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Love bites
Kathy is directing the new play by Nick Stafford, Love Me Tonight, at the Hampstead Theatre, London from 21 October to 20 November. Starring Amanda Abbington, Linda Bassett, Hugh Ross and Nicolas Tennant, the play is about a family trying to find lost love with one another after the funeral of its youngest son. For more information and to buy tickets, go to the Hampstead Theatre’s website here. To promote the play, Kathy has embarked on another press tour and a new piece by the Telegraph has been added to the media section in which she reveals that the acting bug has still to bite her, years after she gave it up to concentrate…
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Going mental
Kathy is to direct the regional premiere of psychiatric drama Blue/Orange at the Sheffield Crucible in the New Year. The play, by Joe Penhall, is set in a London mental hospital, and stars an enigmatic patient who claims to be the son of exiled African dictator Idi Amin. As the play progresses, this apparent delusion becomes unnervingly plausible. It’s an incendiary tale about race and madness and has won three awards for Best Play since it was first aired in London in 2000 – the Olivier Award, Critics’ Circle award and Evening Standard award.
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Back to her roots
Media section updated with an interesting interview with Kathy about The Quare Fellow and her approach to directing, posted on the York Theatre Royal website. Plus an Observer piece written by Kathy herself about the project got off the ground (note the imaginative subs who used the same headline “Kathy comes home” as an Observer feature almost exactly two years ago).
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Happy anniversary
Kathy is touring the country with her direction of Brendan Behan’s The Quare Fellow. Starting at the Liverpool Playhouse on 12 February and ending at the Tricycle Theatre in London on 8 May, it is a 50th anniversary production of Behan’s classic comedy-drama. Set in an Irish prison, the play follows the inmates, wardens and the quare fellow as his hour approaches. Performed by the Oxford Stage Company, it is the first time in 20 years that this masterpiece has been on the stage. Full details below. Click on the theatre website for more details and to buy tickets online: 12-21 Feb Liverpool Playhouse 0151 709 4776 www.everymanplayhouse.com 24-28 Feb Oldham Coliseum 0161…
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Born bad beckons
Kathy’s latest play, Born Bad, opens at the Hampstead Theatre. Written by Debbie Tucker Green, Born Bad is an intense play centering on a black family forced to confront one sister’s nasty secret over the course of an evening. Described by The Guardian as equivalent to swallowing a “scalding cup of triple espresso in one gulp”. Stars Jenny Jules, Nadine Marshall, Alibe Parsons, Nicholas Pinnock, Ewart James Walters and Sharlene Whyte.
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Oooh Betty!
Doors open to Karen McLachlan’s play Betty at the Vaudeville Theatre. Directed by Kathy, Betty sees Geraldine McNulty play devout and repressed middle-aged woman who accidentally finds love in her washing machine’s spin cycle. She then heads off on a bizarre journey of discovery as she tries to break her addiction to the mechanical marvel.
