Birmingham Stage Company is to mount an eight-month tour of Tom Gates, a new story for the stage adapted from Liz Pichon’s books by Pichon and BSC actor-manager Neal Foster.
More than five million copies of the Tom Gates books have sold in the UK and abroad. Pichon has won more than 20 awards and in 2017 was the World Book Day illustrator. The Tom Gates series has been optioned for television.
Birmingham Stage Company has staged more than 80 productions since it was founded in 1992. The company has become a leading producer of theatre for children and their families, including the Horrible Histories series.
Foster has written and directed all the most recent Horrible Histories shows including Barmy Britain – Parts One, Two, Three and Four which played at the Garrick Theatre, Apollo Theatre and Sydney Opera House, and Groovy Greeks and Incredible Invaders which toured nationally.
His first fictional adaptation was David Walliams’s Gangsta Granny while his adaptation of Walliams’s Awful Auntie is completing an 18-month national tour and his next Walliams show will be Billionaire Boy in autumn 2019.
Foster will direct Tom Gates. The cast comprises Matthew Chase (Tom Gates), Ashley Cousins (Marcus / Granny), Matthew Gordon (Derek / granddad), Amy Hargreaves (Amy / Delia), Daniel Harkin (Mr Fullerman / Dad) and Alice Redmond (mum).
Tom Gates opens at Capitol Theatre, Horsham from 14 until 17 February 2019. It tours to Bristol Hippodrome, Lyceum Theatre, Crewe, Darlington Hippodrome, New Alexandra Theatre, Birmingham, Richmond Theatre, King’s Theatre, Southsea, Guild Hall, Preston, Liverpool Empire, New Theatre, Hull, Milton Keynes Theatre, Swan Theatre, High Wycombe, Playhouse, Weston Super Mare, New Victoria Theatre, Woking, Cliff’s Pavilion, Southend, Eden Court, Inverness, Venue Cymru, Llandudno and Wyvern Theatre, Swindon until 30 November.