A new press night and extended season has been announced for a major new production of the multi award nominated The Tailor-Made Man at the Stage Door Theatre.
The Tailor-Made Man will be the inaugural play at the new Stage Door Theatre in Drury Lane, the first pub theatre in the West End, where the opening musical, Sondheim’s Marry Me A Little – also directed by Robert McWhir – has played to sold out houses, critical acclaim and garnered 4 Off West End Award nominations.
The Tailor-Made Man will run on selected dates at the Stage Door Theatre from Thursday 9 May to Saturday 3 August.
The new Press Night is Thursday 16 May at 7.30pm.
The Tailor-Made Man, by Claudio Macor, is the powerful true story of the Hollywood studio system in its heyday, its hypocrisy and the star who gave up everything for the man he loved.
William “Billy” Haines was a popular MGM movie star in the 1920’s who was fired by studio boss Louis B. Mayer because he was gay and refused to give up his lifelong partner, Jimmie Shields, and marry the silent screen vamp Pola Negri in a sham lavender marriage.
As punishment, his films were pulled from release and sealed in the MGM vaults never to be seen again, and his official studio photographs were destroyed. It was an attempt to erase him completely from movie history. But Billy and Jimmy’s turbulent, passionate love affair was to survive and lasted over 50 years. This is their story.
Cast to be announced.
The creative team is: Writer Claudio Macor, Director Robert McWhir, Designer David Shields, Producer LAMBCO Productions.
Claudio Macor said: “Thirty years ago a friend gave me a copy of Kenneth Anger’s book Hollywood
Babylon. As I was reading the various Hollywood scandals Kenneth Anger so vividly described I came across “The White Legion and the Purple Poodle” and first discovered the story of William “Billy” Haines and Jimmie Shields.”
Macor’s The Tailor-Made Man play premiered in London at the Hen and Chickens in 1992, it quickly got a transfer to the Battersea Arts Centre (BAC) to be followed by a TV showcase by Thames Television, who were planning to bring back Masterpiece Theatre. The Tailor-Made Man was chosen to be one of the six initial episodes but then Thames lost their ITV franchise. The play was performed on Freedom Radio with Broadway star Robert Bogue as Billy and Oscar-nominated Judd Hirsch as Louis B Mayer, and then had successful runs in San Diego and West Hollywood. It received another London run at the Cockpit Theatre before its Off-Broadway run at Centre Stage. It was turned into a musical in 2013 at London’s Arts Theatre.
