SYNOPSIS

Famously made into an award-winning film starring Michael Caine and Julie Walters, Willy Russell’s hilarious and heart-warming comedy won the Olivier Award for Best Comedy in 1980. His intimate play tells a story of big ideas through his irresistible, beautiful drawn protagonists.

Rita, a young working-class hairdresser, decides to pursue her hunger for education and enrols on an Open University course in English Literature. Full of excitement and anticipation to finally be able to expand her horizons, she bursts into the life of her tutor Frank, a brilliant but disillusioned academic, frustrated poet and committed drinker. It doesn’t take long for the exuberant student to win over the cynic professor with her unorthodox literary insight and her refusal to take no for an answer. Their Pygmalion-inspired journey leads both onto an unexpected path of inner growth and friendship.

„A marvellous play, painfully funny and passionately serious.” – London Times
„Warmly written… It is the interchange of feeling and realization of new approaches to life on both sides that make this play of particular interest.” – London Telegraph

CAST & CREATIVE TEAM

Time & Place

Early 1980’s.
Frank’s office on the first floor of a Victorian-built university in the north of England.

There will be one interval of twenty minutes.

The video and/or audio recording of this performance by any means whatsoever are strictly prohibited.