Nottingham Playhouse, named the UK’s Most Welcoming Theatre in the TMA awards earlier this year, has unveiled a prestigious season of drama for spring 2008. Artistic Director Giles Croft and Chief Executive Stephanie Sirr have once again attracted some of theatre’s greatest talents to Nottingham, with co-productions set to tour the UK and transfer to London. The Nottingham line-up is completed by the finest in children’s theatre, visiting drama, dance, music and comedy. Amongst the season’s highlights:

·         Shared Experience co-produces an epic two-part staging of Tolstoy’s WAR AND PEACE, adapted by Helen Edmundson

·         Steven Berkoff directs ON THE WATERFRONT by Budd Schulberg with Stan Silverman

·         The first major production in over 20 years of BREAKING THE SILENCE by Stephen Poliakoff

·         David Wood’s adaptation of TOM’S MIDNIGHT GARDEN, marking the 50^th anniversary of the novel by Philippa Pearce

·         PLUS: "tough man" Frank rules a council estate in Roy Williams’ new play ANGEL HOUSE, presented by Eclipse Theatre

·         The RSC turns racial division on its head in Dominic Cooke’s stage version of NOUGHTS & CROSSES by Malorie Blackman

·         The new Fabulous Beast show JAMES SON OF JAMES is just one of a dazzling array of visiting dance works

·         Stand-up from Andy Parsons, Russell Howard, Stewart Lee, Daniel Kitson, and Paul Merton and his Impro Chums

·         Further comedy; music; youth theatre presentations; and for the very young, the ever-popular Saturday Club

·         NEW for 2008: Martin Simpson inaugurates a series of monthly live music sessions under the banner PLAYHOUSE FOLK

NOTTINGHAM PLAYHOUSE THEATRE COMPANY presents…

WAR AND PEACE by Leo Tolstoy is one of the towering achievements of world literature. With Russia devastated by Napoleon’s invading armies, five aristocratic families discover that status cannot defend them from the forces of history.  Now theatre audiences will be swept up in their story as never before in Helen Edmundson’s suitably epic adaptation, performed in two separate parts. This is the second collaboration between Nottingham Playhouse Theatre Company and the renowned Shared Experience, following A Passage to India in 2004. Directors Nancy Meckler and Polly Teale will extend and rework the acclaimed production which Shared Experience presented as a single evening at the National Theatre in 1996. A flexible cast will transform the stage into everything from battlefield to ballroom, with minimal scenery and powerful physicality. Launching a major UK tour, WAR AND PEACE premieres at Nottingham Playhouse from Friday 1 to Sunday 17 February, with four opportunities to experience both Parts 1 and 2 in a single enthralling day.

Steven Berkoff makes a hotly anticipated return to Nottingham Playhouse to direct ON THE WATERFRONT, the celebrated portrait of racketeering and corruption in 1950s New York, written by Budd Schulberg with Stan Silverman. In what promises to be an exhilarating new staging, Nottingham Playhouse Theatre Company enters into partnership with East Productions to co-produce the classic story of the young man who "coulda been a contender". When he finds himself implicated in murder, dock worker Terry Molloy questions his loyalty to the Mob-dominated unions. Emboldened by a streetwise priest – and the love of the dead man’s sister – he decides to take a stand against them.  Previously best known in the Oscar-winning film version starring Marlon Brando, ON THE WATERFRONT runs at Nottingham Playhouse from Friday 18 April to Saturday 3 May.

Widely regarded as Britain’s foremost television dramatist, Stephen Poliakoff has also written prolifically for the stage. His 1984 play BREAKING THE SILENCE tells an unlikely tale, in fact based directly on the story of his own grandfather. In Lenin’s Russia, the impossibly elegant Nikolai Semenovitch is appointed a Telephone Inspector and installed, along with his once-grand family, in a once-grand railway carriage. Ignoring both the new regime and the duties it has imposed on him, Nikolai risks everything in dogged pursuit of his own technological dream – but sooner or later he will be forced to confront the revolution within his own family. Unseen in over 20 years, BREAKING THE SILENCE is directed by Esther Richardson and runs from Friday 16 to Saturday 31 May.

2008 is the 50^th anniversary of one of the greatest novels ever written for younger readers: TOM’S MIDNIGHT GARDEN by Philippa Pearce. Nottingham Playhouse Theatre Company will mark the occasion by staging the acclaimed adaptation by David Wood. When a grandfather clock strikes thirteen, it signals the beginning of an extraordinary adventure for lonely young Tom. Downstairs he finds a wonderful garden where no garden existed before, and there he befriends the mysterious Hattie. He soon realises that Time itself is behaving very strangely. Directed by Head of Education and Roundabout Andrew Breakwell, TOM’S MIDNIGHT GARDEN takes over the Playhouse stage from Friday 20 June – Saturday 5 July.

VISITING WORK

Nottingham Playhouse continues to support Eclipse Theatre by hosting its new production ANGEL HOUSE (Tuesday 26 February to Saturday 1 March). A special commission from Roy Williams, the writer of Little Sweet Thing and Sing Yer Heart Out for the Lads, the play charts 24 hours in which everything changes for Frank, "tough man" of the Angel House estate, and for each member of his family.

