want to explore and exploit.
“They’re all vulnerable, every one of them…but when I went to see Vanessa Redgrave in the play when I was nine, I wasn’t very impressed! Her speech at the end wasn’t very good!
“In this production, I want there to be vulnerability, but also warmth, in every character, for the audience to be able to laugh and cry with them.”
Settlement regular Maurice Crichton (Vanya) and Amanda Dales (Yelena) in rehearsal for York Settlement Community Players’ Uncle Vanya in 2018
Helen sees a difference between The Seagull and the other three plays. “It isn’t like the others in that the ending is very abrupt,” she says. “Chekhov was very influenced by Ibsen, and this is more of an Ibsen ending than elegiac, but the play is also a great deal funnier than people realise, especially in Act One.
“As with Ibsen and Shakespeare, you can be too reverent in how you present it, but I want people to find the characters recognisable types that they know.
“All life is there; you don’t have to hit people over the head with it. All the resonance is there. It’s all going at someone’s home and that’s how it should feel.”
What has Helen learned from her earlier productions? “Not to have so much on stage, like having a chaise longue previously! The costumes will be period, there’ll be a soundscape and lighting, but what matters is to make it absorbing to watch, so it’s going to be very intimate.”
Settlement’s production, by the way, will be carrying the best wishes of writer/translator Michael Frayn, who has sent the York company a message of gratitude. “It’s a wonderful achievement for YSCP to have performed all of Chekhov’s four last great plays – and I can’t help being pleased, of course, that they have chosen to use my translations,” he wrote.
Helen Wilson standing by cherry blossom when directing The Cherry Orchard in 2015
“Most productions of the plays these days seem to be ‘versions,’ with
the period, location, genders, and politics changed to make them more relevant
to audiences who might otherwise not be up to understanding them.
“People in York, though, are evidently made of tougher stuff, because the simple intention of my translations is to get as close to the original Russian as I can. Just occasionally, perhaps, it’s worth trying to catch the sense and feel of what Chekhov actually intended. So, thank you, YSCP!”
Helen has stated this will be her last Chekhov, but out of the blue she
says: “Having done the other three, in some ways I’d like to do Three Sisters again.
Having learned things since I did it, I’d do it differently but more or less
with the same cast.
“You get into a rhythm of what these plays are like, and they still move
me every time. It’s like a labour of love doing them.
“But when I finish this one, I’d love to do an Arthur Miller one next.
The thing about Chekhov and Miller is that they’re universal. You don’t have to
modernise them for resonance. They will always resonate in their own period.”
A word in your shell like by the sea at Staithes: Cliff and The Seagull director Helen Wilson
York Settlement Community Players in Chekhov’s The Seagull, York Theatre Royal Studio, February 26 to March 7, 7.45pm plus 2pm matinee on February 29; no Sunday or Monday performances. Box office: 01904 623568, at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk or in person from the Theatre Royal box office.
Tickets for Helen Wilson’s Chekhov talk at 6pm tomorrow (January 29) at York Explore, Library Square, Museum Street, York, cost £5 at yorkexplore.org.
Quick question:
What’s the story behind seagull Cliff, Helen?
“He’s called Cliff and he lives in the window of the much frequented Dotty’s Vintage Tearoom in Staithes, collecting coins for the RNLI. He was allowed to commune with me for an hour or two and seemed to enjoy it!”
Rory Mulvihill, donning beard, wig and iconic green coat, to play Fagin for a second time. Pictures: Anthony Robling
YORK Light Opera Company mark
60 consecutive years of performing at York Theatre Royal by presenting Lionel
Bart’s Oliver!, 60 years after the musical’s West End debut.
Running from February 12 to 22 in a revival directed by Martyn Knight, with musical direction by John Atkin, the show is based on Charles Dickens’s novel Oliver Twist and revels in such songs as Food, Glorious Food, Oom-Pah-Pah, Consider Yourself and You’ve Got To Pick A Pocket Or Two.
Leading the cast of 40 will be Rory
Mulvihill, a veteran of the York theatre scene, who will be playing Fagin after
a career with York Light that does not quite stretch back 60 years but does run
to 35. “I started in 1985 with the summer show Songs From The Shows, which was
a cabaret-style show, where I remember I was part of Three Wheels On My Wagon
as a cowboy,” he says.
Reflecting on his subsequent myriad York Light roles, he says: “I’ve enjoyed all of them, but the one I’m most proud of is Barnum. It was a tremendous show. Every member of the cast had to learn a circus skill and perform it to full houses. I spent four months going to a circus school three days a week learning how to tight rope walk.”
Rory Mulvihill in the rehearsal room for York Light Opera Company’s production of Oliver!
