Production news round-up: Emilia Clarke to make West End debut in The Seagull and Sophie Isaacs to star in Six

This week’s production news round-up includes Emilia Clarke’s West End debut in The Seagull, and Sophie Isaacs joining the cast of Six.

Musicals

Evelyn Hoskins will join the cast of Waitress from January 25, producers have confirmed. It comes as they announce Marisha Wallace will also return to the role of Becky and Monique Ashe-Palmer will join the ensemble on January 6. The show is currently running at London’s Adelphi theatre.
Author: Sara Bareilles (music and lyrics), Jessie Nelson (book)
Director: Diane Paulus
Producers: American Repertory Theatre, Barry and Fran Weissler, Norton and Elayne Herrick, Alecia Parker, David I Berley, Feste Investments BV, Peter May, Evamere Entertainment, Tamar Climan, Michael Roiff, Ken Schur, 42nd. Club, Square 1 Theatrics, Jam Theatricals and Adam Blanshay Productions.

Sophie Isaacs will star as Katherine Howard in Six the musical from January 21. She will replace Vicki Manser in the show, which is booking until July 2020.
Authors: Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss
Directors: Lucy Moss and Jamie Armitage
Producers: Kenny Wax, Global Musicals and George Stiles

Full casting for The Steamie has been announced. The musical, which runs from December 21-31 at Glasgow’s SSE Hydro, features a 13-strong dance ensemble in addition to the cast.
Author/director: Tony Roper
Music and lyrics: David Anderson
Cast includes: Louise McCarthy, Gayle Telfer Stevens, Mary McCusker, Fiona Wood and Harry Ward
Producer: Neil Laidlaw

Darren Day will join the cast of Mame. He will star as Beauregard alongside Tracie Bennett in the title role, and Harriet Thorpe as Vera. The show, which first ran at the Hope Mill Theatre in Manchester, will play at Northampton’s Royal and Derngate theatre from January 7 to 11, and at Salisbury Playhouse from the 21 to 25.
Author: Jerome Lawrence and Robert E Lee (book), Jerry Herman (music and lyrics)
Director/choreographer: Nick Winston
Design: Philip Witcomb (set), Tim Mitchell (lighting), Ben Harrison (sound), Jason Carr (orchestrations)
Producers: Katy Lipson for Aria Entertainment, Hope Mill Theatre and Ray Rackham Theatrical with associate producers Evan Sacks and Adam Mackie

Darren Day to star in musical Mame

Plays

Emilia Clarke will make her West End debut in The Seagull, as part of the season of work directed by Jamie Lloyd at the Playhouse. The show will run from March 11 to May 9, with a press night on March 19. The full cast and creative team are yet to be confirmed.
Author: Anton Chekhov, Anya Reiss (adaptation)
Director: Jamie Lloyd
Design: Soutra Gilmour
Producer: Jamie Lloyd Company

Game of Thrones star Emilia Clarke to make West End debut in The Seagull

A UK tour of Lady Chatterley’s Lover has been confirmed for February 2020, opening at Dartford’s Orchard Theatre. Based on DH Lawrence’s novel, the show will play at venues including Guilford’s Yvonne Arnaud Theatre, Cardiff’s New Theatre and Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds, before closing on April 23 at Theatre by the Lake in Keswick.
Author: DH Lawrence
Director: Ciaran McConville (adaptation)
Cast: Rupert Hill, Phoebe Marshall
Producers: Tilted Wig and Churchill Theatre

Casting for The Sugar Syndrome at Richmond’s Orange Tree theatre has been announced. The production, which is the first major revival of Lucy Prebble‘s debut play, runs from January 28 to February 22.
Author: Lucy Prebble
Director: Oscar Toeman
Cast includes: Ali Barouti, Alexander Gilbreath, John Hollingworth, Jessica Rhodes
Design: Rebecca Brower, Elliot Griggs (lighting), Daniel Balfour (sound designer and composer), Molly Syrett (costume), Chi-San Howard (movement director)
Producer: The Orange Tree Theatre

Sebastian Barry‘s On Blueberry Hill will transfer to the West End, opening on March 11. This follows runs of the play in Dublin and New York. The show will run at Trafalgar Studios until May 2, 2020.
Author: Sebastian Barry
Director: Jim Culleton
Cast includes: Niall Buggy and David Ganly
Design: Sabine Dargent, Mark Galione (lighting), Denis Clohessy (sound design and composition)
Producer: Trafalgar Theatre Productions and Fishamble

