PRESS RELEASE
Logos Theatre Company, currently
presenting Shakespeare's Richard
II at the Landor Theatre, might
be entering the record books for the number of cast changes affecting
one character!
They opened on April 20 with Kenneth McClellan,
the company's 85-year-old founder, in the role of John
of Gaunt, the young King's
wise old uncle. Unfortunately, Kenneth has been suffering
badly from sciatica, and had to withdraw from the part. He
is currently in Bolingbroke Hospital
- ironically, since Bolingbroke is
his son in the play - and the Company all wish him well.
On the second night, the actor and director Terry
Adams, who in
a hectic rehearsal period had been assisting the production's directors
Roger Sansom and Bryan
Hands, went on with the script to fill the
breach.
On the third night, Bryan Hands took over the role and played
it till the end of the week.
Now a member of the cast, George May, is
learning the part in order to perform it from Tuesday, and for
the rest of the run—in tandem with three characters after Gaunt dies!
All round, it could be a record.
Also in the production, as King Richard's
sympathetic and distressed young Queen,
is Anna Wollin who is much on our screens
at present as the sexy lady in the latest version of the famous
Cornetto commercial.
Streatham Guardian
29th April 2004
Yvonne Gordon
There's stil time to catch Logos Theatre
Company's excellent performance
of Richard II at the Landor
Theatre in Clapham North. Resplendent
in stunning costumes by Didi Chapman and
with the minimum of props, apart from an impressive throne, the
16-strong cast really bring this rarely-performed script to life
in the intimate space of this small, yet perfectly formed theatre.
Simon Cole does a convincing job as the passionate, yet sensitive
King Richard, and Paul Agar is charismatic and compelling as the
self-seeking Henry Bolingbroke, who seeks to usurp the throne from
under the hapless king's nose. Having just graduated from LAMDA,
he has arranged the vibrant fight sequences in this play, and has
just finished filming Time Of Her Life, to be screened on BBC later
this year.
He is a name to look out for, along with Patric
Deony, who is
excellent as impassioned nobleman Thomas Mowbray,
Duke of Norfolk,
reputedly the king's instrument in the accusation against him of
killing a royal uncle. Patric also
performs very well as
Hotspur, the son of the Earl
of Northumberland. The group's founder,
85-year-old Kenneth McClellan, is very
convincing as Bolingbroke's
father John of Gaunt, the most senior
living member of the royal family. Director Roger
Sansom rises well to the role of the Duke
of York, and Anna Wollin is suitably
humble and unassuming as King
Richard's Queen.
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