TROUBLE IN MIND Transfers to London Tonight

Print Room at the Coronet welcomes the London transfer of Alice Childress' Trouble in Mind. Following a critically acclaimed run at in the Ustinov Studio in November 2016, Trouble in Mind will run in Notting Hill from tonight 14th September to 14th October 2017, directed by Laurence Boswell with Tanya Moodie in the lead role of Wiletta Mayer.

Pip Donaghy returns to the role of Henry alongside Geoff Leesley as Bill. Jonathan Slinger, who recently starred as Willy Wonka in the West End production of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, joins the cast to take on the role of Al Manners with Andrew Alexander as Eddie, EwArt James Walters as Forrester, Ncuti Gatwa as John, Faith Alabi as Millie and Daisy Boulton as Judy.

Laurence Boswell said "I am thrilled to be restaging Trouble In Mind for the Coronet after its hugely successfully outing in Bath. We have assembled a cast packed with talent, a beautiful and important play and the perfect London venue

Written by trailblazing American playwright Alice Childress, the production tells the story of a group of African-American actors rehearsing for a 1950s Broadway productionin a theatre dominated by white men. By turns comic and dramatic, Childress's Trouble in Mindwas the first play by a black woman to be professionally produced in New York.

Wiletta Mayer is a talented African-American actress who has spent a lifetime building a career in the theatre. Now she's on Broadway, rehearsing 'Chaos in Belleville', an anti-lynching play with a white director. As rehearsals progress, Wiletta finds it increasingly difficult to relate to the part she is playing. Will she be able to overcome her misgivings and will the show go on?

Andrew Alexander's (Eddie) theatre credits includes: High Society (the Mill at Sonning Theatre); The 39 Steps (West End); Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (Sheffield Lyceum); Hot Mikado (Watermill Theatre); Salad Days (UK Tour). On screen has has appeared in McMafia; Midsomer Murders; Downton Abbey; The Hippopotamus; A Hundred Streets; The Monuments Men; Brash Young Turks; Gangster Kittens.

Daisy Boulton's (Judy Sears) theatre credits include; Present Laughter (Theatre Royal, Bath); A View from the Bridge (Touring Consortium); Shakespeare in Love (West End); The White Carnation (Finborough Theatre); Measure for Measure (Almeida Theatre). Television and film credits include Yonderland, Kids in Love; The Exception.

EwArt James Walters' (ShelDon Forrester) theatre credits include: Sweet Bird of Youth (Chichester Festival Theatre); Hamlet; King Lear; Julius Caesar; Oroonoko; Timon of Athens; Spanish Tragedy / Cymbeline (RSC); Nation; Royal Hunt of the Sun (National Theatre); A New World; As You Like It (Shakespeare's Globe); Cuban Revolution (Royal Court); Porgy and Bess (West End); Timon of Athens; Hamlet (Young Vic); Moby Dick (Royal Exchange Theatre). Television, film and radio credits include; Gunpowder; Holby City; Top Boy; Sarah Jane Adventures; Class Act, Jane Eyre; League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

Faith Alabi's (Millie) trained at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Theatre credits include; Funeral Flowers (Royal Court); The Rolling Stone (Orange Tree Theatre); Eclipsed (Gate Theatre). Television, film and radio credits include; Cold Feet; Grantchester; Drifters; Chewing Gum; Agatha Raisin, My Song and Girls.

Geoff Leesley (Bill O'Wray) theatre credits includes: Trouble in Mind (Theatre Royal Bath); An Inspector Calls (Tour); War of the Roses (Rose Theatre); The Flannelettes (King's Head); Much Ado About Nothing; Road (Royal Exchange Theatre); The Crucible (Regents Park); Othello (West End); The Knight of the Burning Pestle (Mercury Theatre / Young Vic). Television includes: Holby City; Doctors; New Tricks; The Escape Artist; Grandpa in my Pocket; White Heat; Law and Order UK. Film credits include: Wimbledon; Ashes and Sand; Asylum; A Life for a Life; Wilde.

Jonathan Slinger (Al Manners) trained at RADA. Slinger recently starred as Willy Wonka in the West End production of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Theatre Royal Dury Lane). Other theatre credits include; Plastic (Theatre Royal Bath); Medea (West End); Urinetown (St James Theatre / West End); Hamlet; The Tempest; The Comedy of Errors; Twelfth Night; The Homecoming; Macbeth (RSC); Yes, Prime Minister (Chichester Festival Theatre); The Gods Weep (RSC / Hampstead Theatre); Uncle Vanya (Young Vic); Power; The Duchess of Malfi; The Coast of Utopia; Richard II; The Machine Workers (National Theatre); Widower's House (National Theatre / Tour). Television and film credits include; Nelson in his Own Words; Playing Ball; Doctors; The Adventures of Daniel; Vexed; Paradox; The Bill; Rosemary and Thyme; Midsomer Murders; Foyle's War; Cold Feet; The Last September; Spring Awakening. Radio credits include; War and Peace; Bel Ami; The Duchess of Malfi; The Coram Boy; Euripides; A High Wind in Jamaica.

Ncuti Gatwa (John Nevins) trained at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. He has appeared in A Midsummer Night's Dream (Shakespeare's Globe); 946: The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips (Knee High Theatre); Lines (The Yard); Shakespeare in Love (West End); Romeo and Juliet (HOME) and television series, Bob the Servant (BBC 4).

