CityLife

Something for everyone in new Lowry season

THUMBS UP: Matt Lucas is coming to The Lowry

MATT Lucas as Joe Orton’s gay lover, Felicity Kendal in George Bernard Shaw’s Mrs Warren’s Profession, a new show starring Penelope Keith and the return of Matthew Bourne are just some of the highlights in the new Lowry season.

There’s also a series of ‘nu-Burlesque’ shows and an adventurous new initiative called No Boundaries, featuring work by Slung Low as well as the Lowry’s own production of Fireflies, a new play inspired by local places, people and events and written by one of the northwest’s leading playwrights, Kevin Fegan.

The season opens with ****ing Men (August 27-29), a comedy drama following ten male couples and strangers as they search for love, sex and intimacy in modern day America.

Then Little Britain star Matt Lucas and Chris New take to the stage from August 31-September 5 as Joe Orton and his lover Kenneth Halliwell in the darkly funny Prick Up Your Ears.

In complete contrast is the stage version of Victoria Wood’s hugely popular BBC sitcom Dinnerladies. Starring Andrew Dunn (Tony) and Shobna Gulati (Anita) from the original TV cast, it runs from September 7-12.

After their recent successful visit with The Cripple Of Inishmaan Druid returns to The Lowry with Enda Walsh’s The Walworth Farce, a ferociously entertaining and tender farce about family history and violence (September 15-19).

Eighteen Stupid Reasons Why I Love You Lots And Lots is on September 21-22, followed by the entirely more serious and multi award-winning Deep Cut – Sherman Cymru by Philip Ralph.

Taken from original source material, the play is a compelling account of how one young soldier’s family fought to uncover the truth about her death (September 22-26).

After Zeitgeist Production’s version of dark adult comedy The Killing of Sister George (September 24-26), Penelope Keith stars at The Lowry for the first time in Entertaining Angels by Richard Everett, a sharply comic show about a clergy widow who finds her new-found freedom suddenly threatened.

That runs from September 28-October 3 and is followed by the Watermill Theatre’s acclaimed production of Hot Mikado, directed by Strictly Come Dancing’s Craig Revel Horwood (October 6-10).

Little Tin Rock God from Kobal Theatre Company, running on October 8 and 9, is followed by Red Ladder’s Forgotten Things, a dark comic play for cross-generational audiences (October 15-17). Sun 18 October

Take a trip beyond the grave with Rumpus Theatre Company’s production The Horrific Case of Mr Valdemar on October 18, while you can trace an epic journey across America with Angel Club (North)’s Obstacles to Coming Home (October 22-23), or follow Alice down the rabbit hole with Refressh Theatre’s Alice on October 24.

A sure-fire hit and genuine audience pleaser is The Pitmen Painters, the story of how, in 1934, a group of Ashington miners hired a professor to teach an art appreciation evening class.

Rapidly abandoning theory in favour of practice, the pitmen began to paint. Their engrossing, empowering story runs from October 27-31.

The very next week Felicity Kendal stars in Mrs Warren’s Profession, George Bernard Shaw’s provocative play about constrained morals (November 2-7), while Icons on November 6 is ‘a theatrical cabaret for the fame-fixated Heat magazine generation’. 

Found Theatre’s The Signalman (November 8-9) is an evening of chilling ghost stories by Charles Dickens and M. R. James, introduced by intrepid Victorian psychic investigator, Montagu Furzan.

There are more intrepid investigations from November 5-7 as The Vagina Monologues returns. 

As troops withdraw from Iraq, the Royal Shakespeare Company bring Roy Williams’ Days of Significance to the Lowry.

It’s a blisteringly topical play examining the aftermath of war, where conflicts rage beyond the battleground. (November 24-28)

More than 60,000 Polish people have come to Britain to seek work since 2004.

Two British lads reverse the trend to work in Warsaw in Hard Graft’s comedy Poles Apart, tells their story on November 26.

Turning to dance, Rambert Dance Company celebrate 10 years at The Lowry with a diverse and thrilling programme on their Comedy of Change Tour 2009.

Featuring live music by the Rambert Orchestra, this great company’s 22 dancers reveal their versatility in works inspired by Charles Darwin and samba (September 23-25), while Argentina’s hottest dance show Tango Fire features 10 sensational dancers accompanied by sizzling live music (September 20).

Company Chameleon present Kith/Kin – from male duet Rites, to the female perspective of Before Night Fell, to young men’s dance project Stride – on September 30.

October 21 sees the eagerly-awaited return of New Adventures and Matthew Bourne with Dorian Gray, in which Oscar Wilde’s gothic fable becomes a darkly seductive dance theatre event. Until October 24.

Bonachela Dance Company, led by Rafael Bonachela, bring their The Land of Yes and The Land of No to The Lowry on November 3, while Life (November 15) uses Indian dance, original live music to explore spirituality, meditation and the many stages of human life.

Insane in the Brain (November 21) finds a classic story injected with a dose of hip-hop as breakdance becomes a way of expressing freedom within the confines of a psychiatric hospital.

Meanwhile, on December 8 aerial theatre company Ockham’s Razor return with The Mill, featuring a wooden wheel suspended six metres in the air, powered by performers whose changing fates hang in the balance.

No Boundaries opens on September 2 with Slung Low’s They Only Come at Night: Resurrection.

Be part of the pulse-quickening action as a graphic novelist comes face to face with the vampiric creatures from his latest book. Until September 12.

Journey beyond media hype to the heart of a war zone in Slung Low’s Beyond the Front Line, a large-scale, outdoor experience which explores the ties between the civilian population and the Armed Forces.

The show, running from October 5-17, is a unique collaboration between Slung Low, The Lowry, Imperial War Museum North and Salford University.

Fireflies – A Love Story Waiting to Happen (October 16-31) stars Corrie’s Suranne Jones and is directed by Noreen Kershaw (Shameless).

This fiercely frank and darkly comic tale reveals two lonely hearts in the face of hardship.

Tickets for the new Lowry season go on public sale from Thursday, July 2.