Derek Jacobi, Emma Fielding And Ronald Pickup Star In Heartbreak House By Bernard Shaw At The Chichester Festival Theatre, Directed By Richard Clifford

6 July – 25 August

Derek Jacobi returns to Chichester Festival Theatre during its 50th Anniversary season in Heartbreak House, Bernard Shaw’s comic exploration of love and social mores. The notable cast also includes Emma Fielding and Ronald Pickup.

Bernard Shaw, the master of wit and social commentary, brilliantly debates money and morality, idealism and realism, as he chronicles a society teetering on the threshold of enormous change. On the brink of World War I, Ellie Dunn, her father and her fiancée attend a house party at the home of eccentric Captain Shotover. The guests are soon divided by Ellie’s pragmatic decision to marry for money, not love.

Derek Jacobi plays Captain Shotover. His numerous credits at Chichester include Uncle Vanya, Playing the Wife, Hadrian VII, The Royal Hunt of the Sun and Saint Joan. Other theatre credits include King Lear (Donmar Warehouse, UK tour and Brooklyn Academy of Music), the West End production of Twelfth Night, for which he won an Olivier Award, A Voyage Round My Father (Donmar Warehouse and West End), Don Carlos (Sheffield Crucible and West End), Becket (UK tour and West End), Kean and The Grand Tour (both for The Old Vic), West End productions of Richard III and Richard II, and Breaking the Code (UK tour, West End, Washington DC and Broadway). Numerous productions for the RSC include award-winning productions of Much Ado About Nothing (which transferred to the West End, Broadway and Washington DC) and Cyrano de Bergerac (which transferred to the West End, Broadway and Washington DC). Film credits include My Week with Marilyn, The King’s Speech and Gosford Park. Television credits include The Borgias, The Long Firm and I, Claudius.

Emma Fielding plays Hesione Hushabye. Theatre credits include The King’s Speech (UK tour and West End), Decade (Headlong at St Katherine’s Dock), Private Lives (West End and Broadway) for which she received an Olivier Award-nomination and Theatre World award, Playing with Fire, Look Back in Anger and Arcadia (all for the National Theatre), The School for Scandal, for which she received an Olivier Award-nomination and The School for Wives, for which she won the Ian Charleson and Critics’ Circle Awards. Television includes Cranford and Kidnap and Ransom. Film includes Twenty8k and Fast Girls.

Ronald Pickup plays Mazzini Dunn. Recent credits include his role as a would-be womaniser in the film The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. Television credits include Larkrise to Candleford and Fortunes of War. Theatre credits include the West End production of Waiting for Godot alongside Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart and Simon Callow, and Amy’s View (National Theatre and Broadway), for which he was nominated for an Olivier Award. He also worked with Laurence Olivier at the National Theatre, most notably in Three Sisters and Long Day’s Journey Into Night.

George Layton plays Billy Dunn. He is perhaps best known for two television roles: Dr Paul Collier in the comedy series Doctor in the House, and its sequels, and Bombardier ‘Solly’ Solomons in It Ain’t Half Hot, Mum. He has enjoyed success as a screenwriter, co-writing episodes of the Doctor in the House series with fellow co-star Jonathan Lynn (who went on to write the Yes, Minister series). Layton and Lynn also co-wrote another sitcom, My Brother’s Keeper. Layton was one of the original presenters of BBC TV’s That’s Life, hosted by Esther Rantzen. His theatre credits include West End productions of Chicago and Oliver! and Chips with Everything (Royal Court Theatre and Broadway).

Jo Stone-Fewings plays Randall Utterwood. He has already featured in Festival 2012, playing Mirabell in The Way of the World. He has previously appeared at Chichester in King Lear and The Scarlet Letter. Other theatre credits include War and Peace, Fuente Ovejuna and Ghetto (National Theatre), A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The City Madam (RSC Stratford), King John, The Taming of the Shrew and The Park (all for the RSC), Richard III and Twelfth Night (RSC and West End), Dancing at Lughnasa (The Old Vic), and West End productions of The 39 Steps and The Country Wife.

