programme

THE FIFTH COLUMNBY ERNEST HEMINGWAY

Two’s Company and Karl Sydow in association with Master Mediapresent the London premiere of

Director Tricia Thorns

Set Designer Alex Marker

Costume Designer Emily Stuart

Lighting Designer Neill Brinkworth

Sound Designer Dominic Bilkey

Fight Director Toby Spearpoint

Production Manager Michael Ager

Stage Manager /Operator Remi Bruno Smith

Technical Stage Manager Paddy Brant

Associate Sound Designer Joel Price

Design Assistant Klara Beckers

Costume Assistant Olwen Murray

Production photography Philip Gammon

Rehearsal photographs Michael Shelford

Stagetext captioned performance Alex Romeo

Press Anne Mayer (020 3659 8482)

Marketing Clemmie Hill of Target Live

Poster and programme design Jon Bradfield

Production insurance Gordon & Co

Producer Graham Cowley

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Our grateful thanks to Professor Paul Preston, Carlos Garcia Santa Cecilia, Martin Minchom, historians and authors, for invaluable advice about Madrid and the Civil War; Simon Mullins, Lizzy Harvey and Kathryn Waring of the Opera Tavern for hosting a wonderful fundraising lunch; StageText for all the equipment for the captioned performance; Marilyn Harper for teaching us to sing like revolutionaries; Imogen Ffion Brown, Emma Clegg for help on the fit-up; Lizzie Hunter for additional costume; The Mint Theater, New York, Artistic Director Jonathan Bank, for contacts and advice; Miss Dunmore’s hair by Lynne @ Emslie Griffin at Stars; Rose Bruford School of Theatre and Performance for props; Out of Joint for rehearsal space; Harriet Parsonage and The Questors Theatre Ealing; Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives; the National Theatre; Tim and Susie Battle; Nick Hern; Jane Jones; Naomi Wood; Duncan Coombe.

Lighting and other equipment supplied by DCLX www.dclx.co.uk

Special thanks to Guy Chapman for his generous help with marketing and in all sorts of other ways.

Particular thanks to those who have contributed to the costs of this production. The Fifth Column is generously supported by The Opera Tavern, The Boris Karloff Charitable Foundation, the Mercer’s Company, the Royal Victoria Hall Foundation, Sir David Hare, Amanda and Howard Jennings and Sally Joyce.24

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Guitarist Ruben de Guillen

GUESTS AT THE HOTEL FLORIDA:

Dorothy Bridges, war correspondent, Room 109 Alix Dunmore

Robert Preston, war correspondent, Room 110 Michael Shelford

Philip Rawlings, Room 113 Simon Darwen

STAFF OF THE HOTEL:

Manager of the Hotel Florida Stephen Ventura

Hotel Electrician Joshua Jacob

Petra, Hotel maid Catherine Cusack

Hotel Maid Elizabeth Jane Cassidy

Anita, a Moorish Tart Sasha Frost

INTERNATIONAL BRIGADES:

Comrade, Abraham Lincoln Battalion James El-Sharawy

guarding Room 107

Comrade Wilkinson, Abraham Lincoln Battalion Elliot Brett

Max, Thaelmann Battalion Michael Edwards

REPUBLICAN POLICE AND SECURITY:

Antonio, Head of Counter-Espionage Michael Shelford

Assault Guard Harvey Steven Meneses

BAR CHICOTE:

Waiter Joshua Jacob

NATIONALISTS:

Sentry Elliot Brett

German General Carl Gilbey-McKenzie

General’s Aide James El-Sharawy

Civilian Joshua Jacob

Signaller Harvey Steven Meneses

The play takes place in Madrid in the autumn of 1937, mainly in the Hotel

Florida, Plaza Callao; also in the Seguridad Headquarters, the Bar Chicote,

Gran Via, and an artillery observation post on the Extremadura Road.

ERNEST HEMINGWAY did more to change the style of English prose than any other writer in the twentieth century, and for his efforts he was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1954. Hemingway wrote in short, declarative sentences and was known for his tough, terse prose. Publication of The Sun Also Rises and A Farewell to Arms immediately established Ernest Hemingway as one of the greatest literary lights of the twentieth century. 

As part of the expatriate community in the 1920’s Paris, the former journalist and World War I ambulance driver began a career that lead to international fame. Hemingway was an aficionado of bullfighting and big-game hunting, and his main protagonists were always men and women of courage and conviction, who suffered unseen scars, both physical and emotional. He covered the Spanish Civil War, portraying it in fiction in his brilliant novel For Whom the Bell Tolls and subsequently covered World War II.  His classic novella The Old Man and the Sea won the Pulitzer Prize in 1953. He died in 1961.

