A new production from Australia and a world première have been added to Birmingham Rep’s 2022 programme of work, marking the theatre’s 50th anniversary season.
The Rep’s offering as part of the Birmingham 2022 Festival—a six-month celebration of culture that surrounds the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games—will include Counting and Cracking which follows the journey of a Sri Lankan-Australian family over four generations, from 1956 to 2004.
Written by S Shakthidharan with Eamon Flack, Counting and Cracking features a cast of 19 performers hailing from six different countries. It will visit only two venues in the UK and can be seen at the Rep from 19 until 27 August.
The previously announced world première of the stage adaptation of Floella Benjamin’s Coming to England (31 March until 16 April) will be staged as part of the Birmingham 2022 Festival, as will another world première, Playboy of the West Indies—The Musical (10 June until 2 July), with a score firmly rooted in the Caribbean.
Away from the Birmingham 2022 Festival, the Rep will stage a new production of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing (4 until 8 October) by Ramps On The Moon, the company committed to putting D/deaf and disabled artists and audiences at the centre of their work.
The Rep’s associate company Told by an Idiot will present the world première of Would You Bet Against Us? (19 May until 4 June), a “hilarious and poignant celebration of the most important night in Aston Villa’s history, becoming European Cup champions in 1982”. It marks the 40th anniversary of this huge event in the history of Birmingham football.
The Royal Shakespeare Company production of Moliere’s Tartuffe (14 October until 5 November), directed by Iqbal Khan and adapted by Anil Gupta and Richard Pinto, transports the story to Birmingham’s Stratford Road.
The Rep will hold a symposium attended by comedians, directors, writers and academics, Serious About Comedy (1 April), an inquiry into the development of comedy in all its forms in conjunction with the University of Birmingham.
The Rep’s artistic director Sean Foley said, “to have been able to programme and deliver a whole year of shows for the Rep in its 50th year in its theatre on Centenary Square has been a privilege; that it has also coincided with such an important year for the city is an incredible honour.
“These shows celebrate and interrogate how the legacy of the Commonwealth has enriched our shared culture.
“To finally be able to bring Tartuffe, Moliere’s superb comedy about a conman, to the Rep stage in Anil Gupta and Richard Pinto’s sparklingly funny new version set in Birmingham which was a hit at the RSC in 2018, is a joy.
“It was to be the first main stage show under my artistic directorship in March 2020 but never saw the light of day. Now, directed by our associate director Iqbal Khan who is also artistic director of the Commonwealth Games opening ceremony, it seems the perfect conclusion to the Rep’s 50th anniversary season.”