The cast also features Fiona Button, Raymond Coulthard, Sara Stewart, Trevor Cooper and Maroussia Frank.

Bernard Shaw’s plays include Pygmalion, Mrs Warren’s Profession, Arms and the Man, Candida, You Never Can Tell, Man and Superman and Major Barbara.

Richard Clifford directed Playing the Wife for Chichester in 1995. Other directing credits include The School for Scandal, The Game of Love and Chance and All’s Well That Ends Well. Other credits include The Tempest, Faerie Queen, The Clandestine Marriage, Elizabeth the Queen, She Stoops to Conquer, All’s Well That Ends Well, Comus, The Mikado and Die Fledermaus.

Design is by Stephen Brimson Lewis whose Chichester credits include The Master Builder, Separate Tables and Racing Demon. West End credits include The Lion in Winter, The Tempest, Flare Path and Waiting for Godot. Other theatre credits include Antony and Cleopatra, Julius Caesar, All’s Well That Ends Well, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Taming of the Shrew (all for the RSC, where he is an Associate Artist), Indiscretions (which received a Tony Award nomination and won an Olivier Award for the National Theatre production as Les Parents Terrible), A Little Night Music, Marat/Sade, Private Lives, Inadmissable Evidence, Uncle Vanya and Mrs Klein (all for the National Theatre).

Lighting design is by Peter Mumford whose Chichester credits include The Last Confession, The Master and Margarita, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Out of this World, The Seagull, The Gondoliers, Heartbreak House, Easy Virtue and Saturday Sunday…and Monday, The Waltz of the Toreadors, Three Women and a Piano Tuner. Other theatre credits include Top Hat, Absent Friends, Much Ado about Nothing, The Lion in Winter, The Misanthrope, Carousel and Fiddler on the Roof (all for the West End), Cock and The Seagull (Royal Court Theatre and New York), Jumpy (Royal Court Theatre and West End), and National Theatre productions of All’s Well That Ends Well, The Hothouse, Exiles and The Bacchae (which won an Olivier Award).

Music is by Jason Carr whose Chichester credits include The Water Babies, Six Pictures of Lee Miller, Fortune’s Fool, The Seagull, The Master and Margarita, Three Women and a Piano Tuner, Doctor Faustus, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, 5/11, Carousel and Funny Girl. Other credits include Chariots of Fire (Hampstead Theatre and West End), Sunday in the Park with George (Menier Chocolate Factory, West End and Broadway, and for which he received a Drama Desk Award and Tony Award nomination), La Cage aux Folles (Menier Chocolate Factory) and A Little Night Music (Menier Chocolate Factor and Broadway).

Heartbreak House is at Chichester Festival Theatre from 6 July – 25 August, Evenings 7.30pm (except Press Night: Thursday 12 July at 7.00pm), Matinees 2.15pm. Tickets: University of Chichester Previews £10 & £27, Previews/Press Night £14 – £33, Evenings/Matinees £15 – £36. To book, go to cft.org.uk or contact the Box Office on 01243 781312.

In the pre-show talk, Before Heartbreak House, playwright David Hare introduces George Bernard Shaw’s own ‘favourite play’. This event takes place on Friday 13 July at 5.45pm in the Festival Theatre. Tickets are free but must be booked in advance through the Box Office on 01243 781312.

After Words, a post show talk with some of the Heartbreak House cast and creative team, is on Thursday 2 August.

Release issued by: Chichester Festival Theatre

LINKS

Chichester Festival Theatre website

Photos: Anne-Marie Duff in Cause Celebre at the Old Vic Theatre

Production photos of Terence Rattigan’s Cause Celebre at the Old Vic Theatre

Thea Sharrock (Blithe Spirit) directs Terence Rattigan’s final play, Cause Celebre at the Old Vic Theatre, starring Anne-Marie Duff and Niamh Cusack.