In Hemingway’s words:

From the preface to the printed script of The Fifth Column:

“The Play was written in the fall and early winter of 1937 while we were expecting an offensive.... Each day we were shelled by the guns beyond Leganès and behind the folds of Garabitas Hill, and while I was writing the play the Hotel Florida was struck by more than thirty high explosive shells. So if it is not a good play perhaps that is what is the matter with it. If it is a good play, perhaps those thirty some shells helped write it. …

The title refers to the Spanish rebel statement in the fall of 1936 that they had four columns advancing on Madrid and a Fifth Column of sympathisers inside the city to attack the defenders of the city from the rear. If many of the Fifth Column are now dead, it must be realised that they were killed in a warfare where they were as dangerous and as determined as any of those who died in the other four columns.”

From a letter intended for the New York Times in 1940:

“The old Florida was a great hotel. When we first lived in her in the early winter of 1937 she was just eleven hundred yards as no crows were flying it, from the first line trenches in the Casa de Campo. But the Government made a six day offensive starting April Fifth of that year, that ended up with around nine thousand casualties and the Florida eighteen hundred yards from the first lines. There were those who said it wasn’t worth it. It was at the start of that offensive that I was asleep one night with the window open knowing that it was alright to sleep because when you had to go down there the noise would let you know. What woke me, though, was the noise of glass breaking. It was a machine gun bullet that had come in the open window and hit the mirror of the armoire. I moved the bed over to a more secluded angle in the corner of the room, being careful not to waken any of my friends, and that is all there is to that story except that the management put in a new armoire and apologized for the barbarousness of the fascists. …

In the fall of 1937 when I took up playwrighting, there weren’t any top floors to the hotel anymore. Nobody that was not crazy would go up there in a bombardment. But the two rooms where we lived were in what is called by artillerymen a dead angle. Any place else in the hotel could be hit and was. But unless the position of the batteries on Garabitas hill were changed, or unless they substituted howitzers for guns, our rooms could not be hit because of the position of three different houses across the street and across the square. I was absolutely sure of this after being in the hotel during twenty-two heavy bombardments in which other parts of it were struck. It seemed eminently more sensible to live in part of a hotel which you knew would not be struck by shell fire, because you knew where the shells lit, than to go to some other hotel further from the lines, the angles of which you had no data to figure and where you would maybe have a shell drop through the roof.

Well, I had great confidence in the Florida and when Franco finally entered Madrid, our rooms were still intact. There was very little else that was though.”

Some geography:

The Casa de Campo, formerly a royal hunting park, lies to the West of the city, behind the Royal Palace. By the autumn of 1937 Republican troops held the ground up to the lake in the Casa de Campo. Beyond that was Nationalist territory and their artillery was on Garabitas Hill. The Hotel Florida was vulnerable as it was in the direct line of fire; the Fascists were often aiming at the Telefonica tower – at that time the second tallest building in Europe – a few yards further down the Gran Via, near Chicote’s, the famous nightclub (still open today). The Telefonica was where the war correspondents went to phone their copy to Paris or London and was a prime target.

The front line was much less certain in Carabanchel, a poor suburb to the south of the centre. House to house fighting meant that nobody quite knew whose territory they were in.

The Plaza Callao is still the same hub of activity as it was, and many of the buildings, including the Cinema mentioned in the play, still stand. The Hotel Florida was demolished in mysterious circumstances in 1964.ER

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Members of the company in rehearsal

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D Spain became a Republic in 1931. A new constitution established many new freedoms. The Catholic Church, which had long supported the old regime, was the object of particular hatred for Republicans, and many churches were burned down.

Conservatives and landowners fiercely resisted the new constitution, causing many of the reforms to be reversed. This led in 1934 to a general strike and a violent rebellion in Asturias in the north. After two weeks the rebellion was brutally crushed by the army, led by General Francisco Franco.

In the January 1936 elections Socialists, Communists and left-wing Republicans buried their differences and the Popular Front won a decisive victory. However, a group of senior Generals plotted a military coup, which started in July when Franco led an uprising in Spanish Morocco. Nazi German planes airlifted the rebel Army of Africa to Spain. With the rebel Army of the North they quickly took over large areas of Western and Northern Spain. The ruthlessness with which the invading armies, including Moroccan mercenaries, massacred republican militias and civilian populations in towns they conquered provoked an equally savage response from Republican forces. What the Generals had hoped would be a quick victory turned into a prolonged Civil War.

The rebel “Nationalist” forces were supported from the start by Hitler’s Germany and Mussolini’s Fascist Italy. Britain, France and the USA declined to intervene in support of the democratically elected government. The Republic was forced to accept help from Stalin, who supplied weapons and through the Comintern recruited volunteers from all over Europe, Britain and America to form the International Brigades, which started to arrive in Spain in August.

