Four theatres team up for Lovely Bones adaptation

Published: 17 February 2018
Reporter: Steve Orme

Aiming to charm: The Lovely Bones

The world première of Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones, adapted for the stage by Bryony Lavery and a joint venture between four theatres, will open in Northampton in September 2018.

It will be a Birmingham REP, Northampton Royal and Derngate and Northern Stage co-production in association with Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse. It will also tour to The New Wolsey Theatre, Ipswich.

The Lovely Bones was published in 2002 and is a coming-of-age tale that became an instant bestseller across the world. It won the Indies Choice Book Award for Adult Fiction in 2003.

It tells the story of Susie Salmon who is just like any other girl. She wants to be beautiful, adores her charm bracelet and has a crush on a boy from school. There is one big difference: Susie is dead.

She observes while her family cope with their grief in different ways. Her father Jack is obsessed with identifying the killer. Her mother Abigail is desperate to create a brighter future. And her sister Lindsay is discovering the opposite sex with experiences that Susie will never know.

Alice Sebold said she was excited “to see The Lovely Bones as a play and see its characters come to life on stage”. Bryony Lavery spoke of her passion for this “rich, funny, tough, healing book”, saying “I’ve found that the huge story is very happy to change its medium and reveal its treasures on the stages at five of the UK’s leading theatres.”

Melly Still directs. Her credits include Helen Edmundson’s adaptation of Jamila Gavin’s novel Coram Boy at the National Theatre in 2005 and 2006 and on Broadway. She has also directed for Glyndebourne and the Royal Shakespeare Company.

The Lovely Bones runs at Royal and Derngate, Northampton from 1 until 22 September. It transfers to Liverpool Everyman from 25 September until 6 October, Northern Stage, Newcastle from 9 until 20 October, Birmingham REP from 30 October until 10 November and New Wolsey Theatre, Ipswich from 13 until 17 November.

Are you sure?