Nigel Harman to Direct a Steven Berkoff West End LUNCH and THE BOW OF ULYSSES

Nigel Harman is to head a first class creative team when he directs a major West End season of Steven Berkoff one-act plays, Lunch and The Bow of Ulysses at Trafalgar Studios for five weeks from Thursday 6 October - Saturday 5 November.

Press Night is Monday 10 October at 7.00pm

Lunch (1983) and it's sequel The Bow of Ulysses (2002) are two of Berkoff's finest small pieces, examining the relationship between a couple when they first meet and have, what appears to be, an abortive one-night-stand; and how they are years later after two decades of marriage.

The creative team includes Olivier Award-nominated Sound Designers Ben & Max Ringham, designer Lee Newby (Grand Hotel, Dogfight), lighting designer Joshua Carr (Hangmen, West End) and Offie Award Best Choreographer Alistair David as movement director.

Cast to be announced.

Nigel Harman said: "I am thrilled to have the opportunity of working on two of Steven Berkoff's rarely performed short plays, When I first read them I was struck by the caustic beauty of the writing. Berkoff manages to amuse, horrify and move all in one sentence. And his instinct for the human condition, with all it's flaws and wonders, is unique. I'm intrigued to put these plays on stage and see how an audience will react. They are a challenge to watch. Some people will laugh and enjoy the theatricality of them. Others may find them uncomfortable in the way they hold a dark mirror up to relationships. One thing's for sure, they don't pull any punches."

Producer Jimmy Jewel said: Berkoff's plays are always physically demanding for the actors involved. In Lunch and The Bow of Ulyses, intentional vulgarity sits Cheek by Jowl with passages of poetic clarity, allowing the characters to reveal the most painful and ugly aspects of their lives. Lunch is a black comedy of errors that is as universal as it is bizarrely peculiar. It is a psychological and sexual struggle for power. Berkoff's writing is astounding in its unrelenting physicality. Yet it skips from Shakespearian verbosity, allusion and surprising imagery to tiptoeing indecision. The Bow Of Ulysses avoids any hint at conversation, with each character speaking in long soliloquies, before passing the baton to the other. The man feels he has wasted years married to the woman, she believes he'd have been nothing without her support. The truth, as truth always is, is more complicated and the sides switch around and explore one another, without ever touching in conversation. This is a rare opportunity to see two of Berkoff's finest small pieces."

Creative Team

Nigel Harman (Director)

As director Nigel is currently under the umbrella of The Michael Grandage Company. He is working on bringing a musical over from Broadway with ATG, and also creating a new theatre piece with Neal Street Productions. Previous credits include Shrek The Musical (UK tour). Nigel is also widely known as an actor having won an Olivier and several Television Awards. Theatre work includes, I Can't Sing, A Chorus of Disapproval, Shrek The Musical, Guys And Dolls,Three Days Of Rain, The Caretaker, Privates On Parade. Television includes: Downton Abbey, Mount Pleasant, Miss Marple, Eastenders, Larkrise To Candleford, Hotel Babylon, The Outsiders, Plus One. Films: Blood Diamond, Telstar.

Alistair David (Movement Director)

Theatre includes Ghost (UK tour), Two Noble Kinsmen (RSC); Annie Get Your Gun, Show Boat (also West End) Anything Goes (also tour), Oliver!, My Fair Lady, The Way of the World, My Dad's a Birdman and Bull (Sheffield Crucible); Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, The Sound of Music (Regent's Park Open Air);Tipping the Velvet (Lyric Hammersmith); Bells are Ringing (Union Theatre, 'Best Choreographer' Off West End Award). Alistair directed and choreographed Robbie Williams' worldwide concert tour Swings Both Ways.

BEN & Max Ringham (Sound Design)

Brothers Ben and Max Ringham have been twice nominated for the Best Sound Design Olivier Award (for Piaf and The
Ladykillers) and won one as part of the creative team for The Pride. Recently they won the 2014 Best Sound Design Award at the Off-West End Awards for Ring (BAC) and an Imga Award for Excellence in Sound Design for iOS audio game Papa Sangre II. In 2001 they became associate artists with the Shunt collective, collaborating on large scale site specific shows such as Dance Bear Dance, Tropicana and Amato Saltone. They have produced scores and sound designs for more than 40 major productions and have worked extensively in the West End, the NT, RSC and on Broadway.

Joshua Carr (Lighting Design)

Recent credits include: Hangmen (Royal Court & West End); Wonderman (Gagglebabble, National Theatre of Wales & Wales Millennium Centre); Henry V (Regent's Park Theatre); Raz (West End).

Lee Newby (Designer)

Theatre design credits include: Grand Hotel, Dogfight (Southwark Playhouse) Ignis and Deathwatch (The Print Room). His upcoming work includes Floyd Collins (Wilton's Music Hall) and The Tempest (The Print Room). Lee is the UK Associate Designer on New York transfer of the David Bowie/Edna Walsh musical Lazarus, directed by Ivo van Hove, to a purpose built theatre in Kings Cross.

Ginny Schiller CDG (Casting)

Ginny has been Casting Director for the Royal Shakespeare Company, Chichester Festival Theatre, Rose Theatre Kingston, English Touring Theatre and Soho Theatre, and is the current casting director for the Ustinov Theatre, Bath under the Artistic Directorship of Laurence Boswell. She has worked on many shows for the West End and No. 1 touring circuit.

Jimmy Jewell Ltd (Producer)

Jimmy Jewell Ltd is currently represented by Britten in Brooklyn at Wilton's Music Hall and the sold-out critically acclaimed Katie Brennan's Quarter Life Crisis at the Edinburgh Festival. Recently Jimmy was Associate Producer on the Olivier and Whatsonstage award winning Memphis the Musical at the Shaftesbury Theatre and also on The Mentalists starring Stephen Merchant at Wyndhams Theatre. Jimmy is currently Production Talent Consultant on the world tour of Dan & Phil - The Amazing Tour is Not on Fire, having already played the London Palladium, the Dolby Theatre Hollywood, Beacon Theatre New York and currently in Australia. The show is the first British acquisition by YouTube Red Originals and will go to international broadcast this autumn together with a 'making of' documentary. Jimmy Jewell Ltd has presented Peter Pan (Lyric Theatre Shaftesbury Avenue); The One Direction Story (Lyric Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue); Sikes & Nancy (Trafalgar Studios, UK Tour & Mercury Theatre, Colchester). Jimmy Jewell Ltd invests in theatre across the UK, including the current UK tour of Billy Elliot, and the Olivier Award-winning production of Sweeney Todd at the Adelphi Theatre starring Michael Ball and Imedla Staunton.

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