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The brown word: Death on the Throne @gatehouselondon

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We’re warned at the start of the show with an upbeat number that this is not the usual sort of musical. And it turns out to be just that. But with boundless enthusiasm and energy from its two leads, who deploy a range of voices and breathtaking energy to create a series of voices for puppet characters, a bedtime story becomes a silly oddball tale about four souls stuck in purgatory. With puppets. And various toilet humour references. It’s currently playing at Upstairs At The Gatehouse . The piece starts as a bedtime story. Daddy (Mark Underwood) is about to read a bedtime story for Louise (Sarah Louise Hughes). But her stomach felt funny, and soon, she went to the bathroom. Then, for reasons that seem to only make sense in the confines of the show, they start telling the story of four people who died in unfortunate circumstances in the bathroom. Depicted as puppets, they’re stuck in purgatory as St Peter doesn’t have enough space for each of them in the afterlife. And so begins a puppe...

New cast photos: Shakespeare in Love


New cast photos from the production of Shakespeare in Love are out. The new cast took over at London’s Noel Coward Theatre on 12 January 2015.



The production’s second company stars Orlando James as Will Shakespeare opposite Eve Ponsonby as Viola De Lesseps.


Joining them in the cast, Nicholas Asbury plays Wessex, Neal Barry plays Henslowe, Richard Bremmer plays Tilney and Sir Robert De Lesseps.

Paul Brennen plays Fennyman, Suzanne Burden plays Queen Elizabeth, Ryan Donaldson plays Ned Alleyn, Edward Franklin plays Marlowe, Ncuti Gatwa plays Wabash, Gregg Lowe plays Sam, Andy McKeane plays Ralph, Peter Moreton plays Burbage, Joy Richardson plays Nurse, Charlie Tighe plays Nol and Stuart Wilde plays Webster.

The cast also includes Aaron Anthony, Jonno Davies, Peter Hannah, Nick Hart, Joshua Higgott, Sioned Jones, Sandy Murray, Ellie Nunn, Thomas Padden, Stevie Raine, Elliot Rennie and Florence Roberts.


The limited season ends 18 April 2015.

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