The rebels advanced on the capital, Madrid, and in August 1936 the Nationalist air force began bombing raids. By early November 1936, 25,000 Nationalist troops and the Nazi German Condor Legion had reached the western and southern suburbs of Madrid, and the Battle of Madrid began. Fearing that the city was about to fall, the Government moved to Valencia, leaving a Junta de Defensa in charge. The 11th International Brigade, including the Thaelmann Battalion, largely made up of volunteers from the German and British Communist Parties, reached Madrid a week later, and halted the Nationalist advance.

In early 1937 the Republican air force was effective enough to stop any more aerial bombing of the city and ground forces counter-attacked. The Republic gained only a few hundred yards, at the cost of huge numbers of casualties. The siege continued for the next two years.

Meanwhile the Nationalist advance continued in other parts of Spain. The defenceless Basque town of Guernica was destroyed by German bombers,

creating an international outcry.

Madrid continued to hold out, with extraordinary bravery. Helen Grant wrote in April 1937: “The main impression on walking about Madrid is that nobody even thinks about danger. The majority of the houses and shops in the Gran Via have been hit... Although sometimes the guns are quite deafening, no one appears to take any notice.”

The Republican forces were weakened by their internal political divisions. Communists, Left Republicans, Socialist and Anarchists attacked each other in print and, as in Barcelona in May 1937, in fighting. The various right-wing, Fascist, Monarchist and Falangist parties on the Nationalist side, on the other hand, were held together by Franco who had been supreme military commander and head of the Nationalist government since November 1936. Despite Republican counter-offensives at Saragossa, Teruel and the River Ebro, the Nationalists had split Republican Spain in two by April 1938. Republican forces were beaten back over the Ebro in November 1938 and the by now severely depleted International Brigades were disbanded.

In January 1939 the Nationalists took Barcelona and 400,000 Republican refugees fled over the border to France. In March Madrid surrendered. Franco was victorious and remained in supreme power until his death in 1975.

Members of the company in rehearsal

ELLIOT BRETT Comrade Wilkinson and SentryThis is Elliot’s professional debut. Theatre includes: Verbatopolis, Ten Pound Tale (C Venues, Edinburgh).

ELIZABETH JANE CASSIDY Hotel MaidTrains part-time at Anthony Meindl's Acting School. Theatre includes Hearts (Tricycle Theatre), Victim, Sidekick, Boyfriend and Me (Oxford Playhouse), Ailie and the Alien (Lyric). Film includes Mr. Holmes, An Open Window, Your Move, Pulled Apart By My Own Hands, Lone.

CATHERINE CUSACK PetraTheatre includes: Judith: A Parting From The Body, Fragile, The Factory Girls (Arcola), Dancing At Lughnasa, The Crucible, How Many Miles To Babylon? (Lyric, Belfast), Ghosts (New Vic, Stoke), All That Fall (Arts Theatre/ 59E59 New York), The Seagull (Headlong), Bingo (Chichester/Young Vic), The Two Character Play (Jermyn St. Theatre), The Early Bird (Natural Shocks, London and Project, Dublin), What Fatima Did, Bold Girls (Hampstead), King Lear (Second Age), Salt Meets Wound (Theatre 503), Uncle Vanya (Wilton's Music Hall), Mary Stuart (National Theatre of Scotland), The Mushroom Pickers (Southwark Playhouse), The Gigli Concert (Finborough), The Venetian Twins (Watermill), Bronte, Mill On The Floss (Shared Experience), Blood Red Saffron Yellow (Drum, Plymouth), Our Lady Of Sligo (Out of Joint), Measure For Measure (ETT), Prayers Of Sherkin (Old Vic), Phaedra's Love (Gate), Mrs Warren's Profession (Lyric Hammersmith), The Glass Menagerie (Bolton Octagon), Moonlight, The Seagull, You Never Can Tell (Gate Theatre Dublin), Lovers Meeting (Druid), Poor Beast In The Rain (Bush) . TV includes: The Last Days of Anne Boleyn, Doctors, Jonathan Creek, Ballykissangel, Sophia and Constance, Dr. Who (BBC), The Bill, The Chief, Cadfael (ITV), Coronation Street (Granada). Film includes: Finding Neverland (Miramax), Conspiracy of Silence

(Flick Features), Boxed (Fireproof Films), The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne (HandMade Films)Radio includes: Poetry Please, The Girl At The Lion D'Or, Fragile, Something Understood, The Steward Of Christendom (Radio 4)

SIMON DARWENPhilip RawlingsFor Two’s Company: What The Women Did (Southwark Playhouse). Other Theatre includes Flare Path (UK tour), Our Country's Good (Out of Joint/Toronto/Tour), Lizzie Siddal (Arcola Theatre), The Armour/Hotel Plays (Defibrilator), Catch 22 (Northern Stage/Birmingham Rep/National Tour), Virgin (Watford Palace), King Lear (Theatre Royal Bath), Mad About The Boy (Young Vic), Sour Lips (Oval House), Love Love Love (Paines Plough/Drum Theatre /national tour), Unrestless (Old Vic Tunnels), Accolade (Finborough Theatre), Ramshackle Heart (Public Theatre, New York) Arse, Shove (Theatre 503), Mad Forest, The Wonder (BAC), The Merchant of Venice, The Tragedy of Thomas Hobbes, The Taming of the Shrew, A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Royal Shakespeare Company), 1 in 5 (Hampstead Theatre), Fanny & Faggot (Trafalgar Studios), Flamingoes, Nikolina, Bedtime for Bastards (nabokov). Television includes Silent Witness, The Bletchley Circle, The Bill. Film includes A Simple Man, Howard Everyman.

