DROWSY CHAPERONE Team To Create New Musical for Stratford 2011

The Stratford Shakespeare Festival has announced that it has commissioned a new musical from Bob Martin, Don McKellar, Lisa Lambert, and Greg Morrison, the creators of THE DROWSY CHAPERONE.  The musical will be presented at the 2011 Festival. 

Des McAnuff, the festival's artistic director, says, "I have often said that I would love to see new Canadian musicals developed at Stratford. I am very excited with this first step and we all look forward to seeing what this talented team creates. I think it's deliciously ironic that members of this group lampooned us here at Stratford so successfully with the hilarious series 'Slings and Arrows' and I'm excited to see what will come of this new partnership."

THE DROWSY CHAPERONE (book by Martin and McKellar, music and lyrics by Lambert and Morrison) is a comedic homage to musicals of the 1920s.  In the musical, an obsessive Broadway fan listens to the cast recording of fictional 1920s musical 'The Drowsy Chaperone,' and the show comes alive in his apartment.  The musical, which was originally performed in Toronto, debuted on Broadway in 2006 and won Tony Awards for Best Book, Best Costume Design (Gregg Barnes), Best Featured Actress (Beth Leavel), Best Original Score, and Best Sound Design (David Gallo).

The Stratford Shakespeare Festival states, "With William Shakespeare as its foundation, the Stratford Shakespeare Festival aims to set the standard for classical theatre in North America. Embracing our heritage of tradition and innovation, we seek to bring classical and Contemporary Theatre alive for an increasingly diverse audience.

For more than half a century, our mission has evolved to address the ever-changing, ever-challenging Canadian cultural landscape. What has remained constant, however, is our determination to create stimulating, thought-provoking productions of Shakespeare's plays, to examine other plays from the classical repertoire, and to foster and support the development of Canadian theatre practitioners.

By searching Canada and the world for the finest talent, and by providing the conditions and training that enable those artists to achieve their most courageous work, we will immerse our audiences in a theatregoing experience that is not only innovative, entertaining and unsurpassed anywhere in the world, but also deeply relevant to, and reflective of, their lives and communities."

For more information, including other details of the 2011 Festival, visit www.stratfordfestival.ca.

Photo Credit: Ben Strothmann

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