Sebastian Barry’s On Blueberry Hill announces West End transfer

Undetectable, a “love story for the post-chemsex generation” will open the Kings Head Theatre 2020 season. The show, which premiered at the venue in March 2019, will run from February 12 to March 7, with a press night on February 14.
Author: Tom Wright
Director: Rikki Beadle-Blair
Cast includes: Lewis Brown, Freddie Hogan
Producer: Kings Head Theatre

Casting has been confirmed for the UK premiere of The Realistic Joneses, which runs from February 6 to March 7 at Theatre Royal Bath. The play is a “portrait of marriage, life and squirrels”, and ran on Broadway in 2014.
Author: Will Eno
Director: Simon Evans
Cast includes: Corey Johnson, Sharon Small, Jack Laskey, Clare Foster
Design: Peter McKintosh, Richard Howell (lighting), Gregory Clarke (sound)
Producers: Theatre Royal Bath Productions

Santi and Naz will run from January 28 to February 2 as part of London’s Vault Festival. The play explores homosexuality before and during India’s partition through a female friendship, and the legacy of post-colonialism.
Authors: Guleraana Mir and Afshan D’Souza-Lodhi
Director: Madelaine Moor
Cast includes: Rose-Marie Christian, Ashna Rabheru
Design: Sascha Gilmour, Sarah Sayeed (composer, sound design), Rajiv Pattani (lighting)
Producer: The Thelmas

Flights, a “comic elegy to lost youth and wasted opportunity” opens at Clapham’s Omnibus theatre on February 13, and runs until 29. The play explores the effect of a friend’s death on the lives of those left behind.
Author: John O’Donovan
Director: Thomas Martin
Design: Naomi Faughnan, Zia Bering-Holly (lighting), Sue Mythen (movement)
Producer: One Duck Theatre

Casting has been confirmed for Quality Street, Laurie Sansom‘s inaugural production as artistic director of Northern Broadsides. The play, who’s legacy named the chocolates, will run open at Halifax’s Viaduct Theatre on February 19, before touring the UK.
Author: JM Barrie
Director: Laurie Sansom
Cast includes: Jessica Baglow, Dario Coates, Jim English, John Gully, Claire Hackett, Louisa May Parker, Alicia McKenzie, Sophie Mercell and Gabriel Paul
Design: Jessica Worrall, Joe Price (lighting), Nick Sagar (sound)
Producer: Northern Broadsides

Other

The immersive production The Wolf of Wall Street will close in January, six weeks after its official opening night. The experience, which stages the story of corrupt investor Jordan Belfort, will close on January 19, at the end of its current booking period.
Adaptor/director: Alexander Wright
Producer: Hartshorn-Hook’s Stratton Oakmont Productions

Hannah Waddingham, Steph Parry and Emma Norman will star in a charity gala performance of The Pirate Queen at London’s Coliseum on February 23, 2020. They will join the previously announced Rachel Tucker, Jai McDowall and Matthew Pagan, with proceeds from the event going to Leukaemia UK.
Author: Alain Boublil (book), Claude-Michel Schönberg (music and book), Richard Maltby, Jr (book), John Dempsey (book and lyrics)
Director: Drew Baker
Designer: Ben M Rogers
Producer: Tom Gribby

Playwright Kieran Hurley‘s project Bubble, “a simultaneous global theatrical debate, connecting live and online audiences across borders to discuss freedom of speech in the university community and the nature of online debate,” will be streamed from the Theatre Uncut homepage for a month from March 23. The script of the piece is designed to be set in any university.
Author: Kieran Hurley
Producer: Theatre Uncut

The Arcola has released its 2020 season, which will feature a poetry evening with Inua Ellams a new staging of Thomas Mann‘s Death in Venice, and two performances of They Shall Not Pass: The Battle of Cable Street by Steven Berkoff. The world premiere of Love and Apocalypse by Tena Stivicic will open on October 20, running until November 14.

Inua Ellams and Rebecca Lenkiewicz to feature in 20th anniversary Arcola Theatre season

Actors including Hugh Bonneville, Robert Bathurst, Jane Asher and Paterson Joseph will participate in a semi-staged reading of A Play for Five Voices and a Painted Hall by Ian Kelly, at Greenwich’s Old Royal Naval College. Billed as a “salon evening”, the event will take place on January 23, 2020.