ALIX DUNMORE Dorothy BridgesTrained at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. For Two’s Company: What The Women Did (Southwark Playhouse), London Wall (Finborough and St James Theatres). Other theatre includes: Ben Hur (Tricycle Theatre), The 39 Steps (Criterion, West End), Gaslight (New Vic, Newcastle-Under-Lyme), Top Girls (Out of Joint), The Dead Guy (English Theatre Frankfurt), Nature Adores a Vacuum (Soho Theatre), Separate Tables (Mill at Sonning), A Winter of War (Cheltenham Everyman), The Two Noble Kinsmen (Bristol Old Vic). Television includes: Casualty, Doctors, Call The Midwife (BBC). Radio includes The Simon Day Show, 49 Cedar Street (BBC). Film includes: London Wall (Master Media). Alix is a founder member of the Fitzrovia Radio Hour

MICHAEL EDWARDS MaxTrained at Drama Centre London.

At Southwark Playhouse: Jekyll and Hyde. Other Theatre includes: Bruises (Tabard Theatre), The Emperor Self, The Dog the Night and the Knife (Arcola Theatre), The County (Camden Peoples Theatre), A Hard Rain (Above the Stag), Flight (Brockley Jack), Jekyll and Hyde (Hong Kong Academy of Performing Arts), House of Bones, The Last Days of Judas Iscariot (Platform Theatre), Michael Jackson at the Gates of Heaven and Hell (Underbelly), The Rime of the Modern Mariner (The Dalston Old Boys Club). Film includes: We Don’t Know Either (Guerrero Productions), Nearly Always (RCA), Fifty Eight (YOCF), Welcome to Nightvale (Redon Productions), L’eau (Nomentum Productions), Tiger House (Strike Films), Denousa (Venetsano Films).

JAMES EL-SHARAWY International Brigade Comrade, General’s AideTrained at Rose Bruford School of Theatre and Performance. For Two’s Company: The Cutting of the Cloth (Southwark Playhouse). Other Theatre includes: Scattered (Clywd Theatr Cymru/Good Chance Theatre, Calais), Walaa (New Diorama/ St Martin in the Fields), A Hard Rain (Above the Stag), Psychopomp and Circumstance (The Hen & Chickens), Tunnel (The Nightingale Theatre), Portrait of a Man (Victoria and Albert Museum), Qudz (The Yard Theatre), Masked (George Bernard Shaw Theatre, RADA), Days of Significance (Unicorn Theatre), Death of a Salesman (The

Rose Theatre), Amir: The Lost Price of Persia (Theatre 503). Film includes: False Assurance (ICAEW Short Film), Evidence of Existence (Filmmaker at Large)

SASHA FROST AnitaTrained at The Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts (LIPA). Theatre includes: The Lightning Child (Shakespeare’s Globe), Gutted (Theatre Royal Stratford East), Suspension (Bristol Old Vic), Kick-off (Riverside Studios), The Canterville Ghost (Southwark Playhouse) Television includes: Sunny D (BBC3), Agatha Raisin (Sky1), Casualty, Frankie, Garrow’s Law, Holby City, Doctors (BBC), Privates (BBC/TwentyTwenty), Hollyoaks (Lime Pics), Beautality (6 Degree Media)Film includes: Star Wars: Episode VII- The Force Awakens (Lucas Film), Remainder (Tigerlily Films), Anti-Social (JRS Films), FIT (Stonewall)

THE COMPANY

CARL GILBEY-MCKENZIE German GeneralThis is Carl’s first professional engagement since a three month stint at The Little Theatre Club, St Martin’s Lane in 1966. Theatre includes about 100 amateur roles (OUDS, Chelsea Centre and Michael Croft Theatre). Also Director of some fifty school productions of plays, musicals and operas (DCPS [now DPL] and The Hall, Hampstead).

JOSHUA JACOB Electrician, Waiter and CivilianTrained with National Youth Theatre, Tricycle Young Company and Southwark Playhouse Young Company. This is Joshua’s professional debut. Theatre includes: Switch (Tricycle Theatre), Lost Love (Chelsea Theatre), Humanity on the Edge (Stanley Halls).