The Royal Shakespeare Company returns to the Playhouse with Dominic Cooke’s stage adaptation of a contemporary classic: NOUGHTS AND CROSSES by Malorie Blackman (Tuesday 25 to Saturday 29 March). Youngsters Sephy and Callum live in a world ruled by prejudice. Theirs is a forbidden love, but nothing –  not racism, not family loyalties, not even terrorism – can keep them apart.

DANCE in all its diversity maintains a strong presence in the spring schedule:

• Energy, invention and bold theatrical colour are the hallmarks of Henri Oguike Dance Company (Tuesday 19 February)
• In James son of James, Ireland’s hottest dance company Fabulous Beast spins a raucous tale of heroism and betrayal, through dance, dialogue, song and outrageous humour (Thursday 21 – Saturday 23 February)
• Audience favourite Richard Alston Dance Company displays its customary joie de vivre once more (Tuesday 11 March)
• The indefinable DV8 explores sexuality, religion and intolerance in To Be Straight With You (Friday 11 – Saturday 12 April)
• Bonachela Dance Company showcases the work of Kylie Minogue’s choreographer of choice (Wednesday 7 May)
• Random Dance breaks further bounds in Entity, a diptych of new works by Wayne McGregor (Friday 9 May)
• Nottingham-based New English Contemporary Ballet presents an adventurous new programme (Thursday 5 June)
• Jonathan Lunn Dance Company ingeniously examines interconnected lives in Reading Room (Tuesday 10 June)

A wide assortment of enticing treats leaves COMEDY and MUSIC lovers spoiled for choice:

• A new monthly series of Thursday night folk sessions hosted in the Playroom studio, PLAYHOUSE FOLK is launched on 31 January by Martin Simpson, followed by Nancy Kerr and James Fagan (21 February), Gareth Pearson (3 April), Vin Garbutt (22 May) and Bob Fox (19 June)
• Solo dates from Mock the Week regulars Andy Parsons (Saturday 15 March) and Russell Howard (Monday 17 March)
• Highly commended comedy from Stewart Lee – officially the 41^st best stand-up of all time (Friday 21 March)
• An explosion of infectious rhythmic brilliance by the Yamato Drums of Japan (Sunday 6 – Monday 7 April)
• An Evening of Flanders and Swann pays affectionate tribute to the wit and warmth of the legendary duo (Sunday 4 May)
• Paul Merton and his Impro Chums are quite literally making it up as they go along (Monday 2 June)
• Double act LipService spoof super-spydom with a feminine touch in Jane Bond (Friday 6 – Saturday 7 June)
• Phoenix Nights alumnus Daniel Kitson proposes snack-based solutions to the woes of the world (Thursday 12 June)
• A new set of soul-stirring, folksy songs from leading Nottingham singer-songwriter Freddie Kofi (Friday 13 June)
• Fringe hit Deborah Frances-White reveals How to Get Almost Anyone to Want to Sleep with You (Saturday 14 June)

THEATRE BY THE YOUTHFUL and THEATRE FOR THE VERY YOUNG

Nottingham Playhouse continues to serve all ages, through education and youth work, as well as theatre for youngsters:

• Three specially formed youth groups take on the bard in the Shakespeare Youth Festival (Thursday 13 – Friday 14 March)
• A double bill from the Playhouse’s Nubian All-Stars and Momentous Youth Theatre (Thursday 3 – Saturday 5 April)

• A quartet of shows for the February holiday week takes some of the pain out of Half Term for parents of under-8s. On Wednesday 13 February, Nottingham Playhouse Roundabout and AJTC present Wedding Story, Sara Clifford’s fantasy of a lost boy who is found again. Then Krazy Kat Theatre returns with three magical shows complete with Sign Language: The Magic Flute on Thursday 14 February, Clownderella on Friday 15 February, and on Saturday 16 February,           Growing, Growing… Gone!
• SATURDAY CLUB continues with more for the very young, sponsored by Ark Day Nursery: Moby Duck presents The Kam Tree (22 March); Tam Tam Theatre presents Jabuti (5 April); Cornelius & Jones present The Victorian Toy Theatre (17 May); and Krazy Kat is back again with Red Riding Hood (7 June).

LOOKING FORWARD…

Three highlights of Nottingham Playhouse’s autumn 2008 season are also on sale already:

• Giles Croft directs VERTIGO, adapted by Jonathan Holloway from the original novel by Boileau and Narcejac (Friday 12 – Saturday 27 September)
• Lucy Pitman-Wallace returns to direct MACBETH by William Shakespeare, co-produced with the Royal Lyceum, Edinburgh (Wednesday 22 October – Saturday 15 November)
• He’s back! Kenneth Alan Taylor writes, directs and stars as Widow Twankey in ALADDIN, his 25^th Playhouse pantomime (Friday 28 November 2008 – Saturday 24 January 2009)