SAT 17 - SAT 31 JULY Supported by a National Lottery grant from the Arts Council England's Ambition for Excellence fund - Royal & Derngate

SAT 17 – SAT 31 JULY

  Supported by a National Lottery grant from the
Arts Council England’s Ambition for Excellence fund

Gin Craze!
A BOOZE-SOAKED LOVE BALLAD FROM THE
WOMEN OF GIN LANE
BOOK AND LYRICS BY APRIL DE ANGELIS
MUSIC AND LYRICS BY LUCY RIVERS
A ROYAL & DERNGATE, NORTHAMPTON AND
CHINA PLATE CO‑PRODUCTION
IN PARTNERSHIP WITH ENGLISH TOURING THEATRE
Welcome to this performance of Gin Craze!
It’s wonderful to have audiences back in the theatre
and it’s been a joy to have a production rehearsing in
the building once again, albeit under stringent Covid
protocols, with the cast and core team members in a
bubble for the entire rehearsal and production period.
We’re very grateful to everyone who has had to put in
the extra effort to make this happen. We hope you’ll
agree that it’s been worth it to bring this fantastic new
musical to the stage!

Jo Gordon & James Dacre

We would like to thank the following supporters:

The Made in Northampton season is sponsored by
Michael Jones Jeweller

                                          #HereForCulture

Inspiring and supporting
the creation of new
musicals and operas
With the support of Arts Council
England’s Ambition for Excellence
fund, Royal & Derngate has been
leading a consortium including
China Plate, Improbable, Mercury
Musical Developments, Musical
Theatre Network, Perfect Pitch
and Scottish Opera, which has
been working to address the
barriers that prevent the creation
of new, and original, musical
theatre specifically developed for
mid‑scale regional touring.
Gin Craze! has been developed
as part of this three‑year project
which has seen Royal & Derngate
and its partners support 150
artists in nurturing the creation of
new musical theatre.
Also developed as part of this
project, An Improbable Musical
will take to the Royal stage next
spring and the concept album
#ZoologicalSociety is available
to stream or download from all
major streaming platforms.

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Gin Lane by William Hogarth, 1751

April De Angelis reflects
on developing the musical
Gin Craze!
I met Michael Oakley, the director of Gin Craze!, when
he directed another ‘historical play’ of mine Playhouse
Creatures at Chichester in 2012 about the first English
actresses, set in the 17th century. He then directed a
further play set in the mid-18th century, Fanny Hill, at
Bristol Old Vic in 2015. We enjoyed the experience of
working together so much that we looked around for an
idea for another play with an historical setting.
I had been given a book on the subject of the Gin
Craze and suggested it as an idea. So the seeds of the
project go back to those early conversations. We then
approached Northampton and ETT who commissioned
it. BUT as I began to write I had a strong feeling that the
characters I was creating would be singing. I had never
written a musical before but started to write lyrics for the

characters. After we had showed a draft to our producers
they suggested we bring a composer on board and that
was when we met Lucy Rivers for the first time. We were
lucky enough to be invited to a residential development
workshop in Saratoga Springs, USA by the Orchard
Project and it was actually there that Lucy, Michael
and I met for the first time. Lucy brought her guitar to
America. I remember the day she came over and sat on
my porch in Saratoga and sung the tune she had written
to Inebriate You. Michael and I were blown away - we
loved what she had done. She then composed more
music and Lucy and I wrote the lyrics for a new song too.
It was a very liberating and exhilarating experience. Lucy
and I found a method where when we felt there needed
to be a song - which the scene should be wrapped
around - I would send Lucy some thoughts on content
and images and then she would create the lyrics and the
music. Lucy and I talked a lot about street ballads and
how they would have been the music of the streets and
Lucy’s music reflects that. Any Hogarth print will show
you multiple sources of sound.
The challenge of writing Gin Craze! was finding a story
to match the history and tell it through character. The
women of Gin Lane did not write their stories down
as they were working women and so we have had to
imagine their lives. Court records are one of the only

places to get information apart from looking at Hogarth
prints to get a flavour of the age, although of course he
was not kind to the women of Gin Lane. Slowly the story
of Mary and Lydia emerged as the heroines who struggle
to make a success of their lives in a hostile world. At
some point in my research I was amazed to discover that
the novelist Henry Fielding was a magistrate at the very
time the Gin Craze was occurring and he had joined the
battle against gin. It seemed too juicy a piece of history
to leave out of the play and he became a character as
well as his novelist sister Sarah and his blind brother John
who set up the Bow Street Runners with Henry. Our first
police force!
We hope the musical transports our audience back to
the world of the Gin Women. Like a lot of working class
and women’s history it is a largely forgotten chapter but
it’s worth knowing about the inventiveness, resilience
and comradeship of the women as well as reminding us
that governments often like to blame the less powerful in
society for its own mistakes.
Find out more in April’s article in The Guardian in
December 2020:
https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2020/dec/21/gin-
craze-april-de-angelis-future-plays-royal-and-derngate