HARVEY STEVEN MENESES Assault Guard and SignallerTrained at Central de Cine Acting School and Metodo Acting in Madrid. Theatre includes: La Cueva de Salamanca of Entremeses of Miguel de Cervantes. TV includes: Rocio Durcal. Film includes: Tiara de la Victoria (short film about Spanish war). Harvey moved from Madrid to London a year ago – this is his professional debut in England.

MICHAEL SHELFORD Antonio/PrestonTrained at Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. Theatre includes: Twelfth Night, Journey’s End, Hobson’s Choice, Early One Morning (Bolton Octagon), Events While Guarding the Bofors Gun, Everyday Maps for Everyday Use (Finborough Theatre), Virgin (Watford Palace) The Boy on the Swing (Arcola), The Daughter in Law (The New Vic, Stoke,) Money in the Vaults (Old Vic Tunnels). Television includes: Game of Thrones, War & Peace, The Crown,

Houdini & Doyle, Lewis, Mrs Biggs, Doctors. Radio includes: The Archers, Hamlet, Dracula, Smiley’s People, The White Devil, Slaughterhouse 5, The Secret Pilgrim (BBC Radio 4). Film includes: Mortdecai.

STEPHEN VENTURA Hotel ManagerTrained at Guildhall School of Music and Drama, Ecole Philippe Gaulier, Royal Holloway. Theatre includes: The One That Got Away (Theatre Royal Bath), The Dog, the Night and the Knife (Arcola), Boris Godonov and The Orphan of Zhao (RSC), The 39 Steps (West End), Cav & Pag (ENO), Frankenstein (Northampton), The Ramayana (Lyric Hammersmith, Bristol Old Vic and West Yorks Playhouse), Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk (Royal Opera), Market Boy (National Theatre), Villette (Stephen Joseph Theatre Scarborough), The Coffee House, The Merchant of Venice, Seven Doors, Doctor Faustus & The Government Inspector, Scapino the Trickster (Chichester Festival Theatre), The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui (Citizens Glasgow), The Taming of the Shrew (Nottingham Playhouse), The Chairs (RSAMD Glasgow), Les Justes (Gate Theatre), The Woman Who Swallowed A Pin (The Lab/Southwark Playhouse), King Lear (RSC/Ninagawa Co), Measure for Measure (Bite/Edinburgh Festival), Maestro Impro Show (Improbable), A Midsummer Night's Dream (Almeida), The Mill On The Floss, Waiting for Godot, You Used To & Strange Attractors (Contact Theatre

Manchester), Macario (Tottering Bipeds), Les Enfants Du Paradis (David Glass Ensemble). Radio includes: Government Inspector, His Natural Life, Monsignor Quixote, The Crystal Rooms, Kes (BBC), Dombey and Son (Worldwide Radio), (BBC). Film includes: Emma (Miramax), Raindance Film Festival cinema trailer (Infinity Productions) TV includes: The Welcome Committee (Rocliffe Films), Alistair McGowan's Big Impression (BBC), The Bill (Thames), Rough Justice (BBC), Downton Abbey (Carnival), Holby City (BBC), Doc Martin (Buffalo Pictures).

TRICIA THORNS Director Tricia began her career as an actress in the West End as part of John Neville’s company at the Fortune, after a Classics BA from Nottingham University. As a director, her work includes The Cutting of the Cloth (Southwark Playhouse), Creation (with a cast of 40, (St Barnabas Church, Dulwich), A Hard Rain (Above the Stag), London Wall (Finborough and St James Theatres), My Real War 1914-? (Trafalgar Studios and national tour), The Searcher (workshop production at Greenwich Theatre), Red Night (Finborough Theatre), What the Women Did (Southwark Playhouse and revived in 2014 for the Great War Centenary), Forgotten Voices from the Great War (Pleasance London), Ex and Black ‘Ell (Soho Theatre), Twelfth Night (Dulwich Picture Gallery), Peer Gynt (Alleyn’s Theatre) and Passion Play 2000, a huge community play which she also wrote. As an actress, theatre includes End of Story (Chelsea Theatre), Harry and Me (Warehouse), Façade (Dingley and Dulwich Festivals), A Kind of Alaska (Edinburgh, tour and USA), Time’s Up (Windsor), The Libertine and The Man of Mode (Royal Court and Out of Joint tour), Betrayal (BAC and tour), Run For Your Wife (West End) and leading roles in theatres in Salisbury, Ipswich,

Edinburgh, Liverpool, Guildford, Derby and many more. Her many television and film appearances include Dangerfield, A Touch of Frost, Keeping Up Appearances, The Darling Buds of May, The Bill, London’s Burning, Captives and The Turn of the Screw.

