Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse: Dramatic start to the new year

Jan 2 2009 by Michael Green, Flintshire Chronicle

After a landmark 2008, the Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse have announced an exciting line-up to get 2009 under way.

Director, Ed Hall, returns with his all-male theatre company Propeller, presenting a Shakespeare double-bill of The Merchant of Venice and A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

This collaboration with Propeller will open in Liverpool before embarking on a UK and world tour.

In February, the great Arthur Miller play, The Price, opens at the Playhouse in a co-production with Nottingham Playhouse, directed by Giles Croft; and following the 2006 co-production with West Yorkshire Playhouse of Hedda Gabler the theatres join forces again for J B Priestley’s When We Are Married, directed by Ian Brown, at the Playhouse in May.

In February the theatres take to the schools and community venues of Merseyside with Billy Wonderful, a new play by one of the North West’s most prominent young playwright’s, Nick Leather. Directed by Everyman and Playhouse associate director, Serdar Bilis (The May Queen, Proper Clever) and with a cast that includes Liverpool actor Neil Caple, Billy Wonderful plays away for a month before returning to its homeground.

In March the Royal Shakespeare Company returns with its exciting new production of Othello, directed by Kathryn Hunter (Theatre de Complicité). Peepolykus follow up their hit comedy The Hound of the Baskervilles with the seriously silly Spyski! (Or The Importance of Being Earnest). Out of Joint (The Overwhelming, King of Hearts, Testing the Echo) bring a classic musical comedy The Convict’s Opera in a co-production with Cate Blanchett’s Sydney Theatre Company, directed by Max Stafford-Clark; and English Touring Theatre (The Changeling) return at the end of March with George Feydeau’s classic farce Where There’s A Will, directed by Sir Peter Hall.

In February, the theatres continue the hugely popular one night gems at the Everyman with two favourite performance poets John Shuttleworth in The Minor Tour (And Other Mythological Creatures) and John Hegley with Beyond Our Kennel.

The legacy of working with local theatre companies and writers becomes more fruitful this year when in February Liverpool company Spike Theatre present their theatrical gothic fairytale The Sandman directed by Glenn Noble at the Everyman; Liverpool writer Stephen Sharkey’s (The May Queen, The Miniaturists) new take on Aristophanes’ Birds, Cloudcuckooland, will have young children giggling at the Everyman; and at the Playhouse, Frodsham-based writer Tim Firth’s (The Flint Street Nativity) new play Sign of the Times with Stephen Tompkinson will delight families of all ages.

The season will also bring exciting new visiting work from Everyman founder Terry Hands’ Clwyd Theatr Cymru with their thrilling new adaptation by Tim Baker of Charles Dickens’ classic Great Expectations and a chillingly resonant and vital piece from Eclipse Theatre of Kester Aspden’s critically acclaimed book The Hounding of David Oluwale, adapted for the stage by Olapido Agboluaje and directed by Dawn Walton.