Thoughts from Lucy Rivers
What’s been amazing about this whole experience is not
only working with this rich material but also the writing
process has been very collaborative and supportive.
Over the three years we’ve been able to really dig into
the story and style we wanted to create, and April and I
found a fluid way of working together on the lyrics. Quite
quickly we got hooked onto the idea of street Ballads
which were the pop songs of the time, and were sang
and sold on street corners. I was also inspired by folk
ballads, Cabaret, Kurt Weill, Torch songs and even George
Frideric Handel has made it in there. Like the writing,
I never wanted it to feel like we had to be tied to the
period but wanted to make the music feel contemporary
and speak to a modern audience.
I’ve worked on many music-driven shows and particularly
enjoy writing Gig-theatre, but Gin Craze! is my first
official musical. Luckily we had the brilliant Victoria
Saxton as dramaturg to help us with the musical
form and expectations, and it’s been a great learning
experience, ie hitting those big numbers, turning dialogue
scenes into songs and pin-pointing the moments when
the best way a character can express themselves is
to sing. More recently it’s been fun working together

with the wonderful Tamara Saringer who’s come up
with beautiful arrangements and the songs and music
hopefully carry the spirit, energy and emotion of those
women of the time.
Now a brilliant team and multi-talented cast are
assembled and rehearsals are underway it’s been so
exciting to see everyone working together to bring the
story and music alive. Gin Craze! feels like a perfect show
for our time. It’s full of wonderful and flawed female
characters singing their heart out, it’s a political satire,
it’s a love story, it’s full of humour, full of drama, and all
washed down with plenty of gin – what’s not to enjoy! I
hope audiences will be gagging to get back into theatres
now we’re allowed and I think Gin Craze! is a welcome
tonic to the past 15 months. As the women of Gin Lane
say...
“We’re the ones who made the fuss
You should thank the lord for us
We drank the most
So raise a toast to
Gin Gin Gin!”

Cast &
Creative Team

DEBBIE                  ROSALIND                   ARUHAN
    CHAZEN                    FORD                     GALIEVA
    Moll/Queen                Suki/Betsy                   Mary
     Caroline

     PAULA                   ALEX                      PETER
     JAMES                 MUGNAIONI                  PEARSON
  Evelyn/Mistress          Henry Fielding/           John Fielding/
                          Jekyll /Constable         Thomas Wilson/
                                                      Bartholomew

     PAKSIE                  RACHEL
    VERNON                   WINTERS
        Lydia              Sarah Fielding/
                              Informer
Cast and creative biographies can be found later in this programme

Creative Team
APRIL DE ANGELIS            JACK KNOWLES
Book and Lyrics             Lighting Designer
LUCY RIVERS                 TONY GAYLE
Music and Lyrics            Sound Designer
MICHAEL OAKLEY              TIAN BROWN-SAMPSON
Director                    Assistant Director
HAYLEY GRINDLE              ALISON DE BURGH
Designer                    Fight Director
TAMARA SARINGER             MATILDA JAMES CDG
Music Supervisor and        Casting Director
Arranger
                            VICTORIA SAXTON
PAUL ISAIAH ISLES           Dramaturg
Choreographer

Follow the link below to read the Rehearsal Room Diary
by Assistant Director Tian Brown-Sampson:
www.royalandderngate.co.uk/gin-craze-blog-1

Production Team
SARA CRATHORNE              GINA SASSI
Company Manager             Wigs Manager
PATRICIA DAVENPORT          MARTIN THOMPSON
Company Stage Manager       Production Manager
ANNE BAXTER                 TOM LEE
Deputy Stage Manager        Tour Production Manager
MADDY WADE                  OWEN DONKIN
Assistant Stage Manager     Associate Touring Production
                            Manager
DARREN ABEL
Assistant Stage Manager     JOE WHITE
                            Rigger
JUSTIN TEASDALE
Sound No 1                  ADAM BEE
                            Lighting Programmer
JOSEPH BERRY
Sound No 2                  JACK HOPKINS
                            Keyboard Programmer
JOSEPHINE LEWIS
Wardrobe Manager            JOHN YOUNG
                            Health and Safety Consultant

Scenery, set painting, properties, costuming, wigs and
make-up by Royal & Derngate workshops and facilitated
by in-house stage management and technical teams

BETTY MARINI                TAMSYN PAYNE
Wig Hair and Make-Up        Curtain Maker
Supervisor
ABI JACKSON
Freelance Costume Maker

Rehearsal photography by Ellie Kurttz

Musical Numbers
Act One                  Act Two
Gin Lane Versus Beer     The New Queen of this
Street                   Town
What Does a Woman Have   They’ll Never Know
to Do                    Look at Me (reprise)
I am a Mother            The Problem of (Not)
Gin Dive                 Having a Cock
One More for the Road    The Path I Choose
Lydia’s song             Puss and Mew
It’s the Law             Watch Your Back
We Could Have it All     What Does a Woman Have
Got Here Without You     to Do

The Informers’ Song      Got Here Without You
                         (reprise)
Look at Me Jack
                         Suki’s Lullaby
Divine Gineva
                         We Could Have it All
                         (reprise)
                         This World Stinks
                         Gin Lane

Thanks
Royal & Derngate, China Plate and ETT would like to
thank the following for their help on Gin Craze!

