Alan Ayckbourn’s new play Arrivals and Departures and the author’s first major revival of his comedy Time of My Life form a double bill at Newcastle-under-Lyme’s New Vic.
“Arrivals and Departures evolved from the idea of telling a story through memories,” said Ayckbourn.
“Nowadays, one of the interests for me as a writer is to surprise and intrigue the audience through the way you tell a story as much as the story itself.
“There aren’t that many new stories to tell—it’s only in the way they’re narrated that the story becomes new.”
He says about Time of My Life, “This is one of my very J B Priestley-esque plays.
“It deals with time and how we sometimes fail to realise where we are in our lives—if only we’d stopped and looked around for a moment.”
In Arrivals and Departures, an elaborate trap is deployed at a London rail terminus in an attempt to capture a dangerous and elusive terrorist. Major Quentin Sexton and his Strategic Simulated Distractional Unit are poised, ready to pounce. But is the Major’s so-called elite unit all it’s cracked up to be?
Time of My Life, first produced at Scarborough’s Stephen Joseph Theatre in 1992 and then in the West End, features the gathering of the Stratton family for an evening to celebrate Laura Stratton’s birthday.
The dinner turns out to be a significant moment in all their lives and has repercussions for years to come.
The cast consists of Elizabeth Boag, Terence Booth, John Branwell, Rachel Caffrey, Sarah Parks, Emily Pithon, Ben Porter, James Powell, Richard Stacey, Sarah Stanley and Kim Wall.
Ayckbourn directs both Time of My Life which start at the New Vic on Tuesday (8 October) and Arrivals and Departures on Thursday (10 October). They run until Saturday 26 October.
The company will also be presenting Farcicals, two one-act linked pieces by Ayckbourn, The Kidderminster Affair on Friday 11 October and Saturday 19 October, and Chloe With Love on Saturday 12 October and Saturday 19 October.