OFFICIAL: Lenny Henry and David Suchet Set for ENCOUNTERS: PERFORMERS ON PERFORMANCE at the Lyric, Jan 20 & Feb 24

ENCOUNTERS: Performers on Performance is a unique series of one to one conversations with high profile performers talking personally, candidly and entertainingly about their life and art. ENCOUNTERS will open at the Lyric Theatre on 20th January 2014 over monthly Monday evenings. Fiona Lindsay will conduct the interviews with Lenny Henry (Monday, 20th January, 2014) and David Suchet (Monday, 24th February, 2014) appearing as the first two guests.

ENCOUNTERS: Performers on Performance celebrates performance, investigates the enduring allure of those that do it and reveals the transformative nature of performing with some of the most loved and respected names in the entertainment business.

Lenny Henry has been a stalwart of British show business since 1975. After a brief period of performing in local discotheques in the West Midlands at the behest of several local disc jockeys - Lenny auditioned for a talent show called New Faces and got through to the TV heats and won. This surprised everyone he knew including him. From there Lenny was featured in landmark television programmes such as The Fosters, Tiswas, the award winning Three of a kind and of course his own Lenny Henry show and the Golden Rose of Montreux garlanded In Pieces. Lenny has always wanted to act, and, from the moment he began his own Production Company Crucial Films in 1991, he began developing projects in which he could interact with his fellow performers - from Alive and Kicking to White Goods, Chef to Hope and Glory, Mr Steadman is Dead to Work experience, Lenny's acting has always given him a rush, the sensation of moving people through drama as well as comedy - and so it's no surprise that since 2009 he has sought out that rush repeatedly via the theatre - in 2009 with Northern Broadsides production of Othello, Comedy of Errors at the National theatre in 2011 and August Wilson's Fences at the Duchess theatre in 2013. Lenny hopes to continue with his theatre work and resume his roles as a producer, writer and actor within the work of others as well as his own.

David Suchet is one of Britain's most respected actors on stage, screen and television. Best known for his role as the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot in Agatha Christie's Poirot, his other television work includes the award-winning BBC drama Maxwell for which he won Best Actor International Emmy Award in 2008, The Life of Freud, Victoria and Albert, Murder in Mind and Anthony Trollope's The Way We Live Now (BAFTA nomination). Suchet's film credits include Executive Decision, A Perfect Murder, Flood and The Bank. David has also worked extensively in theatre. His recent stage credits include Long Day's Journey Into Night, All My Sons (Best Actor What'sOnStage.com Awards, Evening Standard Theatre Awards nomination and Olivier Award nomination), Complicit (The Old Vic), Once in a Lifetime (National Theatre),The Last Confession (Theatre Royal Haymarket) and the Royal Shakespeare Company productions of Troilus and Cressida, The Tempest and Othello. Other credits include Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Critic's Circle Award), Separation (Olivier Award nomination), Oleanna and Amadeus (Best Actor, Royal Variety Club Award, Tony nomination on Broadway and Olivier Award nomination).

ENCOUNTERS: Performers on Performance is produced by Kim Poster for Stanhope Productions. FURTHER PERFORMERS TO BE ANNOUNCED.

The Lyric Theatre is located at Shaftesbury Avenue, London, W1D 7ES. Schedule: Lenny Henry - Monday 20th January, 2014; David Suchet - Monday 24th February, 2014. Box Office 0844 412 4663 www.nimaxtheatres.com.

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