Rory is playing Fagin for the
second time, so he is well qualified to analyse the musical’s portrait of the
trickster who runs a den of nimble young thieves in Victorian London’s murky
underworld.
“The character is written very
differently in the musical from the novel, in a way that makes you feel for
him. You know fundamentally he’s a bad person but there’s always something that
redeems him,” he says.
“If I had to describe him in
three words, I remember there was an advert for creme cakes about 40 years ago
and the slogan was ‘naughty but nice’, so I’m going to go with that one.
“I don’t do anything specific to get into character. Someone once
said their character builds as they dress up as them and that certainly applies
to Fagin as I’ll be having a beard, wig and the iconic long green coat. It
certainly helps wearing the costumes to get into character.”
Rory Mulvihille’s Fagin with his two Artful Dodgers, Jack Hambleton and Sam Piercy
Picking out the differences between the first and second times he has portrayed Fagin, Rory says: “The children involved give Oliver! its dynamic. It’s a different set of kids and crew of course.
“We only have one set of kids this time instead of two. Having done it once, I’m not starting again, I’m building on what I’ve done before. Hopefully I’ll not stumble over the lines and give a better performance.”
A key part of his role is leading the young cast around him. “Whenever you work with kids, it’s difficult to begin with because they’re scoping you out to see what they can/can’t get away with, but once you get over that, it’s a joy.
Jonny Holbek as Bill Sikes with Roy as Bullseye in York Light Opera Company’s Oliver!
“They’re now quite relaxed in the company of the adult cast and I’m getting to know them – maybe a bit too cheeky at times. Theatre is the best gift you can give a kid to carry through their life.”
That sentiment takes him back to
Leeds-born Rory’s first steps in theatre. “Funnily enough Oliver! was the very
first show I was ever in. I played the Artful Dodger in a school production at
St Michael’s in Leeds in 1968. It was just by accident really. I was just asked
to do the part by the director. That was my introduction to theatre and I’ve
been doing it ever since. Now I’ve come full circle with Oliver!”
Rory, who has lived in York since
the mid-1980s, worked as a lawyer for more than 30 years, at Spencer Ewin
Mulvihill and latterly Richardson Mulvihill in Harrogate, before retraining as
a teacher of English as a Foreign Language, but he has always found time for a
parallel stage career.
In doing so, he has been not only a leading man in multiple musicals but also has played both Jesus and Satan in the York Mystery Plays; York lawyer and railway protagonist George Leeman in In Fog And Falling Snow at the National Railway Museum, and lately Sergeant Wilson in Dad’s Army and the outrageous Captain Terri Dennis in Peter Nichols’s Privates On Parade for Pick Me Up Theatre.
Rory Mulvihill, centre, as the flamboyant Captain Terri Dennis in Privates On Parade
Last summer, he set up a new York
company, Stephenson & Leema Productions, with fellow actor and tutor Ian
Giles, making their June debut with Harold Pinter’s ticklishly difficult 1975 play
No Man’s Land.
Now his focus is on Oliver!, performing alongside Alex Edmondson and Matthew Warry as Oliver; Jack Hambleton and Sam Piercy as the Artful Dodger; Emma-Louise Dickinson as Nancy and Jonny Holbeck as the villainous Bill Sikes.
Rory looks forward particularly to singing the climactic Reviewing The Situation. “It’s a tour de force,” he reasons. “You can’t really go wrong with it. It’s a fantastically written song with a beautiful tune, comedy and pathos.
“Please sir, I want some more…and more”: Matthew Warry and Alex Edmondson, sharing the role of Oliver in York Light Opera Company’s Oliver!
“Lionel Bart clearly thought ‘I’m
just going to take the audience’s emotions and put them through the ringer’.
So, at the end, they don’t know whether to laugh or cry. A wonderful piece of
work.”
As the first night looms on the horizon, will Rory experience first-night nerves, even after all these years? “For me, rehearsals can be more worrisome than being on stage,” he says.
“Performing in front of your peers, certainly for the first time, can be very nerve racking, and it’s getting over that that prepares you for being on stage. By the time you get on stage, you have butterflies of course, but you know you can do it.”
York Light Opera Company present Lionel Bart’s Oliver!, York Theatre Royal, February 12 to 22, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm matinee on both Saturdays. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Councillor Robert Webb, Kayleigh Oliver (playing Barbara Castle), Rachael Maskell MP, Martyn Hunter (playing Harold Wilson) and Councillor Anna Perrett at Sunday’s rehearsal run of Made In Dagenham
YORK Central MP
Rachael Maskell and West End musical theatre star Scott Garnham, from Malton,
popped along to Sunday’s rehearsal run of Made In Dagenham.
