A classic thriller, four Alan Ayckbourns and offerings from John Godber, Harold Pinter and Northern Broadsides make up the autumn season at Newcastle-under-Lyme’s New Vic Theatre.
The season opens with a new comedy from BAFTA award-winning John Godber. He turns his attention to the battles, passions and personal dramas of an elite women’s rugby team in Muddy Cows.
The Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough presentation runs at the New Vic from 3 until 14 September.
Patrick Hamilton’s classic Gaslight, the longest-running British play in Broadway history, will be revived by the New Vic from 20 September until 5 October.
Alan Ayckbourn’s annual visit to north Staffordshire has become a New Vic tradition and this autumn the New Vic will be staging no fewer than four of his productions: one of his most popular plays Time of my Life, from 8 until 26 October; his world première production of Arrivals and Departures from 10 until 26 October; and two one-act comedies, The Kidderminster Affair and Chloe with Love on 11, 12 and 19 October.
Ayckbourn fanatics can in fact see all four plays in one day on Saturday 19 October.
Northern Broadsides returns to the New Vic with The Grand Gesture, freely adapted by Deborah McAndrew from The Suicide by Nikolai Erdman. It runs from 29 October until 9 November.
London Classic Theatre will also head back to the New Vic, this time with Harold Pinter’s Betrayal, from 12 until 16 November.
The two Christmas productions at the New Vic are artistic director Theresa Heskins’s adaptation of Dodie Smith’s The Hundred and One Dalmatians from 23 November until 1 February; and Uncle Eric’s Murder at Christmas from 2 until 14 December.