Stage: Chichester Festival Theatre Announces Festival 2018 Season
Chichester Festival Theatre’s Festival 2018, the second season under the leadership of Artistic Director Daniel Evans and Executive Director Rachel Tackley, has been announced and is jam-packed with new productions and a host of stars with an array of classics, musicals and new work – illustrating the breadth of CFT’s work and determination to appeal to as wide an audience as possible. There are new plays by Charlotte Jones, Bryony Lavery and Laura Wade and the starry list of actors includes Rufus Hound, Penelope Keith, Amanda Root, Oliver Ford Davies, Susannah Fielding, Caroline Quentin, Charles Edwards, Paul Jesson, Clare Burt, Joanna Riding and Gary Wilmot.
Sean Foley directs Rufus Hound in Noël Coward’s Present Laughter and Penelope Keith, Amanda Root and Oliver Ford Davies lead the cast of Enid Bagnold’s The Chalk Garden, directed by Alan Strachan. Wycherley’s Restoration comedy The Country Wife stars Susannah Fielding, and Michael Frayn’s Copenhagen receives a 20th anniversary revival by the original director Michael Blakemore, and Cock by Mike Bartlett is directed by Kate Hewitt.
Inkeeping with CFT’s huge success in creating West End-bound musical revivals there are two musicals directed by Daniel Evans: Me And My Girl will star Caroline Quentin – and Clare Burt, Joanna Riding and Gary Wilmot will lead the cast of Flowers For Mrs Harris.
There are also three new plays: The Meeting by Charlotte Jones is directed by Natalie Abrahami; The Watsons by Laura Wade will be directed by Samuel West; and Bryony Lavery has adapted David Walliams’s The Midnight Gang, with music and lyrics by Joe Stilgoe and will be directed by Dale Rooks.
Jam-packed with new productions and a host of stars
Daniel Evans and Rachel Tackley said: ‘‘Festival 2018 is all about breadth of choice, perfectly illustrated by our opening plays: Noël Coward in the Festival Theatre and debbie tucker green in the Minerva. We have three new plays by outstanding playwrights Charlotte Jones, Bryony Lavery and Laura Wade, and revivals of significant contemporary work by Mike Bartlett and Michael Frayn. We look forward to welcoming three of the UK’s brightest young directors – Natalie Abrahami, Tinuke Craig and Kate Hewitt – to Chichester for the first time, alongside welcome debuts by Michael Blakemore and Sean Foley. And we’re thrilled that our brilliant Dale Rooks, who has given us so many outstanding Youth Theatre productions including Running Wild, makes her Festival debut with a show for all ages.
“This season we will achieve a 50:50 gender balance in our acting company, which includes some of the most exciting and beloved names in British theatre. We’re pleased to have over 20,000 tickets available at £10 in the Festival Theatre – double the number of previous years and now available at every performance; and the price of tickets for our rapidly growing Prologue scheme for 16- to 25-year-olds remains at £5. During 2017 we reached 62,000 people aged 0 – 92 through our community and education outreach programmes; among these is our recently launched CFT Buddies scheme, providing a companion for elderly or socially isolated people.
“Finally, we’re delighted that three Festival 2017 productions will reach a wider audience in London this year: Caroline, Or Change at Hampstead, and Quiz and King Lear in the West End.”
Public booking opens:
Saturday 3 March (online only) Tuesday 6 March (phone and in person)
cft.org.uk
Box Office 01243 781312
Tickets from £10
Prologue: £5 tickets for 16 – 25s
10,000 £5 tickets are available for 16 to 25 year-olds for all productions throughout Festival 2017; sign up for free at cft.org.uk/prologue. Members also have access to a range of exclusive events.
