26/01/2010 - Playhouse Theatre Presents - Humble Boy

26th-30th January. Discover this highly acclaimed Charlotte Jones play at the Playhouse Theatre. Directed by Barry Hillman

When Charlotte Jones’ play Humble Boy first appeared at The National Theatre in 2001 it was immediately acclaimed and transferred to London’s West End in 2002 where it won three prestigious awards (including the Critics’ Circle) in the same year!

Starring Dame Diana Rigg and Simon Russell Beale it loosely follows the situation faced by Hamlet in Shakespeare’s play, where the son of a recently dead father finds his mother ready to leap into bed with his successor.

Director Barry L Hillman fell in love with the play having heard it on Radio Three and planned to stage it last year; however, following a chat with his old friend, actress Lesley Joseph, he discovered to his dismay that she planned to star in the show at the Royal Theatre that very year – the first time she’d appeared at this venue, which she’d had an ambition to do. “I cursed her – as I knew we would be no contest against a professional company featuring a star!” says Barry, “but decided to postpone my own production at The Playhouse Theatre in Clare Street for the next year” (2010).

Playing the troubled son, with career and sexual problems of his own, is Robin Armstrong – who took a recent furlough from his frequent acting roles in the town to get married (in Indonesia!), and the part of his selfish and acid-tongued mother is Susan Mallock – more often kept from the stage by her duties as Box Office Manager at the Playhouse!

Doreen Wright is the family friend who lives vicariously through her brighter companion, and Ian Clarke is “the new suitor on the block” – who turns out to be not so new…. and Corinna Leeder plays the girlfriend who gets left in the lurch and in the club, when the son goes to college to study astrophysics. Andrew Nettleship is the enigmatic philosophising gardener.

The play works it’s witty way at the Playhouse Theatre, Northampton from 26-30 January.
Link to the Playhouse Theatre in MYABINGTON local directory
To book tickets call the Playhouse Theatre Box Office
01604 627791 or pay on the night

Tickets - £7
Concessions - £5
Curtain up 7.45pm

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