ALEX MARKER DesignerIn his role as associate designer for Two’s Company Alex has designed all of their productions over the last 11 years: Red Night (Finborough Theatre), My Real War 1914 - ? (Trafalgar Studios and 2 national tours), The Searcher (Greenwich Theatre), Ex (Soho Theatre), London Wall (Finborough and transfer to St James Theatre) and What the Women Did and The Cutting of the Cloth (Southwark Playhouse). He is also resident designer at the Finborough Theatre, where he has designed over 35 productions including: The White Carnation (and transfer to Jermyn Street), Dream of the Dog (and transfer to Trafalgar Studios) and Plague Over England (and transfer to the Duchess Theatre). At the Finborough he recently directed the first production for over 60 years of J. B. Priestley’s play: Summer Days Dream. Alex has designed productions for many other theatres including most recently: The Meeting (Hampstead Theatre), Can’t Buy Me Love and London Calling (Salisbury Playhouse), The Man Called Monkhouse (Edinburgh) and Around the World in 80 Days (Chipping Norton and national tour). He is also director of the Questors Youth Theatre in West London.www.alexmarker.com EMILY STUART Costume DesignerTrained at Wimbledon School of Art. Costume Designs for Two’s Company: The Cutting Of The Cloth, What The Women Did (Southwark Playhouse) London Wall (Finborough and St James

Theatres), Ex (Soho Theatre). Other theatre includes Robin Hood (The Theatre, Chipping Norton) Antigone, (Southwark Playhouse), Martine, Over The Bridge and Lingua Franca (Finborough Theatre), Natural Affection, First Episode, The Living Room, Anyone Can Whistle and Bloody Poetry (Jermyn Street Theatre), Shiverman (Theatre503), Flock (Northern Stage), Murder in The Cathedral (Oxford Playhouse). Emily was the winner of the Best Costume Designer award at the 2011 OffWestEnd Awards and again in 2016.

NEILL BRINKWORTH Lighting DesignerFor Two’s Company: The Cutting of the Cloth (Southwark Playhouse)Other recent Lighting Designs: The Meeting (Hampstead Theatre), In the Night Garden Live (Minor/BBC), The Divided Laing (Arcola Theatre), As Is (Trafalgar Studios), Sweat Factory (YMT, Sadlers Wells), Dido & Aeneas (English Touring Opera), The White Feather (Union Theatre), Contact.Com (Park Theatre), In Lambeth and Who Do We Think We Are? (Southwark Playhouse), Dessa Rose (Trafalgar Studios), Café Chaos, A Square of Sky (The Kosh), The Seagull (Arcola), An Enemy of the People (Albany), Jephthe (English Touring Opera), Strauss Gala (Raymond Gubbay), Bridgetower (City of London Festival/ETO), Vincent River (Old Vic productions), Step 9 of 12, Tape (both Trafalgar Studios), Prometheus/The Frogs/Agamemnon (all Cambridge Arts Theatre), Accolade, Don Juan Comes Back from the War, Fanta Orange (all Finborough Theatre), Seven Pomegranate Seeds (Oxford Playhouse). As Associate: Lohengrin (Warsaw National Opera) Ludd & Isis (ROH), Maria Stuarda (Opera North), Lohengrin (WNO), Symbionts (Wayne MCcGregor, Estonia National Ballet)

DOMINIC BILKEY Sound DesignerDominic is Head of Sound and

Video for the National Theatre after previous appointments at the NT and after 5 years as Head of Sound for the Young Vic. He sits on the Board of the Association of Sound Designers and was last year’s recipient of the TTA Award for Outstanding Achievement in Sound. He trained with the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama.Sound Designs for Two’s Company: The Cutting of the Cloth, What The Women Did (Southwark Playhouse), London Wall (Finborough and St James Theatres). Other Sound Designs include: Shadowlands (Birdsong Productions), Jane Eyre (Bristol Old Vic/National Theatre), Jack & the Beanstalk (Towngate Basildon), Pinocchio (Greenwich Theatre), Tommy (Aria Entertainment, Guy James and Szpiezak Productions), Birdsong (Original Theatre Company), Cinderella/Jack & the Beanstalk (Towngate, Basildon), The Best Christmas Present in the World (Nuffield, Southampton), War Horse Prom (NT/BBC), The Private Ear/The Public Eye (Yvonne Arnaud, Guildford), Dr Marigold and Mr Chops and Masterclass (Theatre Royal Bath), Wagstaffe the Wind-up Boy and Rapunzel (Kneehigh), Journey’s End (co-prod with Icarus Theatre Collective), Twelfth Night, See How They Run and Dancing at Lughnasa (UK tours for Original Theatre Company). As Associate Sound Designer: Great Britain (National Theatre), Public Enemy and The Government Inspector (Young Vic), Wild Swans (Young Vic and A.R.T, Boston), Kafka’s Monkey (Young Vic and International Associates).

