Features

With 2008 looming, it is perhaps understandable that the Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse are keeping their cards close to their chest in the run up to the Big One. However, that doesn’t mean that the shortest season of the theatrical year is to be bereft of exciting works in the city’s theatres.

Intemperance, written by Lizzie Nunnery and set to run at The Everyman from September 21 – October 13, is set in Liverpool in 1854. A time of change, it underlines the vast social differences that transpire as the city takes in thousands of poor, desperate for better lives, as the rich get richer at their expense. The embodiment of this is the building of St. George’s Hall, whilst the needy live in slum cellars, forty to a room, drinking away their fears. Lizzie Nunnery was one of the four writers of Unprotected and Intemperance is yet another World Premier for another exciting new talent from Merseyside.

Also at The Everyman in November, is Lisa’s Sex Strike, an adaptation by Blake Morrison of Aristophanes’ Lysistrata, in which the women go on strike so as to teach their men the value of peace. The action is set in 2007 and in the northern mill-town of Blackhurst.

Grand scale

Simon Schama’s epic portrayal of tow men’s search for freedom during the American Civil War, Rough Crossings could be seen as a partnership play with The Empire’s King Cotton. Yet with no fewer than five theatre companies being involved with its production, it is sure to be a play that is set on a grand scale surrounding the abolition of slavery in its abolition year.

The Flint St Nativity

Making a welcome return to The Playhouse is The Flint Street Nativity with, we’re promised, a reworked final act, as well as Casanova by Carol Ann Duffy, produced by Told By An Idiot. Acclaimed Director, Steve Unwin, bids farewell to the English Touring Theatre with The Changeling also at The Playhouse from 6 – 10 November.

The Everyman’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Pantomime for this year is Aladdin: Genie In The Sky With Diamonds from November 23 – January 12, which is sure to be as popular as ever.

A further highlight of the Everyman’s programme is sure to be Roger McGough and Brian Patten’s one night celebration of forty years of The Mersey Sound on October 19.

2008 should indeed be something special.