The session was
open to York Residents Festival visitors as the Joseph Rowntree Theatre Company
prepared for their fundraising musical production in aid of the Joseph Rowntree
Theatre.
Presented by the
JoRo’s in-house company, Made In Dagenham tells the true story of the beginning
of the equal pay for women movement, focusing on the Ford strike at Dagenham in
the 1960s.
The choice of show
could not be more relevant because the York performances coincide with the 50th
anniversary of the passing of Barbara Castle’s Equal Pay Act of 1970.
The Cortina girls and Buddy Cortina, from the Joseph Rowntree Theatre Company show, with Malton actor Scott Garnham, from the original West End production. of Made In Dagenham. Left to right: Lucy Plimmer, Jenny Jones, Ben Huntley, Scott Garnham, Karen Brunyee and Ashley Ginter.
The subject of equal pay and discrimination is close to Rachael Maskell’s heart, as the Labour MP spent many years as a union rep campaigning for equal rights. Re-elected at the December 12 General Election, she has been appointed as Shadow Secretary of State for Employment Rights.
Addressing the
company on the Rowntree Theatre stage, Ms Maskell said: “This is an
inspirational story you are telling, and it remains a story of women at work
today. If we don’t speak out, how do we expect things to change?”
She described the women of Dagenham as “sparky women who would not take no for an answer”, and urged the JoRo company to “go out there and keep fighting”.
Scott Garnham, who
has performed many times on the Rowntree Theatre stage, appeared in the original London production of Made in
Dagenham in the role of Buddy Cortina.
The Joseph Rowntree Theatre Company’s fabulous machinists of Dagenham meet York Central MP Rachael Maskell and York councillors Robert Webb and Anna Perrett
In York last week for Friday’s tribute show The Best Of Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons at the Grand Opera House, on Sunday Scott said: “To come and support this local community theatre is really important to me. I learned a lot of my stagecraft here in this building.
“The venue is a real hub for performers of all ages and backgrounds, and theatre is a very unifying experience. I’m so pleased that the Joseph Rowntree Theatre Company have chosen to do this show as their annual fundraiser. It’s the story of a truly inspirational group of women, many of whom I had the great pleasure to meet.”
Despite its gritty
subject matter, Made In Dagenham is described as a heart-warming story, full of
humour, coupled with wonderful music. Although the show is not suitable for
young children, on account of “some very strong language”, the company hopes to
introduce a wide new audience to the sparky women of Dagenham.
Next week’s production runs from February 5 to 8 at 7.30pm nightly plus a 2.30pm Saturday matinee. Tickets are available on 01904 501935, at josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk or in person from the Haxby Road theatre’s box office.
The tour poster for Viva La Divas starring Katya Jones, Nadiya Bychkova and Janette Manrara. Picture: Colin Thomas
STRICTLY Come Dancing professional trio Janette Manrara, Katya
Jones and Nadiya Bychkova will be on tour this summer, making a
song and dance of Viva La Divas at the Grand Opera House, York, on June 16.
Collaborating with the original producers of Viva La Diva, first
performed in 2007 with dancer Darcey Bussell and singer Katherine Jenkins, this
glamorous show will pay tribute to stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood,
Broadway and West End musical theatre, modern pop divas and female icons with
the greatest impact on the Strictly dancers.
In this all-singing, all-dancing musical extravaganza, Katya, Nadiya and
Janette will star with a cast of dancers and singers as they celebrate Marilyn
Monroe, Madonna, Beyonce, Judy Garland, Celine Dion, Jennifer Lopez and many
more.
Running from June 14 to July 16, the tour has further Yorkshire dates at
Halifax Victoria Hall on June 23 and Bridlington Spa on the last night.
Miami-born Janette Manrara became a Strictly professional in 2013 after performing at the 2009 Academy Awards, appearing in season five of the American version of So You Think You Can Dance, being a principal dancer on Glee and starring in the stage show Burn The Floor for three years.
Among her Strictly highlights was lifting the Christmas Glitter Ball trophy twice with celebrity partners Aston Merrygold and Melvin Odoom. Looking ahead to the summer tour, Janette says: “I’m so excited to be touring the UK with two of my best friends, Katya and Nadiya – and what a show it’s going to be.
“We’ll be celebrating the glitz, the glamour and style of the greatest
divas in showbiz. We’re going to have so much fun bringing this show to
audiences across the UK and I can’t wait. It’s going to be a blast.”
Before making her Strictly debut in 2016 , Russian dancer Katya Jones and her dance partner Neil Jones won the WDC World Show Dance Championships and three titles at the World Amateur Latin Championship.
After her Strictly partnership with politician Ed Balls in 2016, for her second series Katya was partnered with actor Joe McMadden, the pair duly lifting the Glitterball Ball trophy as 2017 champions.
