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Lights out, but what are York’s theatres doing to keep the fat lady singer at bay?

“Critical situation”: Dark nights, dark days too, at York Theatre Royal until further notice

CLOSED. Closed. Closed. Closed. Closed. York’s theatres have shut down en masse in response to Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Monday briefing on Black Monday to avoid unnecessary social contact at pubs, clubs and theatres.

One by one came the measured official statements in response to the rising Coronavirus pandemic, announced with regret, sadness and heavy hearts.

By way of contrast, a tide of anger rose ever higher on social media from the entertainment industry, feeling shafted by the PM not legislating closure, merely advising it.

In doing so, he placed the decision in the (no doubt frequently washed) hands  of theatre managements, boards and trusts, whose sense of moral responsibility left no option but to announce closure until further notice as a precaution amid the Coronavirus crisis. When insurance effectively amounts to no insurance, hell by hand cart is the only journey in town.

Lights out: Ellen Kent Company’s La Boheme, at the Grand Opera House tomorrow is snuffed out by the Prime Minister’s Coronavirus dictum

The Grand National, the first post-Brexit Eurovision, the Chelsea Flower Show, Glastonbury Festival, the Euro 2020 football championships, are all scrapped for 2020. A tsunami of further announcements will follow, not least from theatre companies cancelling or postponing tours.

Keep Calm and Carry On may be the mantra, but the fear is that Keep Calm and Carry On may well turn to carrion on account of, well, the accounts.

York Theatre Royal, in St Leonard’s Place, Theatre @41 Monkgate, the Joseph Rowntree Theatre, in Haxby Road, and Riding Lights Theatre Company’s Friargate Theatre, in Lower Friargate, have individual boards and managements addressing urgent, previously unimaginable requirements and strictures.

Likewise, the Ambassadors Theatre Group, owners of the Grand Opera House, is co-ordinating the Coronavirus-impacted strategy throughout ATG, making statements for the Cumberland Street theatre, whose staff are now working remotely from home.

Clock stopped: PIck Me Up Theatre’s Tom’s Midnight Garden was curtailed after Monday’s performance at Theatre @ 41 Monkgate, York

These are unprecedented circumstances. Circumstances not even seen in wartime when theatres – some, not all – across the land stayed open through 1939 to 1945.

Circumstances where the new C-word has led to theatre after theatre – together with cinemas, music clubs, museums, galleries, visitor attractions, SparkYork, et al – to issue variations on: “It is with enormous sadness that we take these measures, but the safety of our audiences, staff and community is of utmost importance.”

So, where does each of these York theatres stand now, in a city where, like the rest, the theatre focus is turning to those of the medical variety? The best advice is to visit the theatre websites for information on the present closures, ticket refunds, and, in light of the harsh financial reality, Donate Today requests. “Your support is vital to our survival,” pleads York Theatre Royal bluntly.

A spokesman for the Theatre Royal – take it as read that it was executive director Tom Bird – said: “The closure of theatres in the UK puts York Theatre Royal, along with hundreds of other theatres, into a critical situation.”

Road closed: Riding Lights Theatre Company have had give up The Narrow Road tour for Lent

Does that make it theatre’s version of the intensive care unit? Time will tell, but the arts have a way of defying the last rites, always have, always will, keeping the fat lady singer waiting, the final curtain up in the flies. What they will make of Richmond Rishi’s £330 billion loan scheme is another discussion point for the in-tray, however.

In a nutshell, York Theatre Royal’s shows and public events initially are cancelled until April 11, but there surely will be no miraculous resurrection on Easter Sunday. The York Theatre Royal building, box office and café remained open initially, but the building closed to the public today (March 19). The box office is still taking phone calls on 01904 623568; ticket refunds are underway.

Shows at the Grand Opera House, in common with all Ambassadors Theatre Group theatres, are “temporarily suspended with immediate effect”, with a policy of postponement and future re-arranged dates to be confirmed, rather than cancellations, at this stage.

“We are following government guidance which is currently ambiguous,” say ATG. “It is unclear how long theatres are to remain closed. We will reopen them once the government and medical authorities confirm that there is no risk to our audiences, performers and staff. 

The Missing Peace: one of the now missing pieces at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre, but with plans for re-arranged dates later

“We are working hard with our producers and performers to understand how this will play out, so we can’t confirm that at this time. We will try, wherever possible, to re-programme shows that have been suspended.”

