Tag: Paul Pyant

Felicity Kendal to lead Noises Off at Theatre Royal Haymarket

Noises Off is returning to the West End, with Felicity Kendal set to star in the production at Theatre Royal Haymarket.

Kendal (The Good Life) will play Dotty, with  Jonathan Coy as Frederick Fellows and Alexander Hanson as Lloyd Dallas. Further casting is to be announced.

This celebrated 40th anniversary production of Michael Frayn’s farce is directed by Lindsay Posner (God of Carnage). It opened to critical acclaim at Theatre Royal Bath in Autumn 2022 before transferring for its initial West End run to the Phoenix Theatre in January this year.

The play serves up a riotous double bill – a play within a play. Hurtling along at breakneck speed, Noises Off follows the on and off-stage antics of a touring theatre company as they stumble their way through the fictional farce, Nothing On. From the shambolic final rehearsals before opening night in Weston-super-Mare, to a disastrous matinee in Ashton-Under-Lyme seen entirely, and hilariously silently, from backstage, before we share their final, brilliantly catastrophic performance in Stockton-on-Tees.

The creative team for this production includes Simon Higlett (designer), Paul Pyant (lighting designer), Greg Clarke (sound designer), Will Stuart (composer), Ruth Cooper-Brown (movement and fight director), George Jibson (associate director) and Ginny Schiller (casting director).

Noises Off will run for a 12-week season at the Theatre Royal Haymarket from September 27, 2023. Tickets: www.trh.co.uk

The full cast has been announced for Torben Betts’s thriller Murder in the Dark, which is visiting Richmond Theatre in 2024.

Joining the previously announced Tom Chambers as Danny will be Susie Blake as Mrs Bateman, Rebecca Charles as Rebecca, Jonny Green as Jake, Owen Oakeshott as William and Laura White as Sarah.

Murder in the Dark comes to Richmond Theatre from Tuesday, March 19 – Saturday, March 23, 2024.

New Year’s Eve.  A car crash on a lonely road brings famous but troubled singer Danny Sierra and his extended family to an isolated holiday cottage in rural England.  From the moment they arrive, a sequence of inexplicable events begins to occur… and then the lights go out.

Murder in the Dark will be directed by Philip Franks (The Mirror Crack’d) and designed by Simon Kenny, with lighting design by Paul Pyant, original music and sound design by Max Pappenheim, sound associate Johnny Edwards and assistant director Bethany West.

Franks said: “Horror films have been my guilty pleasure since I was a morbid child. Now is the time to find out whether many years’ worth of jump scares and terrible nightmares can be put to good use. We’ll also see whether my more adult theory – that horror often puts its finger on what worries us most as a society at any given time – will also hold true.”

The show’s UK & Ireland Tour will be produced by Alastair Whatley and Tom Hackney for Original Theatre with Trafalgar Theatre Productions and JAS Theatricals.