KRISTA NORRIS
Sign Language Interpreter
DAVE MIDDLETON
Captioning
HEAR THE PICTURE
Audio Description
RUTH MORGAN – BIRMINGHAM REP
Props loan
A special thank you to the cast involved in the
development process:
Michael Begley, Helen Clifford, Georgia Frost, Richie Hart,
Guy Hughes, Eleanor Kane, Laura Rogers, Witney White

Supported by the Garrick Charitable Trust
April de Angelis, Lucy Rivers and Michael Oakley were
resident artists of the Orchard Project.

Character-led audio
description from
Hear the Picture
Gin Craze! features the real-life historical character of
John Fielding, a magistrate and social reformer, who
was blind from the age of 19. He famously went on to
found the first professional police force, the Bow Street
Runners, along with his half-brother Henry Fielding. For
this production, Hear the Picture bring their specialist
character-led approach to the audio-description offered
for blind and visually-impaired audience members. The
company explain their approach:
Hear the Picture are a company of four professional
actors passionate about delivering audio description with
creative integrity.
Dan Parr, Jo Mousley, Tessa Parr and Darren Kuppan
trained to audio describe after working together in Leeds
Playhouse Pop Up ensemble for ten months, inspired by
the first UK production to include all actors performing
live character-led audio description onstage.
Our investigation into a new style of audio description is
an ongoing process and as individual as each production.

By being part of the creative process from day one
and having access to conversations between director,
designer and actor we can deliver an audio description
detailed with the same understanding of a production
whilst imaginatively creating an aural world that
immerses the listener fully into the energy and spirit of
the performance.
We’re thrilled to be describing Gin Craze! – full of booze,
ballads and brawls and the raucous energy of Hogarth’s
Gin Lane. Hear the Picture will bring to life in vivid detail
the irreverent characters that inhabit the stage to absorb
audio description users into the very heart of this new
musical.

Audio-described performance – Wed 28 July 7.30pm

Other access performances for Gin Craze!:
Captioned performance – Tue 27 July 7.30pm
Signed performance – Fri 30 July 7.30pm

Click here to find for details of other shows with access
performances this season
www.royalandderngate.co.uk/access-performances

Royal & Derngate Team
The pandemic has put a huge pressure on the theatre
sector and, like many of our fellow venues, Royal &
Derngate closed its doors for nearly 14 months. While
our building may have been closed and our stages
empty, a skeleton staff continued to engage with our
local community, through on-line work with young
people, supporting the development of artists, releasing
digital musicals, running a drive-in cinema, and much,
much more.
As team members returned from furlough, they have
worked tirelessly to help prepare the building for our
reopening and our gradual return to a fuller programme
of shows and activities. We’re also delighted to have
welcomed back our enthusiastic team of volunteers. As
we come together once again to support the creation of
new work for our stages, we’d like to thank all the people
who help make Royal & Derngate what it is.
For the full Royal & Derngate team list please visit
www.royalandderngate.co.uk/team-list

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Thank you to all our Business Club
members for their continued support

                                                                    QU I N T O N
                                           QH                       HO U S E
                                  INTE
                                         G RI
                                                IN
                                                     O M NIBU
                                                                S
                                                                    SC H O O L

Thank you
We would like to thank the following for their
generous support:

Director’s Circle Donors
Mr Chris Almand
Mr Ronald Barden
Kate Calnan
Mr & Mrs Greenwell
David & Christine Lloyd
Mrs Fiona Rawlings
Ms Kay Roberts

Director’s Circle Supporters
Mr Ally McLeish
Mr Gregory Steele

Director’s Circle Contributors
Mr D Atkinson
Mrs S Hampden-Smith
Miss Helen Hickman
Mrs Melissa Little
Mr Roger Martin
Mr Adrian Pryce
Mr James Rutherford
Mr Christopher Saunby

Biographies

Cast
DEBBIE CHAZEN
Moll/Queen Caroline
Theatre credits include: Rags (Park Theatre); Sitting
(Hong Kong International Theatre); Romeo & Juliet
(Shakespeare’s Globe); AmDram: The Musical (Leicester
Curve); Love and Information, The Cherry Orchard
(Sheffield Crucible); 3Women (Trafalgar Studios); The
Girls (West End & tour - Olivier Award Nominee, Best
Actress in a Musical); A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur
(Coronet Print Room); The Duck House (Vaudeville
Theatre); In Basildon (Royal Court); Calendar Girls (West
End & tour); The Girlfriend Experience (Royal Court/
Young Vic); Cinderella (Old Vic); Dick Whittington
(Barbican); Crooked (Bush Theatre); A Prayer for Owen
Meany, Mother Clap’s Molly House (National Theatre
& West End); A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Albery
Theatre); and The Rise and Fall of Little Voice (Salisbury
Playhouse).
Television credits include: Avenue 5, Sticks and Stones,
Holby City, The Last Kingdom, Dead Pixels, Agatha Raisin,
You, Me and the Apocalypse, Ambassadors, Asylum,
Sherlock, Trollied, The Spa, Coronation Street, Doctor
Who, Tittybangbang, This Is Jinsy, Doctors (Soap Awards
Nominee, Villain of the Year), We Are Klang, Psychoville,
The Smoking Room, Nicholas Nickleby, Mine All Mine,
Murder in Suburbia, Doc Martin, Midsomer Murders,
Gimme Gimme Gimme, Lucy Sullivan is Getting Married,
Tess of the D’Urbervilles, A Christmas Carol and The
Lakes.
Film credits include: Topsy Turvy, The Duel and Red Joan.