The Joseph Rowntree Theatre will remain closed “until we receive further instruction that it is safe to reopen”. “We will be issuing further advice in the coming days on how we are going to manage ticket refunds and exchanges,” says trust chairman Dan Shrimpton. “We would ask that you please bear with us and wait for us to contact you.”

The Theatre @41 Monkgate website is yet to be updated following Monday’s Coronavirus ultimatum – the About Us section has Covid-19 Guidance from before – but Pick Me Up Theatre artistic director Robert Readman announced performances would cease after Tom’s Midnight Garden that evening.

He also cancelled Pick Me Up’s Sondheim 90 birthday concert this Sunday and the April 17 to 25 run of The Pirates Of Penzance. Be assured that Coronavirus has been the death of York Shakespeare Project’s Macbeth from March 31 to April 4 too.

Riding Lights, York’s Christian theatre company based at Friargate Theatre, have cancelled their March 16 to April 11 tour of The Narrow Road. “We are very sorry not to be performing this Lent but wish you a happy and safe Easter,” their website says.

Meanwhile, prayers and thoughts go to all those working in the theatres at York Hospital and elsewhere, preparing for whatever is to come.

Copyright of The Press, York

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York Theatre Royal cancels shows until April 11. Donations sought

York Theatre Royal executive director Tom Bird

YORK Theatre Royal is cancelling all public performances and events until April 11 after Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Coronavirus briefing on avoiding unnecessary social contact.

Ticket holders are being asked to consider donating the price of their tickets to the theatre, Britain’s oldest playhouse outside London.

Shows at theatres nationwide have been cancelled in response to yesterday’s Government advice on the Coronavirus pandemic, asking the public not to go to theatres, pubs and clubs.

The Theatre Royal box office will be in touch with ticket holders for the next four weeks of performances, covering March 17 to April 11, and they are being requested not to contact the box office directly but wait to be called.

Executive director Tom Bird said: “The closure of theatres in the UK puts York Theatre Royal, along with hundreds of other theatres, into a critical situation. We are asking that people consider donating their ticket purchase to the theatre at this time. As a charity, their support is crucial to our survival.

“If they cannot do this, we’d ask that they consider a credit to their account. If none of this is satisfactory, they can choose a refund.”

York Theatre Royal further advises: “If the closure period is extended, we will be in touch with bookers for future performances in good time, and we’ll also post updates to our website and social media channels.

“It’s with enormous sadness that we take these measures, but the safety of our audiences, staff and community is of utmost importance. 

“We are looking at ways we can be of use to the wider York community during this time. More details regarding these plans will follow.”

The theatre building, in St Leonard’s Place, is remaining open at present, including the café and box office.

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Cookery writer Yotam Ottolenghi to be flavour of the month at York Theatre Royal

Yotam Ottollenghi: letting the flavour flood out in his new book and York talk

CHEF, restaurateur and food writer Yotam Ottolenghi will reflect on A Life In Flavour and provide cooking inspiration at York Theatre Royal on September 17. 

Ottolenghi, who is of Italian-Jewish and German-Jewish descent, will discuss the tastes, ingredients and flavours that excite him and how he has created a career from cooking.

In the 7.30pm event, coinciding with the publication of his latest cookbook, Ottolenghi Flavour, he will “offer unique insights into how flavour is dialled up and why it works, from basic pairings fundamental to taste, to cooking methods that elevate ingredients to great heights”. 

Under discussion too will be his life and career, from how his upbringing – he was born to a chemistry professor and high-school principal in West Jerusalem – has influenced his food, to opening six delis and restaurants in London.

Yotam Ottolenghi: “flavour-forward, vegetable-based recipes” in his September 3 book

Ottolenghi, 51, is chef-patron of the Ottolenghi delis, NOPI and ROVI restaurants. He writes a weekly column in the Guardian’s Feast magazine and a monthly column in The New Yorker and has published the cookbooks Plenty and Plenty More, his collection of vegetarian recipes; Ottolenghi: The Cookbook and Jerusalem, co-authored with Sami Tamimi; NOPI: The Cookbook with Ramael Scully; Sweet, his baking and desserts collection with Helen Goh, and Ottolenghi Simple, his 2018 award winner book with Tara Wigley and Esme Howarth. 

Ottolenghi’s appearance at York Theatre Royal will come a fortnight after Penguin Books publish his new cookbook of “flavour-forward, vegetable-based recipes”, Ottolenghi Flavour, wherein he and co-writer Ixta Belfrage break down the three factors that create flavour.