KARL SYDOW ProducerNew York: NT’s Happy Days starring Fiona Shaw and directed by Deborah Warner (Brooklyn Academy of Music); Haunted by Edna O’Brien; Terra Haute by Edmond White; The Seagull with Kristin Scott Thomas and Carey Mulligan; All My Sons directed

by Simon McBurney with Katie Holmes; American Buffalo andOur Country’s Good by Timberlake Wertenbaker (six Tony nominations, NY Critics’ Award for Best Foreign Play). North America: Backbeat (Royal Alexandra, Toronto and Ahmanson, Los Angeles). International Tours: The Last Confession with David Suchet, the centennial production of Under Milk Wood; and the Out of Joint revival of Our Country’s Good. London: Backbeat directed by David Leveaux; A Dish of Tea with Dr Johnson directed by Max Stafford-Clark; Triptych by Edna O’Brien; Memory directed by Terry Hands; The Line directed by Mathew Lloyd and Jenufa directed by Irina Brown, both written by Timberlake Wertenbaker (Arcola); Ring Round the Moon directed by Sean Mathias (Playhouse); Dirty Dancing (Piccadilly, Aldwych, UK tour, Germany, France, Australia and Italy); the spectacular multimedia production Sinatra at the London Palladium, directed by David Leveaux with choreography by Stephen Mear; And Then There Were None with Tara Fitzgerald (Gielgud); the London and Sydney production of Dance of Death with Sir Ian McKellen, Frances de la Tour and Owen Teale; Bea Arthur (Savoy); Auntie and Me with Alan Davies and Margaret Tyzack (Wyndham’s); Michael Moore, Live! (Roundhouse); the West End revival of Noël Coward’s Semi-Monde; Kevin Elyot’s Mouth to Mouth with Lindsay Duncan and Michael Maloney (Albery); David Mamet’s Speed-the-Plow with Mark Strong, Patrick Marber and Kimberly Williams; Drummers by Simon Bennet and Some Explicit Polaroids by Mark Ravenhill – winner of the Evening Standard Award as Most Promising Newcomer, both directed by Max Stafford-Clark for Out of Joint; Macbeth with Rufus Sewell (Queen’s); A Swell Party – A Celebration Of Cole Porter (Vaudeville); Timberlake Wertenbaker’s Our Country’s Good

(Olivier Award for Best Play); Hysteria (Olivier Award for Best Comedy) and an adaptation of Sue Townsend’s novel The Queen and I which was Out of Joint’s inaugural production. Karl continues to serve on the board of Out of Joint, the UK leading producer of new writing for the theatre. Karl also served as a director of Renaissance Film Company. He continues to act as an independent film producer; projects with David Parfitt, his colleague from Renaissance for Trademark Films, include A Bunch of Amateurs by Ian Hislop and Nick Newman featuring Sir Derek Jacobi, Imelda Staunton, Samantha Bond and Burt Reynolds and My Week With Marilyn featuring Michelle Williams, Dame Judi Dench & Kenneth Branagh.

GRAHAM COWLEY ProducerHas produced all of Two’s Company’s shows, including his own translation of Véronique Olmi’s End of Story. Producer for Out of Joint for 15 years and now Associate. Previously with the Theatre of Comedy Company, the Royal Court Theatre (on whose behalf he transferred Death and the Maiden, Oleanna, Six Degrees of Separation, My Night with Reg and The Weir to the West End), Paines Plough, the Half Moon Theatre, Joint Stock Theatre Group, Greenwich Theatre and the London Palladium. His origins as an actor are hidden in the mists of time.

As a protest against the US/UK invasion of Iraq in 2003, Two’s Company quickly mounted a production of Miles Malleson’s Black ‘Ell at Soho Theatre. The play shows a young officer, returning from the front, decorated for bravery, but traumatised by his experience and refusing to go back. We felt that this cry of pain and rage written in 1916 expressed better than anything the folly of starting another war.

This play was the first in a series of what Two’s Company has become best known for: the rediscovery of plays about the First World War, written during the War or soon after. The first season, Forgotten Voices from the Great War at Pleasance London, consisted of three short plays, ‘D’ Company by Miles Malleson, directed by Ian Talbot, and Brigade Exchange by Ernst Johannsen and Black ‘Ell by Miles Malleson, both directed by Tricia Thorns. On publication in 1916, Malleson’s plays had been denounced in the House of Commons as “a calumny on the British soldier” and all copies were seized by the police. Johannsen had served in the German Army in the War. Written for radio, his play had achieved international success before being banned when the Nazis came to power.

The next in the Forgotten Voices series

was What The Women Did at Southwark Playhouse, another triple bill, featuring Luck of War by Gwen John, Handmaidens of Death by Herbert Tremaine, both directed by Tricia Thorns, and The Old Lady Shows Her Medals by J.M. Barrie, directed by Ian Talbot.

The third episode was Red Night by James Lansdale Hodson at the Finborough Theatre in 2005, which showed the comradeship and humour, fading to disillusion, of a platoon facing misery and death in the trenches.

