Following this Autumn's sell-out 1930s programme, Jermyn Street Theatre's Artistic Director Anthony Biggs announces a season of two premieres and a revival to kick off the theatre's twenty-first anniversary year. Comprising three plays and running from January to April, the line up is made up James Hogan's two works Ivy & Joan, The Last of The De Mullins by Edwardian playwright St John Hankin and The Heart of Things by the writer of the acclaimed The Art of Concealment, Giles Cole.
Continuing the mix of new work and a revival, the season ends with Close Quarter's premiere of The Heart of Things by Giles Cole from 3rd to 28th March. Over a weekend in May 2010, in the aftermath of the last general election, the political parties are wrangling over who will form the coalition government. Meanwhile, in a village near the Norfolk coast, a disillusioned English teacher and part-time election volunteer comes home for a rare visit and tries to put his life in order. However, the politics of family life can be every bit as vindictive and unpredictable as the Whitehall variety, and alliances can be made or broken without warning. The Heart of Things explores the themes of family, ambition, love and loyalty ... and birthdays. It examines the conundrum that exists in sexual identity and the 'minor disturbances' that have far-reaching effects in people's private lives. The play was written in tandem with The Art of Concealment - from the same creative team, which transferred the production to Riverside Studios from Jermyn Street Theatre in May 2012 following wide critical acclaim.
Anthony Biggs became Artistic Director of Jermyn Street Theatre in January 2013. His previous productions at the theatre include the recent Flowers of The Forest, The South African Season, The Potsdam Quartet, the UK premiere of Ibsen's St John's Night, Charles Morgan's The River Line, Ibsen's Little Eyolf and the revival of Frederick Lonsdale's On Approval. Jermyn Street Theatre's current autumn season has comprised the acclaimed production of Flowers of the Forest by John Van Drutten, the first ever revival of Terence Rattigan's debut work - First Episode and the upcoming first production in sixty years of Mordaunt Shairp's controversial 1930s allusion to homosexuality - The Green Bay Tree. The season builds on the theatre's other recent successes, which include Maltby & Shire's Closer Than Ever, Arthur Wing Pinero's The Notorious Mrs Ebbsmith, Steven Berkoff's Religion & Anarchy and the recent production of William Inge's Natural Affection.Videos