Please note, there is the chance to buy a copy with your ticket (£15 and upwards) for this Penguin Live evening. Ottolenghi will conduct a book-signing session after the talk. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

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Astronaut Tim Peake to land at York Theatre Royal for Limitless talk as he launches autumn autobiography

Watch this space: British European Space Agency astronaut Tim Peake to speak at York Theatre Royal in the week of his book launch

BRITISH astronaut Tim Peake will re-live his six-month mission to the International Space Station in his Limitless show at York Theatre Royal on October 11.

Touching down at 7.30pm, Major Peake will reveal what life in space is really like: the sights, the smells, the fear, the exhilaration and the deep and abiding wonder of the view from space. 

In addition, he will reflect on the surprising journey that took him there as he tells the story of his path to becoming the first Briton in space for nearly 20 years – and the first ever to complete a space-walk ­– in 2015.

Those tales will cover his time training in the British Army and as an Apache helicopter pilot and flight instructor deployed to Bosnia, Northern Ireland and Afghanistan.  

Major Peake also will discuss how it felt to be selected for the European Space Agency from more than 8,000 candidates and the six years of training that followed; learning Russian on the icy plains of Siberia, and coping with darkness and claustrophobia in the caves of Sardinia and under the oceans of the United States. 

In this intimate and inspirational conversation, the York audience will hear exclusive stories from Major Peake’s time in space on the International Space Station as he shares his passion for space and science, and the evening will conclude with the chance to ask questions in a Q&A session.

Major Tim Peake on a visit to the UK Schools Space Conference at the University of York in November 2016

The Limitless: In Conversation with Astronaut Tim Peake event takes its title from his upcoming autobiography, Limitless, to be published by Century on October 15.

Every ticket for this Penguin Live show – one of only five on the autumn tour – includes a signed copy of the former barman’s £20 memoir; box office, 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

Major Peake is due to address children from more than 100 schools in a flying visit to the UK Schools Space Conference on Friday, March 20 at the University of York’s department of physics, where children will present work linking the space industry and education.

Major Peake will share his experiences in space, most notably the Principia mission that involved a spacewalk to repair the International Space Station’s power supply with NASA astronaut Tim Kopra; driving across a simulated Mars terrain from space; helping to dock two spacecraft and orbiting Earth almost 3,000 times.

Major Peake attended the schools space conference at the university previously in November 2016 and gave a public lecture there on the highs and lows of life aboard the International Space Station in September 2017.

The Soyuz TMA-19M descent module, the capsule that transported Major Peake safely back to Earth, went on display at the National Railway Museum, York, in January 2018, complemented by a space-age virtual reality experience narrated by the astronaut himself.

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One slug, one caterpillar, only one leaf left, it’s time to play with Slime in gooey show

The Herd Theatre’s gooey goings-on Slime

SLUG and Caterpillar are starving and the only leaf left in the garden is just out of reach.

So begins Slime, Sam Caseley’s squelchy, squishy, surreal, slimy play for two to five-year-old children at the De Grey Ballroom, York Theatre Royal, on April 15 at 10.30am, 1pm and 3.30pm.

Directed by Ruby Thompson, The Herd Theatre’s show is a playful interactive adventure where young theatregoers and their families can expect to “get stuck in with slime” as they help Slug and Caterpillar to work together to form an unlikely friendship, despite their differences.

Just out of reach: the only leaf left in the garden for Slug and Caterpillar

Slug thinks they should work together, but Caterpillar has other ideas, saying slugs are gross, covered in gooey slime and have terrible taste in music. 

The Hull company’s fully immersive and accessible experience will transform the De Grey Ballroom into a “Slime-tastic undergrowth for all”, with British Sign Language integrated throughout.

“This isn’t a traditional play performed in a traditional theatre,” says Ruby, the director. “We’re delighted to host a unique theatrical experience for the very young. During the show, children and their grown-ups can be as loud as they want: giggle, dance, wriggle and talk. We can’t wait to welcome York audiences into the undergrowth, created by designer Rūta Irbīte.” 

“Slugs are gross, covered in gooey slime and have terrible taste in music,” says Caterpillar in The Herd Theatre’s Slime

Playwright and composer Sam adds: “Slugs are amazing and their slime is like no other material on Earth, but they get such a bad rep. So, we’ve made a show that confronts this prejudice, and in doing so explores how we judge others before we know them. And you get to invade the stage and play with Slime at the end.”

