There has been something of a glut of announcements in the past week concerning new and established musicals.
In addition to the previously reported news that Louise Dearman will lead the cast at The Curve's new musical based on Charles Kingsley’s The Water Babies, more details of other new musical events have been published.
Not in London but about London is a musical ride through the streets of London at Salisbury Playhouse.
For the latest in a series of musical Christmas entertainments in The Salberg space, London Calling has been devised by Salisbury Playhouse’s Artistic Director Gareth Machin with musical arrangements by Kate Edgar.
It features poems and prose inspired by the city with a mix of less well known songs and classics such as "A Nightingale Sang in Berkley Square", "Maybe It’s Because I’m a Londoner" and "Streets of London".
London Calling runs from 18 December. The cast includes Glyn Kerslake whose recent credits include Merrily We Roll Along, Stuart McLoughlin and Lauren Storer.
Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Evita will continue its tour around the UK into next year.
Leading the cast will be Marti Pellow. Formerly of pop band Wet Wet Wet, Pellow has enjoyed a stage career that includes credits in The Witches of Eastwick, Chess, Jekyll & Hyde, Chicago and Blood Brothers. In Evita he plays Che, Mark Heenehan plays Peron until 10 May and Madalena Alberto (national tour of Fame, Piaf at the Curve Theatre Leicester) plays Eva Peron.
The tour, produced by Bill Kenwright with the Really Useful Group, starts its 2014 schedule at New Theatre Oxford in January and takes in The Playhouse Theatre Edinburgh, the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre Dublin, the New Theatre Cardiff and The Theatre Royal Plymouth, as well as other venues across the country until June.
Bill Kenwright also presents the new production of Fame—The Musical which opens at New Wimbledon Theatre in February and then goes on a UK tour.
Originally an Oscar–winning film and then television series, the stage musical has been updated and is now set in 2014 with the songs, including the title hit "Fame", being re-envisioned for this production and re-orchestrated by Tom De Keyser.
Gary Lloyd choreographs and directs a cast "fresh from drama school" for this story of students at the High School for Performing Arts New York. Tour dates include York, Woking and Bristol, currently closing in June at New Theatre Hull.
And finally a reminder that the recent revival of Stephen Sondheim and George Furth's Merrily We Roll Along will be available to watch on all Digital Theatre platforms from 22 December.
The production which won the Ned Sherrin Award for Best Musical was Maria Friedman's directorial debut opening at the Menier Chocolate Factory and then transferring to the West End’s Harold Pinter Theatre. The cast includes Mark Umbers, Jenna Russell, Damian Humbley and, as mentioned above,Glyn Kerslake.
London Calling runs in The Salberg, Salisbury Playhouse from 18 December to 18 January. A special concert version plays Wiltshire Music Centre, Bradford on Avon on 15 January.
Booking for Evita and Fame—The Musical is available through the ATG web site and the venues.
Merrily We Roll Along is available from Digital Theatre from 22 December.