Yesterday was another of those days that never let up for a minute, though I’m about to let go by departing for San Francisco this morning.
At the National:
It began at 11am with Nick Hytner’s now annual press conference to announce the shape of things to come for the rest of the year: though not quite complete, since he told us he likes to leave space for the immediate and original arrival of something new and unexpected, exciting plans announced include a big new play that reunites the Festen team of writer David Eldridge and Rufus Norris on the Olivier stage for a play, Market Boy, that is being presented as part of the Travelex £10 season which will also include Simon Russell Beale (returning from his current Broadway stint in Spamalot) in the title role of Brecht’s The Life of Galileo, opening in early July, before Russell Beale is joined by Alex Jennings for Hytner’s new production of Ben Jonson’s The Alchemist.
The Travelex season has been the outstanding innovation of Hytner’s regime, and he told me afterwards it was based on a hunch of trying to reclaim the audience who had given up on going to the theatre and he wanted to lure them back. Lowering the ticket prices to make the theatre available to all is also, he feels, one of the reasons the subsidy is there in the first place; and so when I followed it up by comparing the National’s pricing to that of its commercial cousins, he refused to be drawn into criticising them, since market forces prevail there and even the £60 top price for Hay Fever might be justifiable for the treat of seeing Judi Dench. They’ve got to make their money somehow seemed to be his view, and whereas the National has the luxury of programming across a long-term view, the West End merely jumps from show to show that have to be individually capitalised.
Amongst other things, the National will also be importing Caroline, or Change from Broadway, with its original American creative team recreating their work here at the Lyttelton; and is actively pursuing its own music theatre programme via the studio, where amongst other things Blur’s Damon Albarn is developing a new show (set in Ladbroke Grove), which Hytner himself may direct and has introduced Albarn to playwright Roy Williams to collaborate on. The History Boys – heading to Broadway in April, and whose film version that Hytner has directed will be out in October – will not, he stated categorically, return to the South Bank again, though there’s still a commercial life for it on the road that the National will send it out on another tour of.
Movin’ In to London:
Next it was to Ronnie Scott’s for the London launch of Twyla Tharp’s Movin’ Out that arrives at the Apollo Victoria next month. London production director Colin Ingram, previously of the Old Vic, spoke of the international casting process that saw them hold auditions in London, New York, Paris, Berlin, Rome… and Leeds! The result is a company that features dancers from the US, Australia, Norway, Brazil, Japan, France and here, and after its limited 17-week season here, will go on to a tour of Europe.
Stalling to Woking:
I then headed to Waterloo to go to Woking to catch a matinee of the tour of Anything Goes that features former newsreader Angela Rippon (who this year is the 40th anniversary since she made her broadcasting debut) now making her musical theatre debut, but was twice jinxed: having had a £20 note swallowed by the ticket machine, I spent 15 minutes finding someone to retrieve it, and then, with only 3 minutes to catch the 1.50pm train, rushed to the other end of the station and boarded, only to discover that I was on the wrong 1.50pm Woking train! Apparently there are two that leave at exactly the same time: one that’s the Woking train (and takes nearly 50 minutes to get there), and another that takes just 24 minutes. So I ended up 20 minutes late for the matinee, something I never do, and when I took my seat in the stalls, was amazed to discover it was the only empty seat in the house!
Back to the National:
Finally it was back to the National, for the return of Measure for Measure in Simon McBurney’s contemporary production that was originally seen as part of the Travelex season in the Olivier in 2004, but is now back in the Lyttelton. In a British theatre culture where productions have their runs and are traditionally discarded afterwards, its fascinating to see a production like this that has been touring worldwide since it was originally made, and grow and deepen as it engages with the world it is a part of.
