With Love In Idleness currently running at its home base and soon to follow its production of Travesties at the Apollo Theatre, and with David Baddiel: My Family Not The Sitcom running in the West End, and Funny Girl on a major national tour, the Menier Chocolate Factory has announced a casting update for its production of Peter Shaffer’s Lettice And Lovage.
Joining the previously announced cast members, Felicity Kendal and Maureen Lipman, are Petra Markham and Sam Dastor, in the production directed by Trevor Nunn. The show opens on 17 May, with previews from 4 May, and completes its run on 8 July.
It follows Nunn’s production of Rattigan’s Love In Idleness, which transfers to the West End from 11 May 2017.
The show centres on Lettice (Felicity Kendal), employed as a stately home tourist guide, who has inherited theatricality and eccentricity from her mother. Caught using ‘alternative facts’ to embroider the history of the house by Lotte (Maureen Lipman), her supervisor, she is dismissed. During the dismissal interview they uncover common ground with the result that she and Lotte develop an unlikely friendship.
This is the first major revival of Lettice And Lovage since the 1987 West End production.
Petra Markham play Miss Framer. Her theatre credits include Hedda Gabler, Separate Tables (Salisbury Playhouse), Heldenplatz (Arcola Theatre).
Sam Dastor plays Mr Bardolph. His recent theatre credits include A Midsummer Night’s Dream (New Wolsey Theatre, Ipswich – directed by Trevor Nunn), Yes Prime Minister (Chichester Festival Theatre and West End), and Great Expectations.
From 1968 to 1986, Trevor Nunn was the youngest ever Artistic Director of the Royal Shakespeare Company, directing over thirty productions, including most of the Shakespeare canon, as well as Nicholas Nickleby and Les Misérables. From 1997 to 2003, he was Artistic Director of the National Theatre, where his productions included Troilus and Cressida, Oklahoma!, The Merchant Of Venice, Summerfolk, My Fair Lady, A Streetcar Named Desire, Anything Goes and Love’s Labour’s Lost.
For more information and to book your tickets, visit the venue’s website.