How Chester’s Storyhouse became a launchpad for new musicals
Storyhouse is fast establishing itself as a springboard for musical premieres. As a production of David Baddiel’s The Parent Agency prepares to open there, the Chester venue’s leaders and the show’s producers tell Catherine Jones about their collaboration
When David Baddiel’s The Parent Agency opens at Storyhouse this weekend, it will become the latest new musical to be nurtured and launched at the Chester venue.
It follows Storyhouse’s own home-grown production – Tim Firth’s well-received, whimsical Now is Good – and the sci-fi heart-tugger The Time Traveller’s Wife, which both premiered there in 2022.
And with the West End seen as an increasingly challenging environment in which to develop new, untested musicals, along with the cost of productions running into seven figures, the opportunity offered by regional venues such as Storyhouse are likely to become more and more attractive to commercial producers.
Three years ago, when The Time Traveller’s Wife premiered, the venue, (which incorporates a cinema and Chester’s library) was initially chosen simply as a stage for hire.
But in Storyhouse executive producer Helen Redcliffe’s words, it quickly became “way more heavily involved”, with its team teching the show and its marketing department mobilised to pitch the new production to the theatre’s core audience.
“I think it made us realise how much we had to offer and the value of a venue,” Storyhouse’s creative director Suzie Henderson says. “All producers, no matter how much money they have, need a theatre to put a show on.
“We have fantastic resources here and a brilliant team who are great at finding solutions because they understand this venue so well.”
Redcliffe agrees: “They’re a team that’s used to working together and excited about producing things.”
When The Time Traveller’s Wife held a guest night for fellow producers, it provided Storyhouse with a shop window, too, one that has borne fruit for Redcliffe and Henderson, who were already actively promoting the eight-year-old theatre as a place to try out new work – to generate interest in a new production and use that as a springboard to secure a tour or London transfer.
“Shows like Standing at the Sky’s Edge and Operation Mincemeat didn’t open in the West End,” Henderson points out.
“The buzz grew around them, and then they made that move.
“I think from the conversations we’ve been having, it feels like that is probably the only option open to most new work now, because it’s so tricky in the West End and people aren’t wanting to close down successful productions to try something new.”
It’s a view shared by The Parent Agency’s lead producer Scenario Two, the London-based company founded by former English National Opera artistic director John Berry and creative powerhouse Anthony Lilley in 2017 to focus on commercial theatrical production.
When new shows arrive in the West End, they’re now often from New York, Lilley suggests, “or increasingly they’re being built in London with American money”.
‘Storyhouse is also a hub; it’s not just a theatre; they have a library and lots of stuff for kids, so I thought it was a good place to premiere The Parent Agency’ – David Baddiel, writer
The Parent Agency is Scenario Two’s fourth project, following The Light at the Piazza, which played in London and internationally, Into the Woods at Theatre Royal Bath, and Cages, which was staged at London’s Riverside Studios.
The company alighted upon Baddiel’s bestselling children’s novel – the tale of a disgruntled 11-year-old who wishes for new parents with unexpected results – after Lilley’s wife, Ruth, read it to her children’s theatre group and thought it should be a family musical.
It’s been a three-year journey to bring it to the stage, the process aided by the fact Baddiel had already written a script for a film version, which, in the event, was never made. “That was very useful,” Baddiel explains. “Because I then started to reimagine it as a thing that was fleshed out and that actors were in. And that helped very much when it came to rewriting it as a musical.”
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The Parent Agency isn’t the comedian and writer’s first musical project. In 2014, he adapted his film script for The Infidel, which was staged at Stratford East. “Erran Baron Cohen wrote brilliant music for it, and it was a really funny show,” he recalls. “Sadly, although it ran for quite a long time at Stratford East, it never transferred, because the subject matter even then was thought of as a bit incendiary.
“But I had a really good time, so when lead producer Scenario Two came to me and said they wanted to talk about making The Parent Agency a musical, I thought: ‘I really enjoyed it, and I want to write the book and lyrics again,’ which is what I did for The Infidel.”