ROSALIND FORD
Suki/Betsy
Theatre credits include: Once (UK tour); And the World
Goes Round, Daddy Long Legs, Just So (Barn Theatre,
Cirencester); The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,
Mother Courage and her Children (both at Southwark
Playhouse); Metta’s Little Mermaid (regional tour);
Oranges & Elephants (Hoxton Hall); These Trees are Made
of Blood (Arcola Theatre); Vampire Hospital Waiting
Room, Apocalypse Cruise Ship Love Affair (Edinburgh/
London); Sard Traven and Boostak are Dead, The Fear
(both at Theatre N16); The 25th Annual Putnam County
Spelling Bee (Assembly Roxy, Edinburgh); Rent, A
Chorus Line (Churchill Theatre, Edinburgh); The Drowsy
Chaperone and You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown
(Edinburgh Festival Fringe).

ARUHAN GALIEVA
Mary
Theatre credits include: My Cousin Rachel (Theatre Royal
Bath); Twelfth Night (Southwark Playhouse); The Comedy
of Errors (Royal Shakespeare Company); Much Ado
About Nothing, Two Gentlemen of Verona (Shakespeare’s
Globe); Romeo & Juliet, Twelfth Night (Watermill
Theatre); Bakkhai (Almeida Theatre); and King John
(Shakespeare’s Globe and Royal & Derngate).
Television credits include: Doctor Who, Black Mirror,
Whitechapel and Doctors.
Film credits include: Anna Karenina and BAFTA award-
winning BBC3 film Glasgow Girls.
As vocal soloist: Carnegie Hall (New York), Royal Albert
Hall, Midem Festival (Cannes), Tokyo City Opera Hall, and
headlined at the Royal Festival Hall.

PAULA JAMES
Evelyn/Mistress
Theatre credits include: Henry V, A Christmas Carol, Thy
Eternal Summer, Love’s Labour’s Lost, Robin Hood, Julius
Caesar (Guildford Shakespeare Company); Tudor Palace
Palaver (History Riot/ORNC); The Odyssey (Jermyn
Street Theatre); The Snow Queen (Park Theatre); Honour
(Royal Court/Angry Bear Scratches); Collapsing Creation
(Kākāriki Theatre Company); Half a Horse, Unearthed, The
Gift, Larksong (Hoard Festival - New Vic Theatre); Hamlet
(Iris Theatre); First Encounters: Comedy of Errors (Royal
Shakespeare Company); The Gingerbread Man (Derby
Theatre & UK tour); Alice in Wonderland (Derby Theatre);
Dead Reckoning (Five Plays - Young Vic); Snow Child
(Tutti Frutti international tour); The Revenger’s Tragedy,
The Tragedy of Mariam, Electra, Hecuba (Lazarus Theatre
Company); Not With A Whimper (Arcola Theatre); Duvet
Day (Theatre Delicatessen); Price Tag, Emil and the
Detectives (Red Earth Theatre - UK tour); Stronger Than
Me... and A Puppet in the Works (BAC).
Film credits include: Devotion (TW Productions); Triangles
(Satusfaction Films); Blood In (Booruffle Pictures); Lovely
Monster (Claw Films); Half a Horse, Unearthed, In Defence
of the Monster (New Vic/National Theatre); and Romeo &
Juliet (Guildford Shakespeare Company).

ALEX MUGNAIONI
Henry Fielding/Jekyll/Constable
Theatre credits include: The Visit (National Theatre);
Captain Corelli’s Mandolin (Harold Pinter Theatre);
The Taming of the Shrew, Twelfth Night, Othello,
King Lear, Much Ado About Nothing (Shakespeare’s
Globe); Assassins (Nottingham Palyhouse/Watermill
Theatre); Sleeping Beauty (Watermill Theatre); Alice in
Wonderland, The Beggar’s Opera, The Tempest, Much
Ado About Nothing (Storyhouse Chester); and The
Drowned Man (Punchdrunk).
Screen credits include: Mr Sloane (Sky Atlantic); The
Borgias (HBO); and Romeo and Juliet (National Theatre,
Sky Arts, PBS).

PETER PEARSON
John Fielding/Thomas Wilson/Bartholomew
Peter is a partially sighted actor, yoga teacher and
breath coach trained at Drama Studio London. Peter
works mainly in devising and improvised theatre and is a
member/collaborator of several social theatre companies
(PSYCHEdelight, Actors for Human Rights, Arts for
Action) combining activism with art and has performed
throughout Europe.
He is Co-Director of The Growth House, who create
experimental live events. Current work includes: AMP (A
Manhood Project) and Tales at Twilight.
Theatre credits include: Welcome to The UK (The Bunker
Theatre); Borderline (Southbank Centre/European
tour); Mohand & Peter (Theatre Deli Sheffield); Europe
2121 (Impro Theatre Festival Würzburg); Twelfth Night:
A Gender Experiment (Rose Bankside); A Midsummer
Night’s Dream and Much Ado About Nothing (Cambridge
Shakespeare Festival).
Recorded media credits include: Love_Dances (Adam
Russell Dance); Samsung First Look 2021 (CLYNDR).
Music videos include On and On - Sian Cross (Sian
Cross Music); and Counter Culture - Henrik Schwarz &
Metropole Orkest feat. Ben Westbeech (7K!).