The play is based on the  true story of Alma Rattenbury (Anne-Marie Duff), who was put on trial in 1935 along with her 18-year-old lover, accused of killing her husband. Vilified by the public as much for her seduction of a younger man as the murder of her husband, the play examines the role of passion, guilt and loyalty in 1930s England. Niamh Cusack plays socially and sexually repressed jury forewoman of the trial, Edith Davenport.

The play also stars Lucy Black, Timothy Carlton, Simon Chandler, Richard Clifford, Oliver Coopersmith, Rory Fleck-Byrne, Freddie Fox, Jenny Galloway, Patrick Godfrey, Nicholas Jones, Tommy McDonnell, Lucy Robinson, Tristan Shepherd, Richard Teverson, Sarah Waddell, Michael Webber and Tristram Wymark.

LINKS

Book tickets to Cause Celebre at the Old Vic Theatre in London

Cause Celebre – news and photos

Cause Celebre – Reviews Round-up

A round-up of reviews for Cause Celebre at the Old Vic Theatre in London

Terence Rattigan’s final play, Cause Celebre, has opened at the Old Vic Theatre in London starring Anne-Marie Duff and Niamh Cusack.

The play is based on the  true story of Alma Rattenbury (Anne-Marie Duff), who was put on trial in 1935 along with her 18-year-old lover, accused of killing her husband. Vilified by the public as much for her seduction of a younger man as the murder of her husband, the play examines the role of passion, guilt and loyalty in 1930s England. Niamh Cusack plays socially and sexually repressed jury forewoman of the trial, Edith Davenport.

Thea Sharrock, who directed an Olivier award-winning production of Rattigan’s After the Dance at the National Theatre last year, directs the play following her recent revival of Noel Coward’s Blithe Spirit at the Apollo Theatre.

The play also stars Lucy Black, Timothy Carlton, Simon Chandler, Richard Clifford, Oliver Coopersmith, Rory Fleck-Byrne, Freddie Fox, Jenny Galloway, Patrick Godfrey, Nicholas Jones, Tommy McDonnell, Lucy Robinson, Tristan Shepherd, Richard Teverson, Sarah Waddell, Michael Webber and Tristram Wymark.

Read reviews from the Times, Telegraph, Hollywood Reporter, Express and Evening Standard, below.

LINKS

Book tickets to Cause Celebre at the Old Vic Theatre in London

Cause Celebre – news and photos

FREDDIE FOX in Cause Celebre

Up and coming Freddie Fox, from the Fox acting dynasty, to star in Rattigan’s Cause Celebre at the Old Vic Theatre

It’s hard to find a young actor better connected to the profession than Freddie Fox, 21.

Son of actors Edward Fox and Joanna David, brother to Emilia Fox, nephew of James Fox, cousin of Laurence Fox, godson of John Mortimer, great grandson of famous dramatist Frederick Lonsdale, the list goes on and on.

Fox only graduated from the Guildhall School of Music & Drama last year, but has immediately found work – notably in two major TV dramas, playing 80s pop star Marilyn in the BBC’s Boy George biopic Worried About the Boy and the young version of writer Peter Scabius in Any Human Heart, the high-profile Channel 4 adaptation of William Boyd’s novel.

Up next he plays a bisexual assassin in BBC thriller-noir The Shadow Line alongside an impressive cast that includes Christopher Eccleston, Sir Antony Sher, Stephen Rea and Chiwetel Ejiofor. And he won’t have to travel far to get to work in Cause Celebre: Freddie can be currently seen starring as cleft-palated Camille in Feydeau’s farce A Flea In Her Ear at the Old Vic, opposite Tom Hollander.

Cause Celebre also stars Anne-Marie Duff, Niamh Cusack, Lucy Black, Timothy Carlton, Simon Chandler, Richard Clifford, Oliver Coopersmith, Rory Fleck-Byrne, Jenny Galloway, Patrick Godfrey, Nicholas Jones, Tommy McDonnell, Lucy Robinson, Tristan Shepherd, Richard Teverson, Sarah Waddell, Michael Webber and Tristram Wymark.