This time around, he has partnered with songwriter Dan Gillespie Sells, which seems to have been a match made in musicals heaven. The pair immediately hit it off (Baddiel describes the Everybody’s Talking About Jamie composer as “a genius”) and were soon producing a series of catchy numbers that drive the plot – as well as an unexpected love song he promises will make any parent watching cry.
Their partnership has also proved a boon because The Parent Agency premiere has arrived much sooner than Berry and Lilley were anticipating. They had been in talks with other regional theatres with the idea of an earliest date in late 2025, but pivoted towards Chester when Storyhouse suddenly found itself with a three-week hole in its spring schedule where another new musical slated to open there had fallen through.
“That was in the summer,” Lilley reveals. “John was abroad on holiday, so I went to Chester and rang him, going: ‘I think there might actually be a very quick opportunity to do this.’
“The biggest difficulty being a commercial producer is getting things on stages. One of our main challenges is getting certainty of planning, and that is about getting somewhere to put it on.”
“Sometimes you just have to pull the plaster off and say: ‘Let’s throw everything at it and get on with it,’” Henderson says.
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While Storyhouse brought added value-in-kind to The Time Traveller’s Wife’s own creative team, with The Parent Agency, the theatre is on board as an official co-producer, and along with staffing the technical side, it has been involved in all the casting and design meetings and has helped guide the budget.
It was even Redcliffe and Henderson who suggested Tim Jackson as director. He’s not the only in-demand name involved. The production’s core team of creatives includes designer Jon Bausor, choreographer Carrie-Anne Ingrouille and musical supervisor Nick Finlow – who also worked on The Time Traveller’s Wife.
Meanwhile, Berry says of the collaboration: “It’s nice to work with people you like, and we immediately liked the team at Chester. They’re very professional and very straightforward to deal with. And it’s the ideal partnership; it’s their theatre, and they’re invested in this being a success.
“They have a head start in that they have a fabulous theatre. It’s a gem of a space.”
It’s a space Baddiel already knew through appearing there both with his stand-up shows and, most recently, as part of the venue’s WayWord literature festival for young people last autumn.
“All the messaging I was getting from Chester was that they were really keen and it was the right sort of place for it,” he says. “Storyhouse is also a hub; it’s not just a theatre; they have a library and lots of stuff for kids, so I thought it was a really good place to [premiere the show].”
Berry adds: “It would be nice to make this a success there and find that other commercial producers start to talk to them more about other projects. I think Storyhouse is full of potential.”
Lilley agrees: “There’s something lovely about Chester as an audience and as a market. You want to try a national touring show or a West End show like this somewhere that feels supportive, with an audience that is already there and where people are taking it seriously.”
‘There’s something lovely about Chester as an audience and as a market. You want to try a West End show like this somewhere that feels supportive’ – Anthony Lilley, Scenario Two
They will be hoping to receive that support when The Parent Agency begins performances on February 15, although everyone involved is open about their ambitions stretching beyond Chester’s Roman walls.
Scenario Two is already progressing plans for a tour of “blue-chip regional theatres” in 2026, and both it and Baddiel are understandably keen for a West End run.
“There’s a strange world where it does really well in Chester, catches fire, and then – by some miraculous fluke – someone else has a horrible time in the West End, because you’re always waiting for somebody else’s show to fail. And suddenly, you can get a few weeks there,” Lilley says.
“But our plan isn’t being built on that; it’s being built on a tour that can then move into the West End if we’re very successful.”
Baddiel adds: “I think what we all want is for it to be a launching pad. So, we’ll see. But Chester is a great place to start.”
For co-producer Storyhouse, a touring production with the potential of a transfer to London is another milestone in its own ambitions to grow its profile and be recognised for the quality of work being made there.
“We’re still looking for other producers, especially of new musicals, to work with,” says Redcliffe. Henderson smiles: “The door is open.”
The Parent Agency – The Musical runs at Storyhouse from February 15 to March 2. For more information click here
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