PAKSIE VERNON
Lydia
Paksie trained at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
Theatre credits include: Network, Angels in America
(National Theatre); The Watsons (Chichester Festival
Theatre); Our Country’s Good, A Midsummer Night’s
Dream (Tobacco Factory); The Philanderer (Orange
Tree Theatre); Jungle Book and Little Sure Shot (Leeds
Playhouse).
Television credits include: Shetland (BBC) and
Eve (CBBC).

RACHEL WINTERS
Sarah Fielding/Informer
Rachel trained at Royal Central School of Speech
and Drama.
Theatre credits include: A Christmas Carol (Royal
Shakespeare Company); Much Ado About Nothing,
Macbeth (Shakespeare’s Globe); Wuthering Heights,
Private Lives (Oxford Shakespeare Company); The
Woman in the Moon (Sam Wanamaker Playhouse);
Babette’s Feast (The Print Room); Sleeping Beauty
(Watermill Theatre); Dracula (UK tour); As You Like It and
The Comedy of Errors (Guildford Shakespeare Company).
Television credits include: Borgia (Netflix/ Canal Plus);
and Doctors (BBC).
Film credits include: Vicious (multi-award winning short
horror film).
Rachel also regularly takes part in the Read Not Dead
rehearsed readings at Shakespeare’s Globe.

Creative Team
APRIL DE ANGELIS
Book and Lyrics
April De Angelis is an acclaimed playwright who has
worked in stage, radio and television.
Her plays include: Extinct (Theatre Royal Stratford East
2021); My Brilliant Friend, a two-part dramatisation of
Elena Ferrantes’ epic family saga (Rose Theatre Kingston
and National Theatre 2019/20); The Village (Theatre
Royal Stratford East 2018); Frankenstein (Royal Exchange
Manchester 2018), Jumpy (Royal Court 2011 & Duke of
York’s Theatre, West End 2012, Melbourne and Sydney
2015); an adaptation of Wuthering Heights (Birmingham
Rep 2008); Wild East (Royal Court 2006); A Laughing
Matter (Out of Joint at National Theatre 2001); A
Warwickshire Testimony (Royal Shakespeare Company
1999); The Positive Hour (Out of Joint at Hampstead
Theatre 1997); Playhouse Creatures (Sphinx Theatre
Company at the Haymarket Theatre 1993 and revived
at the Old Vic Theatre 1997 and at Chichester Festival
Theatre 2013); The Life and Times of Fanny Hill (The Old
Fire Station Oxford 1991; revived at the Bristol Old Vic
2015).
Other work includes: the opera libretti: Flight
(Glyndebourne Opera 1997); and The Silent Twins
(Almeida 2007).

LUCY RIVERS
Music and Lyrics
Lucy is a writer, composer, actor, and musician, and is
co-founder of the award winning Gig-theatre company
Gagglebabble.
Composing/Writing credits include: Father Christmas
(Lyric Hammersmith/Pins and Needles); Mold Riots
(Theatre Clwyd); Kite (The Wrong Crowd); The Bear

(Pins and Needles), Sinners Club (TOR and Theatre
Clwyd); The Bloody Ballad, Double Vision (Festival
of Voice), Wonderman (National Theatre Wales and
WMC), Forsythe Sisters (all for Gagglebabble); Alice in
Wonderland, Sleeping Beauties, The Happy Prince, The
Selfish Giant, The Devoted Friend (Sherman Theatre);
Little Sure Shot (West Yorkshire Playhouse and The Egg);
Y Storm (Theatr Genedlaethol); Grimm Tales (Theatr
Iolo), Finding Mr Average (Channel 4); The Devil’s Violin,
Arden of Faversham, Wide Sargasso Sea, Floor 13 and
Seven Songs For Simon (BBC Radio 4.).

MICHAEL OAKLEY
Director
Theatre credits as director include: Wuthering Heights,
Private Lives, As You Like It (Oxford Shakespeare
Company); Romeo and Juliet, Much Ado About Nothing
(PSwDB, Shakespeare’s Globe); NOF*CKSGIVEN (Vaults
Festival); About Leo (Jermyn Street Theatre); William
Wordsworth (Theatre by the Lake/ETT); A Lovely
Sunday for Creve Coeur (Print Room at the Coronet);
The Invisible (Bush Theatre); The Life and Times of Fanny
Hill (Bristol Old Vic/Lamplighter); Variation on a Theme
(Finborough Theatre); Playhouse Creatures (Chichester
Festival Theatre); The Changeling (Southwark Playhouse);
Edward II (BAC).
Michael was Trainee Director in Residence at Chichester
and a recipient of the prestigious JMK Award for young
directors.

