Casting announced for Nutcracker! The Musical

Casting has been announced for the world premiere of Nutcracker! The Musical.

The show puts a modern musical theatre twist on the classic ETA Hoffmann tale and Tchaikovsky’s soaring classical music.

Directed by Ollie Fielding, Nutcracker! The Musical has music by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, book and lyrics by Nancy Holson plus arrangements by Bruce Kiesling and Paul Rigano.

The show opens at the Pleasance Theatre in London on 9th December 2015 (previews from 8th December) and runs to 3rd January 2016.

Dr Seuss’s The Cat In The Hat to be staged at the Pleasance Islington this Christmas

Following a sell-out run at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the National Theatre’s stage adaptation of Dr Seuss’s The Cat In The Hat will return to London in a brand new production this festive season. The show will run at the Pleasance Theatre in Islington  between  Monday 8th December 2014 and Sunday 4th January 2015.

Review: The Curing Room at the Pleasance Islington

The Curing Room 

Pleasance Islington
Reviewed on Wednesday 22nd October 2014
★★★★

Following a successful run in Edinburgh - which saw audience members fainting and running out of the theatre to vomit - The Curing Room has transferred to the Pleasance Theatre in Islington.

Set in Spring 1944, the play centres around seven Soviet soldiers who have been captured by the Nazis. They have been abandoned in an empty locked cellar in southern Poland and stripped of their clothes.

A play about survival, The Curing Room deals with topics most playwrights would shy away from. It certainly isn't every day you see such a horrific play about murder and cannibalism; however, underneath the nudity (the entire cast are completely nude throughout) and taboo subject matter is an incredibly intense piece of theatre about how we might deal in such an incomprehensible situation.

The focus of Joao de Sousa's production is quite remarkable. I could feel the uneasiness in the theatre which grew into concentration. There is no hiding away from the fact that The Curing Room is a shocking play, and I never got used to it or found myself at ease. I have never, ever seen so much blood and guts in all my life.

Interview: Joao de Sousa

Following its Edinburgh run, Joao de Sousa's production of The Curing Room by David Ian Lee has transferred to the Pleasance Islington for a limited run until Sunday 9th November 2014.

Spring 1944 - seven Soviet soldiers have been captured by the Nazis, stripped naked and abandoned in the locked empty cellar of a monastery in southern Poland. Deprived of all resources and ties to the world they knew, the prisoners must redefine their concepts of order and human nature and confront the ultimate taboos - murder and cannibalism – in order to survive...

The Curing Room marks Joao de Sousa’s directorial debut. Last year Joao produced the critically acclaimed theatre production of The Sea Plays (three one-act plays by Eugene O'Neill) at London's Old Vic Tunnels. Before that he worked as assistant director to noted theatre director, Michael Rudman, responsible for casting and directing understudies for productions at the Hampstead Theatre, Theatre Royal Bath (& UK tour), Long Wharf Theatre (USA) and London's West End. 

Joao recently worked for the BBC as an assistant director on their upcoming TV production of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. His other TV work includes first assistant director on the BBC film Coolbox directed by David Farr. He directed the short film Listen to Your Eyes and has worked as assistant to the director on the following films: The Golden Compass and And When Did You Last See Your Father.

I recently spoke to Joao about taking on such a controversial play, the issues surrounding the piece and the extreme ways in which audiences have reacted…

The Curing Room was a huge success in Edinburgh and has now transferred to London. After you first read the play in December 2013 and decided you wanted to direct it, what were the initial challenges?

My first challenge as a director was, ‘How the heck am I going to keep those tensions and relationships meaningful?’ My second challenge was to do with all these props and blood! That was a really interesting challenge, to integrate those into the equation. Once I was able to resolve how I was going to be able to do the stagecraft of this play, then I thought ‘right, now I can get stuck into the play itself.’