Defining their brand of theatre, The HerdTheatre say they “make innovative shows about the world young people live in today”. At the heart of everything is collaboration as they play, chat, imagine, share, and create with groups of children.

Slime has only has 12 words in the show, and every word is spoken and signed by the characters in British Sign Language. Furthermore, every performance of Slime is relaxed. “The audience area is well lit. It’s OK to come, go and make noise if you need to,” say The Herd, whose 45-minute play is followed at each performance by 15 minutes of Slime play.

Tickets for the three performances with British Sign Language and Relaxed Performance access cost £8 on 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

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REVIEW: Is resistance futile in Alone In Berlin at York Theatre Royal?

Denis Conway’s Otto Quangel and Jay Taylor’s SS Officer Prall in Alone In Berlin

Review: Alone In Berlin, York Theatre Royal/Royal & Derngate Northampton, at York Theatre Royal, until March 21. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk

IT is rare to have a perspective on the Second World War from within Germany itself, presented on stage or screen.

What’s more, Kander & Ebb’s Cabaret was a Broadway musical rooted in Anglo-American Christopher Isherwood’s semi-autobiographical 1945 novel The Berlin Stories, set in Weimar Republic Berlin in 1931 with the Nazi Party on the rise. There could be no more cynical voice than that of the nightclub Emcee; entertainment at any price.

This year, New Zealander Taika Waititi’s Jojo Rabbit, a satirical account of the last year of World War Two, as seen through the eyes of a ten-year-old Hitler Youth enthusiast in a German town, garlanded nominations aplenty in the Hollywood awards season but opprobrium in equal measure. How did it end? With the boy and a newly free Jewish girl dancing to David Bowie’s Heroes, sung in Deutsche.

Joseph Marcell’s Inspector Escherich, Clive Mendus’s Benno Kluge and Jessica Walker’s Golden Elsie in Alone In Berlin

Alone In Berlin is a different beast altogether, still with songs (more of which later), but far removed from the powder and paint, mirage and murk of Weimar cabaret or a small-town boy’s loss of innocence. The source novel, based on a true story, was written by a German, the maverick Hans Fallada, responsible for Little Man, What Now? too.

Also known aptly as Every Man Dies Alone, it was published in 1947 – the year Fallada died of a morphine overdose – but not in English until 2009.

Since then, there has been Vincent Perez’s 2016 film with Brendan Gleeson and Emma Thompson and now this York Theatre Royal and Royal & Derngate Northampton co-production, translated and adapted by playwright and political satirist Alistair Beaton and directed by James Dacre, the Northampton theatre’s artistic director.

We watch it through the 2020 filter of grim, vulnerable times, in a year of floods, storms, immigration intolerance, Brexit’s cold shoulder, myopic political leaders, and now the creeping spread of Coronavirus. “This is war,” an exhausted Italian doctor said yesterday.

Resistance movement: Charlotte Emmerson’s Anna and Denis Conway’s Otto Quangel in Alone In Berlin

On the one hand, there is heightened awareness of the need for collective responsibility, but, on the other, a fear that other factors may over-power it, and where does that leave individual action as we wash our hands ever more feverishly? We are indeed, as everyone is in Fallada’s book, very much alone, and seemingly not in control of our destiny.

Such a feeling prevails in Alone In Berlin, where the central question is whether an individual can make a difference through courageous acts of protest when standing up against the drowning tide of Nazism.

Hard-working carpenter Otto Quangel (Denis Conway) and worn housewife spouse Anna (Charlotte Emmerson) have just learnt that their only son, Marcus, has died in action, honourably serving the fatherland, the letter says, but they see no honour in it. Nor does his fiancée Trudi (Abiola Ogunbiyi), who joins the Resistance movement, although the subsequent arc of her story shows how ultimately alone everyone is under duress.

Yes, they had voted for Hitler – more precisely Otto told Anna which way to vote, she says – with Hitler’s promise of jobs to end the Depression, but they had since grown disillusioned. Their boorish, bragging bully of a neighbour Borkhausen (Julius D’Silva), feels empowered to persecute the Jewish woman next door; he and petty criminal Benno Kluge (Clive Mendus) are exploiting the vulture opportunities of Nazism’s tyrannical grip.

