Dateline 20th February, 2000
New Lloyd Webber musical opens in September
The Beautiful Game, the new musical collaboration between Andrew Lloyd Webber and Ben Elton, will open at the Cambridge Theatre in the West End on 19th September, previewing from 29th August.
Contrary to the rumours which spread through the industry last year (which we reported in September), the show will not deal with hunger striker Bobby Sands, but will tell the fictional story of a Belfast teenage football team and its friends and supporters, set against the backdrop of the Troubles. The show is, we are told, a "metaphor for conflict across the world."
New David Edgar opens at the National in May
David Edgar's latest play, based on the life of Hitler's friend and Minister of Armaments and War Production, Albert Speer, will open at the National on 25th May (previews from 15th), with Alex Jennings as Speer.
Entitled simply Albert Speer, the play is based on Gitta Sereny's biography and will be directed by Trevor Nunn.
From Synagogue to Theatre
Formerly the Great West End Synagogue, the Soho Theatre and Writers' Centre opens its first season on 14th March. Situated in Dean Street, the theatre, which cost £10.6m, has a 200-seater auditorium and aims to provide facilities for new writers, the first ever theatre in the West End to do so.
The season opens with Four Plays: Four Weeks, four plays by new writers Jonathan Lichtenstein, Holly Phillips, Marta Emmitt and Amy Rosenthal (daughter of Jack Rosenthal and Maureen Lipman).
The theatre aims to keep admission prices low so as to attract new young audiences, as well as encouraging new writing.
Cabaret at the National
No, not the musical Cabaret, but the kind of cabaret in which Sally Bowles performed, and it is coming to the RNT on Fridays and Saturdays from 17th March. Metropolis Kabarett (in the Terrace Cafe at 10pm) is the brainchild of Olivier Award-winner Henry Goodman who will both direct and perform in a kind of satirical revue.
Metropolis Kabarett will consist of songs, sketches and poems, and there will be a guest star from West End show, which will be preceeded by a meal and jazz accompaniment.
Mendes on the BAFTA trail
Sam Mendes' first film American Beauty has received fourteen BAFTA nominations, including Best Film and Best Director, just three weeks after it received eight Oscar nominations.
Also in the running for Best Film is East is East, which has picked up six nominations, including Most Promising Newcomer for writer Ayub Khan Din. Mike Leigh's Topsy Turvy has also been nominated for five awards, and Neil Jordan's End of the Affair, which is based on the Graham Greene novel, has won ten nominations. Anthony Minghella's The Talented Mr Ripley is nominated in eight categories.
Among those nominated for best actor are Jim Broadbent and Ralph Fiennes, whilst Michael Caine, Timothy Spall, Rhys Ifans, Jude Law and Wes Bentley are the nominations in the Best Supporting Actor category.
A new career for Archer?
Jeffrey Archer, disgraced politican, ex-Mayor of London andidate and best-selling novelist, is to make his first appearance as an actor in a play he has written himself, The Accused. This will be a courtroom drama in which the audience will decide whether or not the accused is guilty. The play will open in the West End in the autumn.