Simon Annand News

On-stage seating for the Shakespeare's Globe production of FARINELLI AND THE KING, starring three-time Tony Award winner and Academy Award winner Mark Rylance, will go on sale on Wednesday, November 1, 2017 at 10:00 AM.The Belasco Theatre will be transformed for this beguiling and transporting production, lit almost exclusively by the glow of candlelight and with live music played on Baroque instruments. Theatregoers who choose on-stage seats, in the upper gallery and at stage level ($32-$157) will have an authentic, up close and intimate viewing experience. These tickets will be available for purchase at Telecharge.com and at the Belasco Theatre box office (111 West 44th Street).

Production images are today released for Daniel Kehlmann's new thriller Christmas Eve, starring Niamh Cusack and Patrick Baladi.

According to Daily Mail reporter Baz Bamigboye, actress and singer Meera Syal will be taking over the role of Miss Hannigan in the West End production of Annie. Syal is well known for her roles in Doctor Strange and Doctor Who. She was last seen in the West End in Romeo and Juliet (2016). Syal joins the cast from November 27 through February 18.

Marking the 15th anniversary of pioneering company Deafinitely Theatre, Artistic Director Paula Garfield is directing a new production of Mike Bartlett's Contractions. It runs at New Diorama Theatre 1-29 November.

Producers Sonia Friedman, Shakespeare's Globe and Paula Marie Blackare have announced complete casting for the critically acclaimed Shakespeare's Globe production of Farinelli and the King, starring three-time Tony Award-winner (Twelfth Night, Jerusalem, Boeing-Boeing) and Academy Award-winner (Bridge of Spies) Mark Rylance.

It has been a wild beginning to the week in terms of Broadway announcements, as not one, not two, but three shows announced main stem intentions for the next year. First, Monday brought a surprise Broadway announcement, as Ken Davenport and his fellow producers announced that the long-gestating original musical GETTIN' THE BAND BACK TOGETHER will be coming to Broadway's Belasco Theatre beginning in July of 2018.

A shoddy group of explorers, a threatening butcher, and many extravagant creatures are just some of the wonderful creations we find in The Hunting of the Snark. Based on Lewis Carroll's glorious poem of the same name, the audience is invited into a world of magic, wonder and bravery.

Bath's Ustinov Studio has become something of a European hub. Visionary director Laurence Boswell and ever-skilful translator Christopher Hampton, who first introduced us to Florian Zeller, are currently championing Daniel Kehlmann - a bestselling writer in Germany, where he published the first of 10 books when he was still a student.

Theatre Royal Bath Productions and Nica Burns are delighted to announce that Laurence Boswell's critically acclaimed production of Daniel Kehlmann's The Mentor will have a West End run at London's Vaudeville Theatre from 24 June to 2 September with opening night for press on Tuesday 4 July.

In celebration of Park Theatre's 4th birthday, the theatre held a stunning and star-studded gala evening. Centred around the performance of Madame Rubinstein (starring Miriam Margolyes, Frances Barber and Jonathan Forbes), guests were invited to dress in 1950s clothing to befit the play's period.

Based on the life and career of cosmetics magnate Helena Rubinstein, John Misto's new play stars Miriam Margolyes and continues a varied season at the Park Theatre. It's a successor of sorts of Ryan Craig's Filthy Business that recently ended its run at Hampstead Theatre, telling the story of a female Jewish immigrant who went on to great success in the business world - though it's more of a comedic biography than a play out to make a social or political point.

Daniel Kehlmann's The Mentor is currently in previews at Theatre Royal Bath's Ustinov Studio for a run through Saturday 6 May, with press night on Thursday 13 April. BroadwayWorld has a first look at the cast in action below!

Danielle Flett (Doctor Faustus, Duke of Yorks; Vera Vera Vera, Royal Court), Morgan Watkins (Silent Witness, BBC; Suffragette), George Whitehead (Love's Labour's Lost, Oxford Shakespeare Company) and Daniel Kendrick (Fury, Soho Theatre; Call The Midwife, BBC) have been cast in The Monkey by John Stanley.

It's ironic that this first production of The Ustinov Studio's German season should be concerned with that most British of subjects- class. British theatre has a rich history of playwrights poking our sensitivities about guilt, entitlement and shame. Marius von Mayenburg's Plastic does it with wit, ingenuity…and a mud-slinging machine (no, that's not a metaphor).  

The misfits shall inherit the earth. This enjoyably offbeat play from Stephen Karam (whose The Humans won the Tony for Best Play last year) opened Off-Broadway a decade ago, but the arrival of a film adaptation in April is a decent indicator that its portrait of adolescent isolation and sexual hypocrisy is still pertinent.

Directed by Russell Lucas and brilliantly presented in the round in a room that isn't really designed for a production as such, The Understudy sees a brilliant U.K. premiere as part of Canal Cafe Theatre's American Season.

Leonard Sillevis (Cowboy Mouth, Kings Head; King John, The Union Theatre), Emma Taylor (NewsRevue, Canal Cafe; The Birds, Leicester Square Theatre; The Nanny, Soho Theatre) and Samuel John (A Long Day's Journey into Night, Bermuda Arts Festival; Dead Funny and Our Walk Through the World, The Old Red Lion) have been cast in Pulitzer Prize nominee Theresa Rebeck's The Understudy, which will make its UK Premiere at the Canal Cafe Theatre this February.

Gary Naylor sees Southend pitch up in Southwark as Tramp Theatre revive a Tennessee Williams slice of life on the margin.

In 1974, renowned Polish journalist Ryszard Kapuscinski travelled to Ethiopia to chart the downfall of Emperor Haile Selassie, 'King of Kings, elect of God', through interviews with his loyal servants and associates. Kapuscinski's 1978 book has been adapted by Colin Teevan into an extraordinary showcase for the talents of quicksilver quick-change artist Kathryn Hunter, who transforms into a dozen different characters with the aid of nothing more than a cane, hat or set of epaulettes.

Gary Naylor sees an ambitious and engaging all-through production of one of Shakespeare's best loved comedies.