HOW SOON IS NOW? to Play Storyhouse in October on UK Tour
Bethan McLean, Kaitlyn Akinpelumi and Laura Robinson lead the cast for Box of Tricks and director Adam Quayle.
Playwright Siân Owen's How Soon is Now? is coming to the award-winning Chester cultural venue Storyhouse on Tuesday 6 and Wednesday 7 October 2026, with tickets costing from £21.30 for Storyhouse Members.
It's New Year's Eve 1997 in Manchester. The DJ is in full flow, and as your favourite indie songs blast out into the smoke-filled air of the club, the whole place feels electric.
Three girls are on the dancefloor. Polly and Angie are up for a big night; Jean is lost and alone. Change is in the air – New Labour, New Year, new millennium. After decades of grey, this should be their time. But as darkness falls and midnight arrives, will they find their light?
Celebrating Northern voices and set to a live soundtrack of 90s classics from the likes of The Stone Roses, Radiohead and The Smiths, How Soon is Now? is an indie musical about mates, music and magic – about finding your place and finding yourself.
Bethan McLean (The One Who Got Away, BBC; A Visit, Paper trail Theatre Company) plays Welsh outsider Jean, Kaitlyn Akinpelumi (The Hunger Games; The Ballad of Songs and Snakes; 10 Reasons Why, Arcola Theatre) as life of the party Angie and LIPA graduate Laura Robinson, making her professional acting debut, as the compassionate Polly.
The cast also includes actor/musician Darren Cowley (Standing at the Sky's Edge, National Theatre; The Essex Serpent, Apple TV; Spring Awakening, Hope Mill Theatre) as DJ Spin Jim shaping the rhythm of the night through iconic 90s tunes, his 'Puck-like' master of ceremonies blurring the boundaries between memory, fantasy and reality.
Meanwhile actor/musician Theo Woolford (The Red Rogue of Bala, Theatr Clwyd; Dial M for Mayhem, UK tour) plays Jean's controlling boyfriend Carl, and L J Willow (Take Flight, Rebel Sparks; Live Odyssey, Camden Stables) completes the band ensemble.
How Soon is Now? is presented by Manchester-based Box of Tricks (Narvik, UK Theatre Award for Best New Play; SparkPlug, Sky Arts; The Last Quiz Night on Earth, Guardian Best of Culture 2020) and written by award-winning playwright Siân Owen (Under Milk Wood, National Theatre; This Land, Pentabus/Salisbury Playhouse; Classic, Theatre503). It is directed by Adam Quayle for Box of Tricks and designed by Hannah Sibai, with musical direction from Vidar Norheim and movement direction by Chris Brown.
Adam Quayle, artistic director of Box of Tricks, says: “I'm so excited to be working with this company to bring How Soon is Now? to life. With some serious talent in the room – actors with incredible voices, multi-talented, multi-instrumentalist actor-musicians – this promises to be an all-singing, all-dancing theatrical experience. Total theatre.
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