MERSEYSIDE'S hardcore theatre-goers (or should that be theatr-goers?) don't mind hopping over the border for their fix. In fact they make up a big proportion of the audience at Theatr Clwyd in Mold.
And for its autumn season, veteran artistic director Terry Hands' venue – one of the few remaining rep theatres in striking distance - doesn't disappoint.
Dylan ThomasIn a season of high quality drama, the theatre’s own company will stage Aristocrats by Brian Friel, Season’s Greetings by Alan Ayckbourn, Copenhagen by Michael Frayn, Beauty And The Beast – The Rock ‘n’ Roll Panto - and Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thomas.
Authored in the early 1950s, when Thomas was at the height of his powers, Under Milk Wood is a landmark in Welsh culture which has captured the affection of successive generations and is sure to be a sell-out.
This new production, directed by Liverpool Everyman founder Hands, runs from Feb 6-Mar 8 and also marks the 60th anniversary of the play’s British première.
Before then, one of Britain's best loved actresses, Maureen Lipman, joins US comedy legend Harry Shearer, the voice of Mr Burns and Ned Flanders himself, in Daytona by Oliver Cotton (Monday 16 – Saturday 21 September). Happy in their shared passion for ballroom dancing, Joe and Elli plan to win the next big competition. But the unexpected arrival of someone from their past threatens to throw everything off balance.
Elsewhere in the Theatr Clwyd complex, Director Kate Wassserberg will open the autumn season with Aristocrats, by Brian Friel, which won a New York Drama Critics Circle award for Best Foreign play (Sept 19 – Oct 12). A family reunion in a once great house is the setting for this play about the decline of an Irish aristocratic family.
Terry HandsTim Baker directs the hit Comedy Season’s Greetings by Alan Ayckbourn,Thursday 3 October – Saturday 2 November. an uncompromising portrait of a traditional family Christmas.
Emma Lucia will direct Copenhagen by Michael Frayn in the Emlyn Williams Theatre (Thursday 31 October – Saturday 23 November), a thriller based on the real-life meeting two great scientists, on opposite sides of the conflict who meet for a brief moment in Copenhagen. They have the capacity to change the course of the war that ravages Europe. It reconstructs that meeting and its consequences for world history.
This year’s Christmas pantomime is Beauty And The Beast – The Rock ‘n’ Roll Panto in the Anthony Hopkins Theatre Friday 29 November Saturday 25 January.
More details and booking here
