The Dukes in Lancaster has a new season of homegrown productions including a special 30th anniversary celebration of their award-winning outdoor walkabout theatre in the city’s Williamson Park.
Robert Louis Stevenson's classic tale Treasure Island, from July 4 to August 12, will be given a thrilling new twist by the team behind this year's sell-out production of The Hobbit.
From April 27 to May 6, The Dukes will be visiting another Island—the one created by Athol Fugard, John Kani and Winston Ntshona.
Joining forces again with The Theatre Chipping Norton, The Dukes presents The Island, a drama of defiance and determination drawing on stories from Robben Island where Nelson Mandela was held prisoner for 27 years.
Launching The Dukes homegrown season on February 15, after its run earlier this year, will be the return of I Was A Wife written and performed by 2015 UK Theatre Award-winning actor, Polly Lister.
Up-and-coming young actors from The Dukes youth theatre play a significant role in the spring season with their own promenade performance of their newly-devised work Generation Z staged in A-wing at Lancaster Castle, the former prison now open to the public.
From new versions of classic stories to a no-holds-barred production of Trainspotting, there’s also a varied year of visiting drama ahead at The Dukes.
The Lancaster theatre will see the return of Northern Broadsides with its adaptation of the romantic comedy Cyrano de Bergerac from March 28 to April 1 and making its Dukes debut from May 9-13 with its production of Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey will be Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds.
Also new to The Dukes is the King’s Head Theatre and In Your Face Theatre’s 21st anniversary production of Trainspotting from June 1 to 3.
Two more highlights of The Dukes season will be part-play, part-cookery demonstration The Chef Show on January 13 and 14 and Made In India, a new play about motherhood and blood ties between women and nations, from March 2 to 4.