Last Updated on 14 June 2021 by Showcall Editorial Team
Marie Jones’ Stones in His Pockets will be revived by her son Matthew McElhinney as part of the 2021 season at the Barn Theatre in Cirencester
The Barn Theatre in Gloucestershire has announced its new season including a revival of Marie Jones’ Stones in His Pockets and a new actor-musician retelling of Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield.
Also scheduled are Simon Reade’s adaptation of Michael Morpurgo’s children’s novel, An Elephant in the Garden, a festive fairy-tale adaptation of Cinderella, and award-winning comedy Jeeves and Wooster in Perfect Nonsense.
The Cotswolds theatre also revealed that, after the success of its first outdoor festival last summer, it would be bringing back BarnFest this year. It will also partner Scoot Theatre to present family-oriented Shakespeare at The Barn at Notgrove in August.
The theatre in Cirencester is reopening its doors for the return of the Goodale Brothers’ Jeeves and Wooster in Perfect Nonsense from 15 June to 10 July 2021 in a co-production with The Theatre Chipping Norton. Directed by The Theatre Chipping Norton’s artistic director John Terry, it features the production’s original cast of Andrew Ashford as Jeeves, Matthew Cavendish as Bertie Wooster and Andrew Cullum as Seppings.
Marie Jones’ tragicomedy Stones in His Pockets will be revived from 27 July to 22 August, marking the 25th anniversary of the show. It will be directed by Matthew McElhinney, the son of the playwright and the play’s original director, Ian McElhinney.
Matthew McElhinney said: “Stones in his Pockets began life in small community halls and regional venues in Ireland before going on to run for four years on the West End and then Broadway, winning two Olivier Awards and several Tony nominations and has now been translated into over 30 languages. A dream come true, but as a consequence of its success, throughout its many iterations it slowly began to drift away from its original essence and into the more farcical, the pantomime and the Irish with a capital O. This production, on the year of its 25th anniversary, is an opportunity for us to reclaim the story.”
After an acclaimed run online earlier this year, An Elephant in the Garden will run at the Barn Theatre from 31 August to 11 September. It follows Lizzie, her mother, and an elephant from the zoo in 1945 Dresden, Germany, as they flee the Allied fire-bombing in the endgame of the Second World War.
The play is adapted and directed by Simon Reade and performed by Alison Reid. The production features design by Max Johns, lighting design by Matthew Graham, costumes by Elizabeth De-Tisi, sound design by Jason Barnes, radio voices by Chris Bianchi and juggling by Rod Laver.
The world premiere of Simon Reade’s actor-musician adaptation of David Copperfield will run from 28 September to 6 November. In this new dramatisation, David Copperfield tell his rite-of-passage story with the help of a pair of quicksilver character actor/musicians.
The Barn’s 2021 season will end with the world premiere of Alan Pollock’s new play, The Brothers Grimm Present: Cinderella, based on the classic fairy tale. The production will run over the festive period from 20 November 2021 to 2 January 2022. Pollock previously adapted A Christmas Carol and Peter Pan for the theatre in 2019 and 2020 respectively.
The Barn at Notgrove will see the Barn Theatre and Scoot Theatre take over the grounds of the Manor House at the Notgrove Estate near Bourton-on-the-Water in the Cotswolds on 21 and 22 August for outdoor family-friendly, 60-minute productions of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Comedy of Errors.
Cast and creatives for the 2021 productions and further information on BarnFest will be announced “in due course”.
