Lockdown Theatre Announces Live Virtual Table Read Of PRIVATE LIVES With Emma Thompson, Emilia Clarke & More!

Following the sell-out success of Samuel Beckett's Waiting For Godot in June, Lockdown Theatre, in association with The Royal Theatrical Fund, today announces a live virtual table read of Private Lives by Noël Coward. The table read will take place on Sunday 13 September at 7pm with the generous permission from the Noël Coward Foundation.

Jonathan Church directs Sanjeev Bhaskar (Victor), Emilia Clarke (Sybil), Robert Lindsay (Elyot) and Emma Thompson (Amanda). Tickets are £35 and all the funds raised from Lockdown Theatres' Private Lives will be used as a crisis grant to support those who are struggling financially in the theatre industry during these unprecedented times.

The live table read will take place via Zoom, followed by a live Q&A with the cast and director chaired by Paul Jackson.

Amanda and Elyot Chase, after a tempestuous marriage have just married again to completely different partners; Elyot to the delightful, young Sybil and Amanda to the upright Victor Prynne. Elyot and Sybil arrive for the first night of their honeymoon at an hotel on the south coast of France, the Cote D'Azur. Sibyl loves being married. She is as much in love with the idea of being a bride as she is with her husband, Elyot, perhaps more so and tells him that she knows how to handle a husband, how to make him happy. Elyot fears that she means she knows how to "manage" a husband. Unknown to the Chases, Amanda is honeymooning at the same hotel with her

new husband, Victor Prynne. Victor has much the same ideas about marriage as does Sibyl. He intends to take care of Amanda. The fact that Amanda never asked to be taken care of is unimportant. Victor will teach her to be a suitable wife.

Limited tickets available at www.rtflockdown.com

Sanjeev Bhaskar plays Victor. His theatre credits include Dinner with Saddam (Menier Chocolate Factory), Dumb Show (Rose Theatre Kingston), Spamalot (Palace Theatre), Art (Whitehall Theatre), and Peter Sellers is Dead (Whitehall Theatre). His television credits include Unforgotten, Sandylands, Porters, Election Spy, Horrible Histories, The Kumars at No. 42 (Winner of two Emmy Awards, a Bronze Rose of Montreaux Award and a Brit Comedy Award), The Indian Doctor, Outnumbered, Chopra Town and Goodness Gracious Me; and for film, Horrible Histories: The Movie - Rotten Romans, Yesterday, Paddington 2, The Zero Theorem, Arthur Christmas, London Boulevard, It's a Wonderful Life, Not the Messiah: He's a Very Naughty Boy, Scoop, The Guru, Anita & Me and Notting Hill.

Emilia Clarke plays Sybil. Her theatre credits include The Seagull (Playhouse Theatre), Breakfast at Tiffany's (Cort Theatre, New York). Her television credits include as Daenerys Targaryen in Game of Thrones; and for film, Spike Island, Dom Hemingway, Terminator: Genisys, Me Before You, Solo: A Star Wars Story and Last Christmas.

Robert Lindsay plays Elyot. He is a BAFTA award-winning actor, whose credits range from the smash hit Citizen Smith in the Seventies to My Family in the noughties, with a generous sprinkling of award-winning stage roles in between, including Me and My Girl, which won him the Olivier Award in the West End, and a Tony Award when it transferred to Broadway. His TV work has ranged from sitcoms (his first was Get Some In!) to BBC Shakespeare productions, and Stephen Poliakoff dramas Friends and Crocodiles and Gideon's Daughter. He co-starred in Alan Bleasdale's GBH along with ... Michael Palin. He appeared in Ricky Gervais's Extras as an arrogant, mean-spirited version of himself. Or, as his friends prefer to say: as himself.

Emma Thompson plays Amanda. Her theatre credits include Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (Lincoln Centre, New York/English National Opera), King Lear (Renaissance Theatre Company UK tour) and Me and My Girl (Adelphi theatre). Her television credits include Years and Years, Upstart Crow, Angels in America and Win; and for film Last Christmas, How to Build a Girl, Men in Black, The Children Act, Bridget Jones's Baby, Beauty and the Beast, Saving Mr. Banks, Nanny McPhee, An Education, Harry Potter, Love Actually, Sense and Sensibility (Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay), Much Ado About Nothing and Howards End (Academy Award for Best Actress).

Jonathan Church CBE directs. He is currently Artistic Director of Bath Theatre Royal's Summer Season, Chair of Marlowe Theatre Canterbury and on the Board of the Almeida Theatre. He was Artistic Director of Chichester Festival Theatre (2006-2016); Artistic Director of Birmingham Repertory Theatre (2001-2006); Associate Director of Hampstead Theatre (1999-2001); Artistic Director of Salisbury Playhouse (1995-1999); Associate Director of Derby Playhouse (1994-1995) and Assistant Director of Nottingham Playhouse (1992- 1994).

Jonathan's West End Productions as a Director include Hobson's Choice, Taken At Midnight (Theatre Royal Haymarket), Singin' In The Rain (Palace Theatre), The Resistable Rise of Arturo Ui (Duchess Theatre), Of Mice and Men (Savoy Theatre and The Old Vic), The Witches (Wyndham's Theatre), A Busy Day (Lyric Theatre), The Life and Times of Nicholas Nickleby (Gielgud Theatre).

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