HAYLEY GRINDLE
Designer
Hayley graduated from the Royal Welsh College of Music
and Drama in 2002, where she was the recipient of the
Paul Kimpton Prize for Innovation.
Theatre credits include: Oliver Twist (Leeds Playbouse,
Ramps on the Moon & UK tour); As You Like It (Queens
Theatre Hornchurch & National Theatre); Hamlet, Road

(Leeds Playhouse); A Christmas Carol (Hull Truck);
Alice Wonderland (Sherman Cymru); Double Vision
(Wales Millennium Centre); Romeo and Juliet (West
Yorkshire Playhouse); Iphigenia in Splott (Sherman
Cymru, Edinburgh, National Theatre & 59E59 New York);
Wonderman (Gagglebabble, National Theatre of Wales &
Wales Millennium Centre); Made in Dagenham (Queens
Theatre Hornchurch & New Wolsey Theatre Ipswich); The
Tale of Mr Tumble (Manchester International Theatre);
Little Sure Shot (Bath Theatre Royal, West Yorkshire
Playhouse & tour); Caucasian Chalk Circle (Unicorn
Theatre); All My Sons, Of Mice and Men (Watermill
Theatre); A Taste of Honey (Hull Truck & Derby Theatre);
Arabian Nights, All the Way Home (Manchester Library
Theatre); Cooking With Elvis (Derby Theatre); Fantastic
Mr Fox (Singapore Repertory Theatre); The Nutcracker,
Animal Farm (Theatre Royal Bath); Mongrel Island (Soho
Theatre); Little Voice, Peter Pan (The Dukes, Lancaster);
and God in Ruins (Royal Shakespeare Company).

TAMARA SARINGER
Music Supervisor and Arranger
Tamara trained as a classical pianist at the Royal
Conservatory of Toronto. She also holds a Master’s
degree from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
Credits as Musical Director/Supervisor include: A Chorus
Line (upcoming, Leicester Curve); Vanara (upcoming,
Hackney Empire); Stay Awake Jake (upcoming album
release); The Wizard of Oz (Leeds Playhouse); Stages
(vaults Festival); The Season (The Other Palace); Growl
(Leicester Curve); Signal (ongoing concert series, The
Hospital Club); Me and My Girl ( as AMD - Chichester
Festival Theatre); Cry Baby, Priscilla Queen of the Desert
(Arts Ed); Mamma Mia (Mark Goucher productions); The
Life (Southwark Playhouse); Vanities (Trafalgar Studios);
Heaven On Earth (UK arena tour); and Savage (The Arts
Theatre)’

PAUL ISAIAH ISLES
Choreographer
Paul Isaiah Isles was a West End performer and dancer
for over 20 years and is now a choreographer and agent.
He has choreographed shows for Shakespeare’s Globe,
Oxford Shakespeare Company and Opera Della Luna.
Paul featured in hit musicals such as: The Lion King
(original cast), Saturday Night Fever, Oh What a Night,
Porgy and Bess, Fame and The Full Monty. He has danced
with Madonna; Kylie; Sugar Babes; Shirley Bassey and
appeared on the Royal Variety Show, Top of the Pops,
Stars in Their Eyes and the Disney film Cinderella.
He also runs his own agency, Isles Management.

JACK KNOWLES
Lighting Designer
Jack trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama.
Recent credits include: Nine Lessons and Carols, The
Duchess of Malfi, Three Sisters, Shipwreck, Machinal, They
Drink it in the Congo, Boy, Carmen Disruption, Game
(Almeida Theatre); Caroline, or Change (Chichester
Festival Theatre/Hampstead Theatre/Playhouse Theatre);
Light Falls, The Producers, Death of a Salesman, Happy
Days, Parliament Square, Our Town, Twelfth Night, A
Streetcar Named Desire, Wit, The Skriker, There Has
Possibly Been An Incident (Royal Exchange); Bluebeard.
Kill. Glass. Imp, The End of History, Instructions for
Correct Assembly, 2071 (Royal Court); Top Girls, Cleansed
(National Theatre); Venice Preserved (Royal Shakespeare
Company); The Importance of Being Earnest (Vaudeville
Theatre); Barber Shop Chronicles (National Theatre/
World tour - 2018 Knight of Illumination Award); Piaf,
Wonderland (Nottingham Playhouse); The Greatest Play
in the History of the World (Royal Exchange/Traverse/
Trafalgar Studios/UK tour); Steel (Sheffield Crucible);
Good Vibrations (Lyric Theatre, Belfast); Circle Mirror

Transformation (Home MCR); Beginning (National
Theatre/Ambassadors Theatre); Committee (Donmar
Warehouse); The Beacon (Staatstheater Stuttgart);
4.48 Psychosis, Reisende auf einem Bein, Happy Days
(Schauspielhaus, Hamburg); Junkyard, Pygmalion
(Headlong); The Forbidden Zone (Salzburg Festival/
Schaubühne, Berlin/Barbican); Phaedra (Enniskillen
International Beckett Festival); A Sorrow Beyond
Dreams (Vienna Burgtheater); Lungs, Yellow Wallpaper
(Schaubühne, Berlin); and Night Train (Schauspiel, Köln/
Avignon Festival/Theatertreffen).
Opera includes: La bohéme (Gothenburg Opera).

TONY GAYLE
Sound Designer
Sound Design credits: Get Up, Stand Up! The Bob Marley
Musical (Lyric Theatre); and breathe... (Almeida); The
Living Newspaper (Royal Court); Shoe Lady (Royal
Court); Poet In da Corner (Royal Court & UK tour); Salad
Days (UK tour); American Idiot (UK tour); Songs for
Nobodies (Wilton’s Music Hall & West End); Floyd Collins
(Wilton’s Music Hall); The Wild Party (The Other Palace);
and Lazarus (King’s Cross Theatre).
Other credits include: Wise Children Trustee, Stage
Sight Committee Member, Founder of The Audio Cartel.
Awards: British Black Theatre Awards Lighting and Sound
Recognition Award 2019.