Jessica Walker’s Golden Elsie, centre, with Charlotte Emmerson’s Anna and Denis Conway’s Otto Quangel in the shadows

What would you do in such testing circumstances? Keep your head down? Keep making coffins as carpenter Otto now is? Or start a campaign of civil disobedience, as Otto decides he must, no matter how small the defiant act, prompting him and then Anna to write to write messages on postcards he stealthily distributes across Berlin, calling on fellow Germans to resist?

Most fall into the hands of the authorities, represented in Fallada’s suffocating story by Gestapo officer Inspector Escherich (Joseph Marcell), a veteran policeman, adapting to do what he must do to survive, and his superior, SS Officer Prall (Jay Taylor), ambitious, merciless, the embodiment of all the very worst Nazi stereotypes.

Once the trail leads to Otto – spoiler alert – the most telling scene has Otto confronting Escherich’s expediency. “You don’t believe in anything,” he scolds him. That shocks Escherich to the core, and in turn it challenges us too, to cling to our beliefs, to cling to hope for the better path, to defy, to resist, if necessary, and to go it alone as the starting point, but with conviction that others will follow.

Dacre’s meticulous, methodical production is one of very high production values, and devastating performances by Conway, Emmerson and Marcell in particular, but it is not wholly successful.

Omnipresent angelic statue: Jessica Walker’s Golden Elsie

Beaton’s script sometimes sails close to the prosaic, and Jessica Walker’s omnipresent angelic statue Golden Elsie, matching the black and white of Jonathan Fensom’s stark set and Nina Dunn’s video designs, will be a divisive figure for audiences.

Essentially a one-woman Greek chorus, she is more reporter than commentator, and while she may echo Weimar cabaret in style, Orlando Gough has given her dissonant, flatlining operatic songs, always eluding a tune and relentless as toothache. This is probably deliberate, but the sheer number of songs is a drag on the play’s momentum.

Jason Lutes’s illustrations from his graphic novel Berlin are used brilliantly, Charles Balfour’s lighting is in turn dazzling, oppressively dark and intimidating; Donato Wharton’s sound design is exemplary.

Ultimately, Alone In Berlin, will have an impact beyond those fault lines in its telling. It will make you think, reflect, whether alone, or better still, together in the bar afterwards. Hopefully, too, it will make you want to make a difference, to push back against the crush, to be the first flutter of the butterfly’s wing.

Charles Hutchinson

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Are some lives worth more than others, ask Out Of Character in new play Less Than Human at York Theatre Royal Studio

Juliet Forster, left, directing rehearsals for Out Of Character’s Less Than Human

SOMETHING strange is happening, something disturbing, say York company Out Of Character in Less Than Human, this week’s production at the York Theatre Royal Studio.

After their sold-out November 2017 show about Victorian freak shows and mad doctors, Objects Of Terror, they are collaborating once more with the Theatre Royal, whose associate director, Juliet Forster, again directs the new piece.

Out Of Character’s publicity artwork for Less Than Human

Less Than Human plays out against the backdrop of Planet Earth having less to give but its inhabitants taking more. In this struggling world of diminishing resources, humanity is forced to wrestle with the true cost of survival.  What does it mean to be truly human? Are some lives worth more than others? Who decides who lives and dies? A question that suddenly has a new urgency and prescience amid the rise of Coronavirus.

As evolving technologies offer new forms of “human being”, is there still hope for a bright future…or do some people have to pay the price, the play asks.

Out Of Character in rehearsal for Less Than Human

Out Of Character’s company of artists and performers brings together people who use or have used mental health services. Their bold, creative and darkly comedic approach to making theatre aims to stir both the mind and the heart.

The company won the Excellence in Equality and Cultural Diversity Prize at the 2018 York Culture Awards. Audiences on social media have described their work as compelling, deeply affecting, intense, beautiful, clever, articulate, challenging, powerful, poignant and thought-provoking.  

Out Of Character cast members in a tug-of-war scene in Less Than Human

Out Of Character’s previous shows included Tales From Kafka in July 2010, Henry IV in May 2012 and More Tales From Kafka in November 2014.

Less Than Human runs from Thursday to Saturday (March 12 to 14) at 7.45pm nightly. Tickets cost £10, concessions £8, on 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

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The strife of Brian as Clough clashes with Dirty Leeds again in The Damned United

Making his point: Luke Dickson’s Brian Clough clashes with David Chafer’s Peter Taylor in Red Ladder Theatre Company’s The Damned United

DOWN the stairs, along the corridor, round the corner, into the dressing room. His dressing room. Hateful, hateful place. Spiteful, spiteful place. Dirty, dirty Leeds.

