Full casting and creative team have been announced for Our Man In Havana, the world premiere musical adaptation of Graham Greene’s iconic novel, opening at Newbury’s The Watermill on Thursday 7 April – Saturday 21 May, with a press night on Monday 11 April.
A roller coaster comedy full of colourful characters and uplifting Cuban inspired songs, this new musical is based on Graham Greene’s iconic novel that cleverly satirises the fine line between truth and lies. The production was originally programmed as part of The Watermill’s Spring 2020 season but had to be postponed by the pandemic, and now Artistic Director Paul Hart, Executive Director Claire Murray and the whole team are thrilled to welcome the show to The Watermill for a new run of the show this spring.
It’s 1958 and Havana is on the brink of revolution. All day and night, the streets are filled with dancing and the shadows are filled with criminals. In the midst of the warm tropical air, an English vacuum cleaner salesman lives a quiet life running a modest business, raising his teenage daughter Milly and collecting miniature whisky bottles.
Just as Milly’s love of shopping reaches new heights, James Wormold receives an offer from the British Secret Intelligence Service that is too good to refuse. What Wormold lacks in sleuthing experience, he makes up for with imagination. Nothing stays quiet for long in Havana and his life is soon turned upside down when the fictional events of his intelligence reports start to come true!
Nigel Lister (The Secret Adversary – The Watermill and Footloose – UK tour) will play ‘James Wormold’, Daniella Agredo Piper (Electrolyte – The Watermill, The Secret Garden – Barn Theatre) will play ‘Milly Wormold’, Paula James (Beauty and the Beast – Rose Theatre, Gin Craze! – Royal & Derngate) will play ‘Beatrice / Maria’, Alvaro Flores (ClubMex – Hope Mill Theatre, Time of Our Lies – Park Theatre) will play ‘Segura / Hawthorne / Marco’, Adam Keast (The Sound of Fury – Liverpool Everyman/Playhouse, The Rise and Fall of Little Voice – Bolton Octagon) will play ‘Hasselbacher/Chief’ and Antonio Sanchez (Mamma Mia! – Sala Joaquin Turina; Seville, Beauty and the Beast: The Musical – Asociacion de Teatro La Ribera; Seville) will be the Onstage Musical Director.
Directed by Watermill Associate Director Abigail Pickard Price, designed by Kat Heath, with Eliane Correa and Ben Morales Frost as co-orchestrators, Our Man in Havana has music by Ben Morales Frost, book and lyrics by Richard Hough, sound design by Adam Fisher, lighting design by Robbie Butler and choreography by Andrea Pelaez, with Chris Cuming as Associate Choreographer. The Stage Management team consists of Rose Burston (DSM), Natalie Toney and Fern Bamber (ASMs) with Katie Crump on ASM placement.
Richard Hough said, “The greatest honour of my career, the acme of my story so far, is being given the chance to transpose the finest writer of the 20th century from the printed page to the Watermill stage. Graham Greene has been an inspiration to me since I first read Our Man in Havana at university, a thousand years ago. The thought of bringing his world to life, of planting my feet in the soil of a little bit of Greeneland, makes me happier than I can say, and quite frankly, more excited than is seemly. To be working with such a superb company and crew is a privilege, and to do it in Newbury a pleasure.”