Pip Donaghy's (Henry) extensive theatre credits include; The Lottery of Love (Orange Tree Theatre); King Lear (Theatre Royal, Northampton); Trouble in Mind (Ustinov Studio, Bath); Taken at Midnight; Taking Sides; Collaboration; Nicholas Nickleby (Chichester Festival Theatre / West End); Venice Preserv'd (The Spectator's Guild Company); Gabriel; The Tempest; The Taming of the Shrew (Shakespeare's Globe); Donaghy has appeared on screen in Foyle's War; Rattigan's Nijinsky; The Deep Blue Sea; Casualty; Holby City; Midsomer Murders; This is Personal.

IF YOU GO:

TROUBLE IN MIND
14 September - 14 October 2017
Evenings: 7.30pm, Matinees: Saturdays 3pm
Trouble in Mind
by Alice Childress
Directed by Laurence Boswell
Press Night: 21 September 2017
Tickets available now

The Print Room began life in September 2010 in a converted printing warehouse just off Westbourne Grove, with a mission to present an exciting mixture of theatre, dance, concerts, art exhibitions and a variety of multidisciplinary collaborations. The theatre is now realising its unique artistic vision in its new, permanent home, Notting Hill's iconic Coronet. Visit www.the-print-room.org or follow @the_printroom for more.

Since 2011, The Ustinov Studio has celebrated UK premieres of work from around the globe. Laurence Boswell and his team have identified, researched and developed new plays from around the world - as well as unearthing forgotten gems - marking the Ustinov as a studio epicentre for UK premieres. Laurence Boswell's inaugural season was in Autumn 2011 with Classic European plays in repertory: The Phoenix of Madrid by Calderon de la Barca in a new translation by Laurence Boswell, Iphigenia by Goethe in a new translation by Meredith Oakes, and The Surprise of Love by Marivaux in a new translation by Mike Alfreds.

Laurence Boswell is an Olivier Award-winner, Artistic Director of the Ustinov Studio and an Associate Artist of the RSC. His receNT Productions include A Midsummer Night's Dream in the Theatre Royal's Main House, and Trouble in the Mind, The Mother, Intimate Apparel and The Spanish Golden Age Season in the Ustinov Studio.

For the RSC his directing credits include: Women Beware Women (the Swan); Beauty and the Beast (RSC); The Dog in the Manger (the Swan); Bartholomew Fair (the Swan) and The Painter of Dishonour (the Other Place). He curated and directed the RSC's Golden Age Season in 2004, which later transferred to the West End and to Teatro Espaniol, Madrid.

Alice Childress was born in 1916 and raised during the Harlem Renaissance; she grew up to become first an actress and then a playwright and novelist. A founding member of the American Negro Theatre, she wrote her first play, Florence, in 1949. In 1952 Childress became the first African-American woman to see her play (Gold Through the Trees) professionally produced in New York. In 1955, Childress's play Trouble in Mind was performed off-Broadway at the Greenwich Mews Theatre to critical and popular acclaim. Trouble in Mind received a well-reviewed off-Broadway revival in 1998 by the Negro Ensemble Company and has since been produced by Yale Repertory Theatre, Center Stage, Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, and Arena Stage.

Childress is perhaps best-known today for A Hero Ain't Nothin' but a Sandwich, her 1973 novel about a 13-year-old black boy addicted to heroin, which was made into a movie in 1978. Other plays written by Childress include: Just a Little Simple (1950), Wedding Band: a Love/Hate Story in Black and White (1966) and Gullah (1984).

Alice Childress died in New York in 1994.

Tanya Moodie (Wiletta Mayer) is a multi-award nominated actress recently recognised for her role in Fences alongside Lenny Henry; Constance in King John (The Globe) and Hamlet with the Royal Shakespeare Company. Further theatre credits include Terror (Lyric Hammersmith); Hamlet (RSC); King John (The Globe); The House that will not Stand (Tricycle Theatre); Trouble in Mind; Intimate Apparel (Ustinov Studio); Fences (West End, nominated - Best Actress What's On Stage Awards 2014); The Under Room; Chair; A Thousand Stars Explode in the Sky (Lyric Hammersmith); Catch; ACDC; Fewer Emergencies; Incomplete & Random Acts of Kindness (Royal Court); The Overwhelming; The Darker Face of Earth; The Oedipus Plays (Royal National Theatre); 66 Books (Bush Theatre); Trade; Peer Gynt; Coriolanus; Measure for Measure (Royal Shakespeare Company); Lysistrata (Arcola Theatre); A Doll's House; Medea (West Yorkshire Playhouse); Much Ado About Nothing (Salisbury Playhouse); The Vagina Monologues (West End/UK Tour); Anything Goes (Grange Park Opera); The Prince of Homburg (RSC, Lyric Hammersmith); The Suit (dir. Peter Brook); The School for Scandal (RSC, Barbican Theatre); As You Like It (Bristol Old Vic, West Yorkshire Playhouse); The Piano Lesson (Tricycle Theatre). Television, radio and film credits include Legacy; Rabbit Fever; The Tulse Luper Suitcases; The Final Passage. On screen, she is known for her roles in Dicte; Common; Skins; Sherlock; Lewis; The Body Farm; Holby City; The Street; The Clinic; Casualty; Sea Of Souls; Silent Witness; Richard Is My Boyfriend; Archangel; Shane; Absolute Power; Prime Suspect 6; Promoted to Glory; In Deep; Shane; High Stakes; Always & Everyone; The Bill; Dr Willoughby; Maisie Raine; Boyz Unlimited; A Respectable Trade; Neverwhere; So Haunt Me; The Man From Auntie, Poetry Please; The Amen Corner; With Great Pleasure; Small Island.

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