TIAN BROWN-SAMPSON
Assistant Director
Tian is a British-Caribbean theatre director, producer,
movement director and choreographer. Her focus lays
mainly within Black, South Asian and East and South
Asian (ESEA) theatre work, new writing and promoting
diversity, representation and accessibility on and off
stage and in positions of power and leadership.
Directing credits include: For Her (Chinese Arts Now
Festival); Different Book Covers (Tamasha); Lost Laowais
(VAULT Festival); Like Yesterday (Young Vic); Sentenced

to Silence (Camden Fringe); Jollof Court (The Bunker
Theatre); Embalmers and The Lost Boys (Theatre503).
Assistant Directing credits include: Ivan and the Dogs
(Young Vic); Does My Bomb Look Big in This? (Soho
Theatre, Tara Arts); Under the Umbrella (Belgrade
Theatre, Tara Arts); and Forgotten (Arcola Theatre).
Movement credits include: Sax: Music Video (Waltham
Forest Borough of Culture); Heard (Camden People’s
Theatre); and Spring Awakening the Musical (SOAS).
Assistant/ Producing credits include: Milk and Gall, Reset
Festival 2021 and Rapid Write Response: Paper Cut
(Theatre503); ImagiNation Festival (Theatre Centre and
Theatre503); and New Stories: Digital Short Play Festival
(New Earth Theatre).

ALISON DE BURGH
Fight Director
Theatre credits include: The Man in the White Suit (West
End); My Cousin Rachel; What’s In A Name?, The Girl on
the Train (UK tour); Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare’s
Globe); The Last King of Scotland (Sheffield
Crucible); Jubilee (Manchester Royal Exchange); The
Ladykillers (Lyric Belfast); Elephant (Birmingham Rep);
Intemperance (New Vic); The Sweet Science of Bruising
(Southwark Playhouse); A View from the Bridge, The
Scotsboro Boys (Young Vic); A Small Family Business
(National Theatre); and It’s A Mad World My Masters
(Royal Shakespeare Company).
Opera credits include: Oklahoma! (Grange Park Opera);
Joseph and His Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat
(Killworth House); Carousel (Opera North); Don Giovanni
(Glyndebourne Festival Opera); Florentine Tragedy,
Gianni Schicci (Greek National Opera); Varjak Paw (The
Opera Group); and The Trojans at Carthage (English
National Opera).

Film credits include: Mindhorn, The Wall of Lyon, Being
Othello, Mine, The Dark Room, Ghost Story, Stubborn and
Spite, Four, Respect and Promises Promises.
Television credits include: Lemon La Vida Loca, Maestro,
The Hour and The Eleventh Hour.
Alison was the first ever female to become an Equity
Registered Fight Director.

MATILDA JAMES CDG
Casting Director
Matilda is a casting director and creative producer from
Cornwall. She was Casting Director at Shakespeare’s
Globe between 2012 and 2017, casting over 50 shows for
the Globe and Sam Wanamaker Playhouse. Highlights
there included: The Merchant of Venice (dir: Jonathan
Munby), Imogen (dir: Matthew Dunster), Farinelli and
the King in the Playhouse, West End and on Broadway,
A Midsummer Night’s Dream (dir: Emma Rice), and
the touring production of Hamlet which went to every
country in the world (dir. Dominic Dromgoole and Bill
Buckhurst).
Other theatre includes: Nationwide Voices (ETT); Lady
Windermere’s Fan (dir: Kathy Burke) and A Woman of
No Importance (dir: Dominic Dromgoole, both for Classic
Spring at the Vaudeville Theatre); and Mary’s Babies (dir:
Tatty Hennessy for Jermyn Street Theatre).
Film credits include: Pond Life (dir: Bill Buckhurst);
Benjamin (dir: Simon Amstell); Undercliffe (dir: Lisa
Mulcahy); and The Complete Walk, 37 short films made
for the Shakespeare 400 celebrations (as Casting
Director and Associate Producer).
She is also Executive Producer of Citizens of the World
Choir, a choir for anyone seeking sanctuary or asylum, for
refugees, displaced people and their allies, which is based
in south-east London.

VICTORIA SAXTON
Dramaturg
Victoria Saxton is a writer and dramaturg with an
expertise in new musical theatre. Her dramaturgy clients
range across Broadway, Off Broadway and UK touring
producers and writers. Victoria has worked with writers
who are produced at the National Theatre and the Royal
Shakespeare Company as well as The Public Theatre,
Vineyard and NYTW.
Victoria was a visiting lecturer at the Royal Central
School of Speech and Drama where she designed and
led a Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Programme.
For many years Victoria worked at the National Theatre
and helped co-design the advanced musical theatre
writers’ group. Victoria was Executive Director of Mercury
Musical Developments from 2015-2019 co‑creating and
producing BEAM2016 & 2018 - the UK’s largest showcase
of New British Musical Theatre. She has an MFA in Musical
Theatre Writing from GMTWP, NYU, Tisch School of the
Arts, and an MA in Creative Writing from Dartmouth
College, USA. Victoria also trained at the Royal Court,
Young Writers Programme.
Writing credits include: audio dramas for Big Finish; Head
of the Table (Young Vic Labs), Fragments (Playground
Theatre); and Marriage a la Mode (Chichester University).
She is currently working on a book about the dramaturgy
of new musicals (Bloomsbury) as well as several other
writing commissions.