Here comes The Damned United, the story of Brian Clough’s ill-fated, fetid 44 days as reigning champions Leeds United’s manager in the summer of 1974.

Adapted for the stage from West Yorkshire author David Peace’s book The Damned Utd, Anders Lustgarten’s play is presented by Leeds’s Red Ladder Theatre Company at York Theatre Royal on April 17 at the familiar kick-off time of 7.30pm.

The strife of Brian: The poster for Red Ladder Theatre Company’s The Damned United

The Damned United invites you to enter the obsessed head of Brian Clough, already the enfant terrible of English football management after his exit from Derby County, who arrives at Elland Road in 1974, seeking to redeem his reputation by winning the European Cup with his new club, Division One champions Leeds United.

This is the team he has despised for years, the team he hates and that hates him no less. Don Revie’s Leeds, the greatest but most grating team of its era.

Let playwright and political activist Lustgarten’s abrasive play take you inside the tortured, drink-befuddled mind of a north-eastern genius slamming up against his limits, as The Damned United “brings to life the beauty and brutality of football, the working man’s ballet”. 

Falling out with the chairman: Luke Dickson’s Brian Clough has another fractious encounter in The Damned United

Directed by Red Ladder artistic director Rod Dixon and originally co-produced with West Yorkshire Playhouse in 2015, this latter-day Greek tragedy adapts Peace’s fictionalised, first-person account to focus more on the flawed Clough’s fractious relationship down the years with Peter Taylor, his sage and stoical regular right-hand man, who did not accompany him to Elland Road.

This bullish character study of bravado, loyalty and strained friendship is performed by Luke Dickson as Clough, David Chafer as Taylor and Jamie Smelt as everyone else, while Dixon is joined in the production team dug-out by set and projection designer Nina Dunn, lighting designer Tim Skelly and sound designer Ed Heaton.

Tickets are on sale at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk, on 01904 623568 or in person from the Theatre Royal box office.

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Pilot Theatre to revive Noughts & Crosses at York Theatre Royal and on autumn tour

Heather Agyepong as Sephy in Pilot Theatre’s Noughts & Crosses at York Theatre Royal last April . Picture: Robert Day

YORK company Pilot Theatre will revive their award-winning 2019 production of Noughts & Crosses for an autumn tour.

This announcement comes amid the blaze of publicity for BBC One’s six-part adaptation of Malorie Blackman’s young adult novel, filmed in South Africa, that began earlier this week.

Sabrina Mahfouz’s stage version of a modern-day Romeo & Juliet tale of first love in a dangerous fictional dystopia will be directed once more by Pilot artistic director Esther Richardson, whose co-production of Crongton Knights played York Theatre Royal from February 25 to 29 on Pilot’s latest tour.

“We’re delighted that this show, which was nominated for best show for children and young people at UK Theatre Awards, is returning later this year,” says Esther. “It’s wonderful that even more young people can experience this production and that Pilot will be able to tour to areas of England that we haven’t visited, thanks to the support of Arts Council England.”

Class act: more than school friends Sephy (Heather Agyepong) and Callum (Billy Harris) in Noughts And Crosses last year.

Noughts & Crosses will open at the York theatre in a September 11 to 19 run before embarking on a national tour until late-November.   

Told from the perspectives of two teenagers, Sephy and Callum, Blackman’s love story set in a volatile, racially segregated society, where black (the Crosses) rules over white (the Noughts), as she explores the powerful themes of love, revolution and what it means to grow up in a divided world. 

Sabrina Mahfouz’s adaptation for teenagers is based on Blackman’s first book in the Noughts & Crosses series for young adults, winner of the Red House Children’s Book Award and the Fantastic Fiction Award, among other accolades. 

Noughts & Crosses was produced by Pilot Theatre, York Theatre Royal, Derby Theatre, Belgrade Theatre Coventry, and the Mercury Theatre, Colchester, as the first show in a new partnership to develop theatre for younger audiences. This is the consortium behind the aforementioned tour of  Emteaz Hussain’s adaptation of Alex Wheatle’s Crongton Knights.

Pilot Theatre artistic director Esther Richardson

Last year, Noughts & Crosses won the Excellence in Touring award at the UK Theatre Awards, when also nominated for Best Show for Children and Young People. 

