Victoria Wood’s first play Talent and Katori Hall’s The Mountaintop, which imagines the last hours of Martin Luther King’s life, are among the highlights of the summer season at the New Vic, Newcastle-under-Lyme.
The season opens at the theatre-in-the-round with a “lost treasure” of Edwardian theatre, Cicely Hamilton’s Diana of Dobson’s. It is described as “mixing stylish comedy with social commentary in a rags-to-riches story set in the unseen world of overworked, underpaid shop girls”.
Abbey Wright, who last visited the New Vic in 2014 to direct Richard Eyre’s adaptation of Ibsen’s Ghosts, directs Diana of Dobson’s, which runs from Friday 29 April until Saturday 14 May.
Wright also directs Talent, which runs from Friday 20 May until Saturday 4 June, and The Mountaintop from Friday 10 June until Saturday 25 June.
Talent was written in 1978 and earned Victoria Wood the Evening Standard award for most promising playwright as well as her first BAFTA nomination.
The Mountaintop won an Olivier Award for best new play. It is a fictional depiction of Reverend Martin Luther King’s last night on earth. It is set in a motel room on the eve of his assassination on 4 April 1968.
The New Vic, Octagon Theatre Bolton and Salisbury Playhouse will get together to stage Singin’ in the Rain from Thursday 30 June until Saturday 16 July.
New Vic artistic director Theresa Heskins will adapt and direct the official sequel to J M Barrie’s Peter Pan from Saturday 23 July until Saturday 6 August. Peter Pan in Scarlet will be a co-production with Oxford Playhouse.
“The ultimate ‘60s show” featuring the hapless Eric and his band of actor-musicians, Maverick takes to the New Vic stage from Tuesday 30 August until Saturday 10 September.