Olivier Award nominees Laura Pitt-Pulford, Gary Wilmot and Paul Keating will star in the European premiere of off-beat musical Little Miss Sunshine which will launch at London’s Arcola Theatre ahead of a UK tour.
Presented by Selladoor Worldwide and Arcola Theatre, the Off-Broadway hit will open with a seven-week season in London, beginning on 21 March 2019, before embarking on a UK regional tour beginning at the New Wolsey Theatre in Ipswich on 26 October.
Based on the cult favourite and Oscar-winning film by Michael Arndt, the musical comedy version of Little Miss Sunshine was created by the Tony Award-winning team of James Lapine (co-writer with Stephen Sondheim of Into the Woods and Sunday in the Park With George) and William Finn (25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Falsetto).
Nominated for her performance in the Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre’s production of Seven Brides For Seven Brothers, Pitt-Pulford (Flowers For Mrs Harris, Chichester Festival Theatre) will play Sheryl, the matriarch of the eccentric Hoover family played by Toni Collette in the original film.
Fresh from his star turn in the 2018 London Palladium pantomime Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, comedian turned stage favourite Wilmot (Me And My Girl, Adelphi Theatre & tour) will play Grandpa, the role which earned veteran screen star Alan Arkin a Best Supporting Actor Oscar.
A double Olivier Award nominee (for Closer To Heaven at the Arts Theatre and Tommy, Shaftesbury Theatre) Keating will play Sheryl’s brother Frank, the role played by Steve Carell in the film.
The cast will also include: Gabriel Vick (Promises Promises, Southwark Playhouse, Sunny Afternoon, Harold Pinter Theatre); recent Royal Academy of Music graduate Sev Keoshgerian (The Musical of Musicals (The Musical!) Above The Stag Theatre); Ian Carlyle (Show Boat, Sheffield Crucible, Blues in the Night, London Hippodrome); Imelda Warren-Green (Bad Girls and Whistle Down The Wind, Union Theatre); and Matthew McDonald (Titanic the Musical UK and Ireland tour, Our House UK tour).
Ten-year-old Lily Mae Denman (Les Misérables, West End), Evie Gibson (The Sound of Music UK tour), Sophie Hartley Booth (making her professional stage debut) will share the pivotal role of Olive.
Completing the cast are the ‘Mean Girls’ who will be performed by Chloe Raphael, Ava Hurley, Ellicia Simondwood, Elodie Salmon, Summer Pelley, Ava Masters, Josselyn Ospina Escobar, Saffia Richards and Yvie Bent.
The new production will be directed by Arcola’s artistic director Mehmet Ergen with design by David Woodhead, lighting design by Richard Williamson, choreography by Anthony Whiteman and musical supervision by Mark Crossland.
Announcing the production earlier this year, Ergen said: “In uncertain times, we all need a little bit of Sunshine. This is the story of a family coming together to celebrate their differences – and that speaks to the heart of Arcola Theatre’s ethos. Our diverse family of artists and audiences is growing every year, and we’re delighted that thousands more people outside London will get to experience Little Miss Sunshine, through our first major co-production with Selladoor Worldwide.”
On behalf of Selladoor Worldwide, executive creative producer David Hutchinson added: “We founded Selladoor to bring original work to the UK and I’m delighted that we are able to present the European premiere of Little Miss Sunshine. We have worked hard over the last 10 years to build strong relationships with regional audiences and venues to make such a premiere possible.
“This new co-production with the Arcola allows us to create an adaptable musical production which will be seen in both an intimate London venue and in larger theatres across the country thus reaching a wider theatre audience. I am a huge fan of James Lapine and William Finn’s work, one of the company’s debut productions in 2009 was Falsettoland – one half of the brilliant collaboration from Finn and Lapine’s masterpiece Falsettos so it seems fitting to again present another of their works in our 10th anniversary year.”
Arcola executive producer Leyla Nazli added: “Arcola Theatre is making bigger shows for longer runs, investing in artists while still providing tickets that are accessible for everybody. All seats for the London run of Little Miss Sunshine will be £10-£30, and as ever, we will keep ‘Pay What You Can’ tickets available every week.”
One of London’s leading Off-West End theatres, the Arcola Theatre’s previous musical productions include Sweet Smell of Success, The Cradle Will Rock, I Can Get It for You Wholesale and The Seven Deadly Sins, all directed by artistic director Ergen.
Angela Thomas
SHARE THIS POST:
Comments are closed.