Co-Producers

Royal & Derngate,
Northampton
Royal & Derngate Northampton is the main venue for
arts and entertainment in Northamptonshire and one
of the major producing theatres in the country, with its
acclaimed Made in Northampton work touring nationally
and internationally.
Eight of its productions transferred to London and the
West End in 2019, with The Worst Witch winning the
2020 Olivier Award for Best Family Show and Our Lady
of Kibeho being nominated for the 2020 Olivier Award
for Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre and
named by The Guardian as one of the 20 Best Shows of
the 21st Century. Meanwhile, recently artists have won
The Stage Ensemble Award, The Stage Debut Award
and the Ian Charleson Award for their work on Made in
Northampton productions and the adapted screenplay
from Royal & Derngate’s original play commission of The
Pope was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay at the
Academy Awards as Netflix’s The Two Popes.
The 2021 Made in Northampton season includes Ralph
Fiennes in the world premiere stage adaptation of
T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets, touring co-productions of

Animal Farm and Othello with the National Youth
Theatre, a brand new musical Gin Craze! by April de
Angelis and Lucy Rivers, and a radical touring revival of
Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None.
The venue also presents a diverse range of visiting
productions on both the Derngate and Royal stages,
featuring musicals, dance, comedy and music, and
its two-screen cinema presents the best in world,
independent, British and mainstream film. Over
recent years the theatre has hosted the UK Musical
Theatre Conference, Devoted & Disgruntled 14 and the
International Teach First conference.
Royal & Derngate’s nationally recognised Creative
Learning programme engages with schools, families
and communities in Northamptonshire and beyond, and
its Generate artistic development programme regularly
supports hundreds of local artists each year.
www.royalandderngate.co.uk

Trying It On, written and performed by David Edgar. Photographer credit Lara Cappelli.

China Plate
Established in 2006, China Plate is an independent
producer of contemporary theatre that engages around
35,000 live audience members annually. The company’s
central mission is to ‘challenge the way performance
is made, who it’s made by and who gets to experience
it.’ China Plate is currently making work with Caroline
Horton, Inspector Sands, David Edgar, Chris Thorpe,
Rachel Chavkin, Rachel Bagshaw, Urielle Klein-Mekongo,
Roy Williams, Chris Haydon and Tim Sutton. They are
Resident Producers at Warwick Arts Centre, partners
in the Rural Touring Dance Initiative (RTDI) founded to
bring contemporary dance to rural venues around the
UK, partners in the ACE Ambition for Excellence funded
Musical Theatre Development Consortium led by Royal &
Derngate, Northampton and Derby CAN, Derby Theatre’s
Arts Council England Producing Hub.
https://chinaplatetheatre.com

Two Trains Running by August Wilson. Photographer Manuel Harlan

English Touring Theatre
ETT (English Touring Theatre) are a UK based
international touring company which creates productions
of outstanding quality, imagination and ambition; work
which interrogates and celebrates contemporary England
and reflects the diversity of our nation. ETT make theatre
and digital work that is imaginative, responsive and
alive: sparking dialogue and fostering connectivity. We
are proud to tour shows that reach the widest possible
range of audiences across the UK and beyond, engaging
in a national and global conversation. ETT won the UK
Theatre Awards Best Touring Production in 2014, 2015,
2016 and Best Play Revival in 2019.
“ENGLISH TOURING THEATRE IS SURELY THE
NATIONAL THEATRE OF TOURING” Sir Ian McKellen
ETT is a registered charity and we need your help in
order to keep making ground-breaking work like
Gin Craze for audiences across the country.
Visit ett.org.uk to find out how to play your part
or contact us at supportus@ett.org.uk

INCIDENTAL:
Music For The Stage
Royal & Derngate and Atlantic Screen Music are releasing
a new charity compilation album. Over the past decade,
Royal & Derngate has commissioned some of the most
influential composers working today to write original
music and this album presents their original compositions,
inspired by some of the most famous plays and novels in
the English Language, featuring spoken performances by
many of the stage’s most acclaimed actors.
It raises vital funds to support Royal & Derngate as
it recovers from the devastating impact of a year of
enforced closure and enabling us to continue to produce
our ground-breaking Made In Northampton productions.
Composers include White Lies, Guy Chambers and These
New Puritans; award-winning film composers Rachel
Portman OBE and Anne Dudley; opera composer Orlando
Gough, British Bhangra pioneer Kuljit Bhamra MBE and
ground-breaking classical and electronic composers
Isobel Waller-Bridge, James Johnston, Valgeir Sigurðsson
and Ivor Novello Award-winner Renell Shaw.
Follow the link below to find out more:
www.incidentalmusicforthestage.com

royalandderngate
   @royalderngate
   @royalderngate

www.royalandderngate.co.uk
Box Office 01604 624811