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The British Theatre Guide Newsletter
No 1207: 13 April 2025
Editorial
This week, Ncuti Gatwa is hitting the headlines, as not only did he begin a new series of Doctor Who yesterday as the eponymous Time Lord but he was announced to be starring as playwright Christopher Marlowe opposite Edward Bluemel’s William Shakespeare in a co-production between Playful Productions and the RSC later this year, but only for a limited London run.
Here in the North West, the saga of the Royal Exchange continues as Curve CEO Chris Stafford has come up from Leicester temporarily as Interim Executive Director and Co-CEO after the departure of Chief Executive Stephen Freeman, who stepped down after a report into the cancellation of last year’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
But that’s not the most notable thing that came out of that press release. Remember last year when they made a big thing of getting rid of the role of Artistic Director for the first time in its almost 50-year history? Well, the press release referred to the person appointed as Creative Director last year, Selina Cartmell, as, "the recently appointed Artistic Director and Co-CEO”.
So it seems that the demise of the artistic director was greatly exaggerated, though I don’t have a press release about the appointment to confirm when this happened (and I did ask). Let’s hope this finally stabilises the management of the theatre so that we can concentrate on what happens on stage rather than in the boardroom—although this appears to only consist of five main-house productions this year, one of which is really a Manchester International Festival production, and the Studio has still not reopened following lockdown, and shows no sign of doing so.
I get a lot of press releases containing promotions thinly disguised as surveys or scientific studies, rarely accompanied by any kind of methodology to show they have any validity or reliability. In fact, most have nothing to do with us as there are a lot of lazy PR companies who don’t bother to check that what they are sending is relevant to the publication they are sending it to as e-mail is cheap compared to the old days of snail mail.
Most of these go in the virtual bin, but Philip Fisher has taken the trouble to examine a recent one that claims to be able to identify the perfect musical song. It uses scientific-sounding terms (like many vintage online scams) like “cosine similarity scoring” and “median values” to sound objective, but what are they measuring against? Whatever is used as the ‘ideal’ model is surely a very subjective choice.
Plus some of the criteria against which songs are being judged are very dubious. “Danceability” is the first criterion, but the top 20 doesn’t feature anything that starred or was directed by the likes of Gene Kelly or Fred Astaire (there is one from West Side Story, but “America” is far from the ‘danciest’ from that show). Can there be a key, tempo or time signature that is ideal for a musical theatre song in every circumstance? Well they are criteria used in this ‘study’. And I’m not convinced that “speechiness” or “acousticness” are words at all—and neither is my spellchecker.
Like most opinion-based surveys, the majority of the ‘top’ results are recent rather than being balanced across the whole of musical theatre history, so they don’t really tell us anything more than how short people’s memories are.
The next newsletter will be on Easter Sunday, so if you celebrate the event for any reason, religious or otherwise, have a great time.
Hayman tours as Miller's Willy Loman Actor David Hayman and director Andy Arnold on the current touring production of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman
Chris Stafford, CEO of Leicester's Curve Theatre, will join Manchester's Royal Exchange temporarily as part-time Interim Executive Director and Co-CEO.
The National Gilbert and Sullivan Opera Company will present three productions at the 31st International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival at Buxton Opera House in August 2025.
Chris Stafford, CEO of Leicester's Curve Theatre, will join Manchester's Royal Exchange temporarily as part-time Interim Executive Director and Co-CEO.
A drama telling the stories of four generations of Northern Irish women and a new play featuring live cooking on stage are in Belgrade Theatre's autumn and winter 2025 season.
The National Gilbert and Sullivan Opera Company will present three productions at the 31st International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival at Buxton Opera House in August 2025.
Little Women Lee Dean and Daniel Schumann, Pitlochry Festival Theatre, The Belgrave Coventry and Blackpool Grand Theatre at The Lowry, Salford
Manhunt Royal Court Theatre and Sonia Friedman Productions at Royal Court Theatre
Boys from the Blackstuff Liverpool's Royal Court and National Theatre at Everyman Theatre, Cheltenham
Abigail's Party Royal Exchange Theatre at Royal Exchange Theatre
Kim’s Convenience Adam Blanshay Productions and Park Theatre at HOME, Manchester
Spitfire Girls Tilted Wig and Mayflower, Southampton at Derby Theatre
International Draft Works 2025 Dutch National Ballet, Northern Ballet, Stuttgart Ballet, Royal Ballet, Joburg Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet, Norwegian National Ballet at Linbury Theatre, Royal Ballet & Opera
Piaf Watermill Theatre Company at Watermill Theatre Newbury
The Koala Who Could (Nicoll Entertainment present a Rose Theatre, Lowry, Northern Stage, Unicorn Theatre and MAST Mayflower Studios production) - Bristol Old Vic, Bristol, –
The Da Vinci Code (Wiltshire Creative and Mercury Theatre Colchester) - Salisbury Playhouse, Salisbury, –
