Royal & Derngate Northampton today announces that it will premiere a season of original musical theatre as part of its upcoming Made in Northampton 2021 season.
As the culmination of a three-year project which has seen Royal & Derngate, Northampton lead a national consortium of partners to support 150 artists in nurturing the creation of new musical theatre, the venue will premiere three original musicals onstage and one online.
Legendary improvised theatre company Improbable return to their roots with An Improbable Musical which takes to the Derngate stage in March. April de Angelis and Lucy Rivers’ Gin Craze! then follows in the Royal auditorium in June and Jonny Wright and Tim Gilvin’s Scot Free will be presented in concert performances in the Autumn. Meanwhile, the venue is supporting the release of digital musical On Hostile Ground by Juliet Gilkes Romero, Michael Henry, Darren Clark and Charlotte Westenra.
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 Development, 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.
Royal & Derngate Artistic Director James Dacre explains “Over five years up to 2017 Royal & Derngate welcomed an audience of more than 200,000 to 50 visiting musicals. Only one of them was a new work. Almost all of these 50 shows had played in our larger Derngate auditorium with little midscale musical theatre available to play in our Royal auditorium. So we set out to change this. Since then, we have collaborated with six consortium partners and over a hundred inspiring artists to champion new musical theatre voices. Together we will have premiered at least six entirely original musicals by 2021.
Having already staged Fox-Tot! and The Season, and streamed our digital musical #ZoologicalSociety to over 130,000, today we can announce that in 2021 we will premiere four completely original musicals, showcasing some of the best new talent in British musical theatre. At the end of such a devastating year for our sector, I’m thrilled that as our theatre begins to emerge from the pandemic, we’ll do so alongside this inspiring range of artists who have reminded us of the importance of remaining ambitious, relevant and determined to create original work.”Â
Tickets will go on general sale for An Improbable Musical, Gin Craze! and Scot Free on Friday 18 December. For more information and to book, visit www.royalandderngate.co.uk.
Royal & Derngate has been awarded UK Theatre and SOLT’s See it Safely mark, an accreditation that acknowledges the venue is COVID-secure and will be following the latest government and performing arts guidelines in welcoming audiences.
