A Double Bill Debut at Chichester Festival
Ken Ludwig makes his Chichester Festival Theatre debut this summer with productions of Murder on the Orient Express and Crazy For You.
13 May – 4 June, Festival Theatre
MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS
By Agatha Christie
Adapted for the stage by Ken Ludwig
Directed by Jonathan Church
MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS will also run at Theatre Royal Bath from 9 – 25 June, immediately following its Chichester premiere.
The celebrated detective Hercule Poirot boards the legendary Orient Express, enjoying the prospect of a luxurious rail journey from Istanbul to Calais in the dead of winter. The train is surprisingly packed for the time of year; only the intervention of the manager secures Poirot a first class berth, alongside an intriguing and glittering company of international travelers. But just after midnight, the Orient Express screeches to a halt, marooned by a snowdrift. And by morning, one passenger is dead… Nobody can leave. A guard appears to be missing. A killer is in their midst. And Poirot must deploy his ‘little grey cells’ on the most difficult case of his career: one that will force him to question his deepest beliefs.
Adapted from Agatha Christie’s masterpiece by Ken Ludwig, this spectacular and sumptuous new staging is directed by former CFT Artistic Director Jonathan Church (Amadeus, Singin’ in the Rain, The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui) and designed by Robert Jones (Oklahoma!, Mack & Mabel).
Henry Goodman makes a welcome return to Chichester to play Poirot, following his appearances in Yes, Prime Minister (2010) and The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui (2012/13), also directed by Jonathan Church, and which both transferred to the West End. His many other roles encompass his Olivier Award-winning Shylock in The Merchant of Venice, Roy Cohn in the UK premiere of Angels in America and Nathan Detroit in Guys and Dolls (all National Theatre), Volpone for the RSC, and Assassins for which he also won an Olivier Award at the Donmar Warehouse.
The production will have lighting by Mark Henderson, music by Adrian Sutton, sound by Christopher Shutt, movement by Lucy Hind, and casting by Gabrielle Dawes CDG.
CRAZY FOR YOU
Book by Ken Ludwig
Music and lyrics by George Gershwin and Ira Gershwin
Direction and Choreography by Susan Stroman
11 July – 4 September, Festival Theatre
This brand new production celebrates the work’s 30th anniversary.
Theatre-mad Bobby Child is torn between his show-business dreams and his rich, demanding New York fiancée and rich, demanding New York mother who want him to run the family bank. On his mother’s insistence, he reluctantly heads west for the bygone mining town of Deadrock, Nevada, to foreclose on a mortgage.
There he finds the mortgage in question is on a dilapidated Victorian theatre and the owner’s daughter Polly is the girl of his dreams. Desperate to prove his good faith and win her love, Bobby lights on the idea of putting on a show – complete with glamorous dancers from New York’s Follies – to save the theatre and renew the town…
This hilarious, riotously entertaining musical is packed with glorious Gershwin melodies (including Someone to Watch Over Me, Embraceable You, I Got Rhythm and They Can’t Take That Away from Me), and its stunning tap-dance routines are guaranteed to set the spirits soaring. The witty book and dialogue are written by Ken Ludwig, who also wrote this season’s Murder on the Orient Express and is the author of the Tony Award-winning Lend Me a Tenor.
Charlie Stemp plays Bobby, returning to Chichester where he played Arthur Kipps in Half A Sixpence in 2016, for which he won the WhatsOnStage Award for Best Actor in a Musical and received Olivier and UK Theatre Award nominations. He has starred on Broadway in Hello, Dolly! opposite Bette Midler and Bernadette Peters, and at the London Palladium in Dick Whittington, Snow White and Pantoland at the Palladium. He is currently playing Bert in Mary Poppins in the West End, for which he received his second Olivier Award nomination.
Tom Edden makes his Chichester debut as Bela Zangler; he received a Drama Desk Award and Tony Award nomination for One Man, Two Guvnors at the NT, West End and on Broadway, and his extensive work also includes Cyrano de Bergerac, Matilda, The Pinter Season and Les Misérables in the West End, Amadeus at the NT and Oliver! at Sheffield Crucible.
The set designer is Beowulf Boritt; the costume designer is William Ivey Long; the lighting designer is Ken Billington, musical director, Alan Williams; with new orchestrations by Doug Besterman and Mark Cumberland, original orchestrations by William David Brohn, sound design by Kai Harada, new arrangements by David Krane, original arrangements by Peter Howard and casting by Jill Green CDG.