“To tour Viva La Divas across this beautiful country this summer with two incredible dancers, who happen to be my very close friends, is a dream come true,” says Katya.
“How the three of us managed to keep everything a secret for
so long I’ll never know. Finally, we can shout it from the roof tops:
girls on tour! It’s going to be epic.”
Ukrainian-born Nadiya Bychkova made her Strictly debut in 2017 as a
two-time world champion and European champion in ballroom and Latin ‘10’ Dance,
partnering former England goalkeeper David James in the 2019 series.
“I’m thrilled to be part of the Viva La Divas tour this summer,” she
says. “We have an incredible team working on what will be a dazzling show that
I can’t wait for audiences everywhere to see.
“It’s going to be a stunning spectacle full of the elegance, style and
attitude, befitting of the greatest divas’ legacies. And to be touring with two
incredible friends in Janette and Katya is simply the dream team.”
Tickets for the tour go on general sale at 10am on Friday at ticketmaster.co.uk and vivaladivasshow.com; York tickets on 0844 871 3024 or at atgtickets.com/york.
Berwick Kaler, playing the dame in his last York Theatre Royal pantomime, The Grand Old Dame Of York, last winter. Picture: Anthony Robling
IT ended, as it only could, with the dame’s return to the
stage. In civvies, this final time, but not in civil mood as he wouldn’t let it
rest on the final night of Sleeping Beauty.
More like civil war. Us and them. Pantomime’s version of
Brexit, except with a different result, the majority, if not all, in the house,
wanting them to remain, not leave, when “one man” and “the board” have decided
it is time to move on. Get panto done, differently, with a new 2020 vision.
Dame Berwick didn’t name the “one man” who went to mow them
down, but he was referring to York Theatre Royal executive director Tom Bird,
newly cast as the panto villain. “I’ll give them three days” [to change their
minds], the grand dame vowed in a tone harking back to the Scargill and Red
Robbo days of union versus management.
“I don’t want to do him any harm…but he’s wrong”, said Mr
Kaler, surrounded by “the family”, the rest of the Panto Five, Martin, Suzy,
David and AJ, their fellow cast members and the crew, buoyed at each unscripted
but barbed line by an adoring home crowd, who cheered and booed his rallying
speech like they had throughout the show.
He even kissed the wall to express how much he loved this
theatre, getting down on his knees at one point too, arms outstretched, in appreciation
of his loyal subjects.
“A house does not make a home. A family does,” read one
letter read out earlier by the panto Queen, Martin Barrass, in his Bile Beans
can regalia in the shout-outs. “Please, Mr Bird, reconsider. Save our panto,”
pleaded a second, and there were plenty more.
“Yah boo to York Theatre Royal. We won’t be back,” hissed
one, read by the luverly Brummie AJ Powell.
Emotions were running high, as they had been for Martin Barrass, breaking down theatre’s fourth wall to speak from the heart at every performance since news broke a fortnight ago that Berwick Kaler, already retired from playing the dame, would not be asked to co-direct or write the 2020 show. “This cast and this band” would not be back either, said Barrass. “A decision that is nothing to do with us. If it was, we would be back each year until we drop.”
Martin Barrass in his role as Queen Ariadne in Sleeping Beauty at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Anthony Robling
Back to Dame Berwick, who found himself feeling “more emotional” now, in this house of York winter of discontent, than in his valedictory speech at The Grand Old Dame Of York last February. Not for himself, he said, but for all those on stage with him who had given so many years – “some for half their lives” – to the Theatre Royal.
“I’ve been told I can’t tell you the truth, so I can’t say
the truth…but I want to because…I’m b****y furious,” he said. “I don’t want to
be political or anything…but someone tell the management that this wonderful,
wonderful theatre has been a repertory theatre for 275 years.
“It’s a repertory theatre and that means we put on our own
shows for the local population. It’s York’s theatre.”
After reading a letter of support sent that morning to “Berwick
Kaler, Acomb”, he resumed: “I just can’t understand that someone can do this to
something that does not need fixing…
…We have made money for this theatre for years. How can one man do this to us? I don’t understand it.”
“Anyway, they’ve got three days,” he repeated, before leading
company and audience through “We’ll meet again, don’t know where, don’t know
when, but I know we’ll meet again some sunny
day.”
The final curtain fell, as it always must, but where and when might that sunny day reunion take place? What will happen to Dame Berwick’s three-day deadline? Will he rise again on the third day, and if so, to say or do what amid this collateral dame-age? Watch this space, as newspapers are wont to say.
As for that “one man”, Tom
Bird, he and the York Theatre Royal management will announce next winter’s show
on February 3. The end and the new beginning all in one.