Velona Pilcher’s The Searcher, an expressionist play with music by Edmund Rubbra, about Red Cross nurses tasked with finding what had happened to men missing in battle, was presented as a workshop production as part of Greenwich Theatre’s Musical Futures.

The final Forgotten Voices project was My Real War 1914-?, adapted by Tricia Thorns from the letters home of Lt. Havilland le Mesurier, a young officer killed in 1916. It toured twice and played at the Trafalgar Studios in London.

The company departed from its main aim of rediscovering the “new plays of the past” with a new musical play, Ex by Rob Young with music by Ross Lorraine, at the Soho Theatre in 2011, before returning with

Red Night

‘Southwark Playhouse churn out arresting productions at a rate of knots’ Time Out

Southwark Playhouse is all about telling stories and inspiring the next generation of storytellers and theatre makers. It aims to facilitate the work of new and emerging theatre practitioners from early in their creative lives to the start of their professional careers.

Through our schools work we aim to introduce local people at a young age to the possibilities of great drama and the benefits of using theatre skills to facilitate learning. Each year we engage with over 5,000 school pupils through free schools performances and long-term in school curriculum support.

Through our Young Company (YoCo), a youth-led theatre company for local people between the ages of 14-25, we aim to introduce young people to the many and varied disciplines of running a semi-professional theatre company. YoCo provides a training ground to build confidence and inspire young people towards a career in the arts.

Our theatre programme aims to facilitate and showcase the work of some of the UK’s best up and coming talent with a focus on reinterpreting classic plays and contemporary plays of note. Our two atmospheric theatre spaces enable us to offer theatre artists and companies the opportunity to present their first fully realised productions. Over the past 22 years we have produced and presented early productions by many aspiring theatre practitioners many of whom are now enjoying flourishing careers.

What People Say…

‘High-achieving, life-giving spirit’  Fiona Mountford, Evening Standard

‘The revitalised Southwark Playhouse’  Lyn Gardner, The Guardian

‘I love that venue so much. It is, without doubt, one of the most exciting theatre venues in London.’  Philip Ridley, Playwright

For more information about our forthcoming season and to book tickets visit www.southwarkplayhouse.co.uk. Staff List

Patrons Sir Michael Caine Peter Gill OBE Sir Simon Hughes Andy Serkis Board of Trustees Tim Wood, Sarah Hickson, Rodney Pearson, Joe Roberts, Giles Semper, Kathryn Serkis, Glenn Wellman Artistic Director (CEO) Chris Smyrnios

General Manager Alys Mayer

Youth & Community Director David Workman

Technical & Production Manager Richard Seary

Front of House & Bar Manager Edward Land

Press & PR Manager Susie Safavi

Box Office & Sales Coordinator Alan Healy

Production Assistant Lee Elston

Duty Managers Joe Deighan, Imogen Watson

Associate Director David Mercatali

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London Wall at the Finborough Theatre. Set in a solicitor’s office in 1931 and first produced that year, it shone a light on the lives of women working in offices, the work they did, the money they earned (not much) and the predatory attitude of their male colleagues. It was so well received it transferred to the St James Theatre.

To mark the Great War Centenary there was a revival in 2014 of What The Women Did in the new Southwark Playhouse.

The most recent production, also at Southwark Playhouse, was the world premiere of The Cutting of the Cloth by Michael Hastings. Based on the author’s youthful experience as a Savile Row tailor’s apprentice, it depicted the eternal struggle between dedication to craft and skill and the pressure to make money.

Earlier productions include Betrayal by Harold Pinter (BAC and Tour), A Kind of Alaska by Harold Pinter (Edinburgh Festival and tours of UK and USA), Harry and Me by Nigel Williams (Warehouse Theatre, Croydon) and End of Story by Véronique Olmi (Chelsea Theatre).

Two’s Company (Theatre) Ltd is a Company Limited by Guarantee. Registered in England no 4978880, Registered Charity no 1105633.

Directors: Graham Cowley, Ian Talbot OBE, Tricia Thorns. 020 8299 3714 or graham@2scompanytheatre.co.uk

Two’s Company is grateful to the following for their support for previous productions: Arts Council England, Ambassador Theatre Group, the Britten-Pears Foundation, Ray Cooney, the Feminist Review Trust, the Foyle Foundation, the Garfield Weston Foundation, the Garrick Charitable Trust, the Golsoncott Foundation, the Manifold Trust, Master Media Ltd, the Mercers’ Company, Karl Sydow, the Royal Victoria Hall Foundation, the Sylvia Waddilove Charitable Foundation, Vera Thorns, Unity Theatre Trust

Pictures (this page): Black ‘Ell; Ex; What The Women Did; London Wall; My Real War 1914-?; The Cutting of the Cloth

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