As with Crongton Knights, schools workshops and outreach projects, along with free digital learning resources, will be available alongside the autumn production of Noughts & Crosses

Casting will be announced in the coming months. Tickets for the York run are on sale on 01904 623568, at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk or in person from the Theatre Royal box office.

Here is a precis of Charles Hutchinson’s review of Pilot Theatre’s Noughts & Crosses at York Theatre Royal, printed in The Press, York, in April 2019.

“ESTHER Richardson proposed Noughts & Crosses when pitching for Pilot’s artistic directorship after Marcus Romer headed south, and her passion for Malorie Blackman’s twist on a Romeo & Juliet story is writ large in her telling of Sabrina Mahfouz’s electrifying adaptation.

Heather Agyepong’s Sephy in Noughts & Crosses last year

“In Blackman’s Britain, Noughts are the white underlings; no orange juice; milk only on Fridays; no mobile phones; second-rate secondary education. Crosses are the black ruling class; apartheid divisions turned on their head.

“Never the twain shall meet on equal terms, except that Nought Callum (Billy Harris), 15, and Cross Sephy (Heather Agyepong), 14, have been friends throughout childhood, meeting secretly on her family’s private beach.

Sephy’s father, Kamal Hadley (Chris Jack), is the Home Secretary; Callum’s mum, Meggie (Lisa Howard), is the Hadley family’s housekeeper. When Callum is one of three Nought teens granted a place at Sephy’s Crosses-only school, how will it affect their relationship?

“Blackman depicts a fractious, tinderbox world: Sephy’s mum Jasmine (Doreene Blackstock) is an alcoholic, neglected by her preoccupied husband; Callum’s dad Ryan (Daniel Copeland) and brother Jude (Jack Condon) are Liberation Militia freedom fighters. Callum’s sister, so damaged in an assault, has curled up in a ball ever since.

Pilot Theatre cast members in a scene in Noughts & Crosses

“As with Pilot’s first hit, Lord Of The Flies, our ability to destroy rather than create bonds, to repeatedly take the wrong turn, lies at the heart of Blackman’s damning, bleak vision that haunts us still more in intolerant Brexit Britain.

“Sephy and Callum express a wish for a better world, one where we rub along with each other, but this is a rotten Britain of death sentences, an intransigent Home Secretary, thwarted love across the divide.

“Given the bold imagination of Blackman’s novel for young adults with its heroine figure of a bright black teenage girl, you might wish she had come up with a similarly bold answer to so many ultimately familiar woes.

“Alas not, but this is nevertheless a superb production with good performances all round, plenty of punch in the direction, and high-quality set, lighting, sound, music and video design.”

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Alan Bennett’s The Habit Of Art heads from York to New York for Brits Off Broadway

Matthew Kelly, left, and David Yelland in The Habit Of Art. Picture: Helen Maybanks

YORK Theatre Royal’s co-production of Alan Bennett’s comedy The Habit Of Art with the Original Theatre Company is heading to New York as part of the Brits Off Broadway festival.

Premiered in York in September 2018, Philip Franks’s show starring Matthew Kelly will be  one of eight productions featured in 59E59 Theaters’ annual celebration of theatre from the UK.

Franks’s production begins its second British tour in March ahead of the American dates from May 29 to June 28 in one of 59E59 Theaters’ three off-Broadway spaces, having first toured Britain in Autumn 2018.

The Habit Of Art director Philip Franks

Leeds playwright Bennett’s 2009 play imagines a meeting between friends and collaborators W.H. Auden, the York-born poet, and composer Benjamin Britten. Most of the original cast are in the latest production, including Kelly, David Yelland and Yorkshire actor Benjamin Chandler, who made his York Theatre Royal debut in the 2018 company.

Kelly says: “I’ve done Brits on Broadway before in [Hull playwright] Richard Bean’s play Toast, which is very different to The Habit Of Art. But Americans are going to love Alan Bennett because they think they’re going to see something very British.”

John Wark, left, and Ben Chandler in The Habit Of Art. Picture: Helen Maybanks

Director Franks adds: “New York is the most wonderful city but there’s a huge challenge because it’s such an English play. I hope very much audiences will respond.”

The 2020 production of The Habit Of Art is produced by the Original Theatre Company and Anthology with Peter Stickney and York Theatre Royal.

Franks last directed in York in Summer 2019 when his Shakespeare’s Rose Theatre production of The Tempest ran at the Elizabethan pop-up theatre on the Castle car park.