The play opens at the Old Vic Theatre on 29 March 2011, with previews from 17 March. It is based on the  true story of Alma Rattenbury, who was put on trial in 1935 along with her 18-year-old lover, accused of killing her husband. Vilified by the public as much for her seduction of a younger man as the murder of her husband, the play examines the role of passion, guilt and loyalty in 1930s England.

Thea Sharrock directed Rattigan’s After the Dance at the National Theatre earlier this year and will direct Alison Steadman in Blithe Spirit from 2 March 2011 at the Apollo Theatre.

Book tickets to see Cause Celebre at the Old Vic Theatre in London

NIAMH CUSACK in Cause Celebre

Niamh Cusack to star alongside Anne-Marie Duff in Rattigan’s Cause Celebre at the Old Vic

Niamh Cusack returns to the London stage this spring in Thea Sharrock’s revival of Terence Rattigan’s Cause Celebre, timed for the writer’s centenary in 2011.

Cusack, whose father was acclaimed Irish actor Cyril Cusack and her sister Sinead is also an accomplished actress, has worked extensively in theatre, film and  TV. Stage roles include Dancing at Lughnasa at The Old Vic, Portrait Of A Lady at the Theatre Royal Bath and His Dark Materials at The National Theatre. TV work includes The Last Detective and Heartbeat and film roles include The Closer You Get, Playboys and Shadow Under The Sun.

Cause Celebre also stars Anne-Marie Duff, Lucy Black, Timothy Carlton, Simon Chandler, Richard Clifford, Oliver Coopersmith, Rory Fleck-Byrne, Freddie Fox, Jenny Galloway, Patrick Godfrey, Nicholas Jones, Tommy McDonnell, Lucy Robinson, Tristan Shepherd, Richard Teverson, Sarah Waddell, Michael Webber and Tristram Wymark.

The play opens at the Old Vic Theatre on 29 March 2011, with previews from 17 March. It is based on the  true story of Alma Rattenbury, who was put on trial in 1935 along with her 18-year-old lover, accused of killing her husband. Vilified by the public as much for her seduction of a younger man as the murder of her husband, the play examines the role of passion, guilt and loyalty in 1930s England. Cusack plays socially and sexually repressed jury forewoman of the trial, Edith Davenport.

Thea Sharrock directed Rattigan’s After the Dance at the National Theatre earlier this year and will direct Alison Steadman in Blithe Spirit from 2 March 2011 at the Apollo Theatre.

Book tickets to see Cause Celebre at the Old Vic Theatre in London

NIAMH CUSACK – CAREER HIGHLIGHTS

Theatre Gate Theatre Dublin: Hester Worsley in A Woman of No Importance, Irina in Three Sisters, Nora in A Doll’s House; RSC: Desdemona in Othello, Juliet in Romeo and Juliet, Jane Hogarth in The Art of Success, Rosalind in As You Like It; West Yorkshire Playhouse: Pegeen Mike in The Playboy of the Western World, Gemma in Captain Swing; Lady Mary in The Admirable Crichton (Theatre Royal Haymarket), Gustchen in The Tutor (Old Vic), Nora Clitheroe in The Plough and the Stars (Young Vic), Irina in Three Sisters (Royal Exchange Manchester), Helena in The Faerie Queen (Aix-en-Provence), The Maids (Donmar), Nabokov’s Gloves, Molière’s Learned Ladies, Portia in The Merchant of Venice (Chichester Festival Theatre), Serafina Pekkala in His Dark Materials, Ghosts (Gate London); Television Lucky Sunil, Poirot, Till We Meet Again, Jeeves and Wooster, Heartbeat, Angel Train, Shadow of the Sun, Colour Blind, Rhinoceros, Little Bird, A&E, Loving You, Too Good to be True, State of Mind; Films Paris By Night, Fools of Fortune, The Playboys, The Closer You Get; Awards Irish Life Award, Irish Post Award.