A Queen’s Theatre Hornchurch production
Bob Larbey’s funny and tender masterpiece about growing old.
In his pleasant nursing home Cooper rails against his ageing body but remains proud of not having ‘lost his marbles’. Aylott, his friend, is increasingly concerned about losing his. Wit and humour keep their worries at bay: Cooper flirts outrageously with pretty nurse Wilson while both men fantasise about escaping to Switzerland.
But when Cooper discovers that his grandson no longer wants to see him, and Aylott’s worst fears are realised, he knows a turning point has been reached.
Is it ever enough to keep treating life as a comedy… and if it isn’t, the painful question is: where does he go from here?
This first play by Bob Larbey (The Good Life, As Time Goes By, A Fine Romance) won the Evening Standard Award for Best Comedy of the Year. This is the play’s first major revival.
Talk Back | free
Wed 28 Sep (after the evening performance). An opportunity for audiences to question the cast and creative team.
Mon, Tue & Wed performances begin at 7.30pm
https://vimeo.com/184766202
Mon, Tue & Wed | 7.30pm || Thu, Fri & Sat | 8pm
Friday Preview | £12.50 | £16 | £19
no concessions available
Mon - Thu Eve, Sat preview & matinees | £18.50 | £23.50 | £27
concessions and discounts available
Fri & Sat eve | £21.50 | £26 | £29
Friday group discount available
Audio Described performance
Sat 8 Oct | 2.30pm
Sign Language Interpreted performance
Wed 12 Oct | 7.30pm
Main House
William Hoyland
Cooper
West End: Carson, Gross Indecency (Gielgud); Lysistrata (Wyndham’s); Murder is Easy (Duke of York's).
Other theatre: King George/Baldwin, The King’s Speech (Chichester/tour); Otavio in A Lady of Little Sense, Don Pedro/Don Diego in Don Gil of the Green Breeches, Duke in Punishment Without Revenge (Theatre Royal Bath); Wehner, Democracy (Sheffield Crucible, The Old Vic); Dogsborough, The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui (Nottingham and Liverpool Playhouse); Neville, SNAFU (Soho Theatre); Col. Wilford in Bloody Sunday, Donald Rumsfeld in Guantanamo, John Major in Half the Picture, Justifying War, The Colour of Justice and Nuremberg, Srebrenica and The Hague (Tricycle); Long John Silver and A Streetcar Named Desire, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Man, Beast and Virtue and Michael Quince MP in Pravda (National); The Cold House (Belfast Theatre on the Rock); The Tempest (Southampton Nuffield); Alchemical Wedding (Salisbury); Dr Wicksteed, Habeus Corpus, To Kill a Mockingbird (York Theatre Royal); The Crucible (Sheffield Crucible); Macbeth, Pastor Manders in Ghosts (Watermill); Alfieri, A View from the Bridge (Liverpool Playhouse); Doc Bayliss, All My Sons (Manchester Royal Exchange); Krogstadt, A Doll's House (Edinburgh Royal Lyceum); Barry, The Light Rough (Hampstead Theatre); The Cenci and Torvald, A Doll's House, Worthy in The Recruiting Officer, Hector in Troilus and Cressida (Bristol Old Vic); Six Men of Dorset (7.84 Theatre Company); Pastor Manders, Ghosts (Shaw Theatre); George in Unity, The Hitchhiker, Clive in Masterpieces (Royal Court Upstairs); Vladimir, Waiting for Godot (Leatherhead Thorndike Theatre); Eugene, Piaf (RSC); Harry Bagley, Cloud Nine (Joint Stock/Royal Court); Brabantio in Othello, Four Knights in Knaresborough, One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, The Queen and I (all UK tours).
Film: Clark Clifford, The Infiltrator (Infiltrator Productions Ltd); Older Priest, Still Life; American Consul, A Mighty Heart (Dallington Paramount); Gandhi; For Your Eyes Only; Return of the Jedi; Inspector Orchard, Diamond Skulls; Hellboy, Scoop.
Television: Justice Lewis in Rillington Place, Dr Godfrey in Call The Midwife, Lord Justice Golding in The Thick of It, Admiral Green in The Hour, Superintendent Rathbone in Life on Mars, Ancient Cataclysms, If, The Cazalet Chronicles, Plain Jane, All the King's Men, Invasion Earth, Our Friends in the North, A Very Open Prison, Between the Lines, Casualty, Clarissa, Die Kinder, All Creatures Great and Small (BBC); Clive, Saved (ITV); Judge, The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret (Merman Television); Henry Vlll, The Jury, Sunset Across the Bay (Granada); Mr Winstanley, Dead Gorgeous (Carlton); The Alchemist (Red Rooster Films); Professor Tasker, Bugs IV (Carnival); Mr White Goes to Westminster and Lords of Misrule (Hat Trick); Rules of Engagement (Yorkshire); The Bill, Black Report, Lord Brownlow in Edward and Mrs Simpson, Mackenzie, Ready When You are Mr McGill (Thames); Boon Central; Sherman in Gentlemen and Players, Captain Box in The Brief, Nelly's Version (TVS); Stan's First Night (STV); Timmons in Yesterday’s Dream (Central); Peter, Fox (Euston Films).
Robin Hooper
Aylott
Theatre: Many seasons at the Glasgow Citizens and Half Moon Theatres. John, Paul, George, Ringo and Bert (Lyric); Artist and Admirers (Riverside); Bloody Poetry and Star-Gazy Pie (Royal Court Theatre); Bright Room Called Day (Bush); The Public (Theatre Royal Stratford East); The Art of Success (Paines Plough); Saturday, Sunday, Monday (Chichester); The Importance of Being Earnest (Nottingham); What the Butler Saw (Northampton); Dead Funny (York and Bolton); My Night with Reg (Stoke on Trent); Blithe Spirit and The Dresser (Watford); As You Like It (West Yorkshire Playhouse); Told Look Younger (Jermyn Street Theatre).
Film: Includes The Terence Davis Trilogy, Prick Up Your Ears, Fellow Traveller, Lecture 21, Collider and A Little Chaos.
Television: Includes Martin Chuzzlewit, The Office, Monarch of the Glen, Riot at the Rite, Twenty Twelve, Mrs Biggs, Lucan, Jekyll and Hyde and Love Nina.
Writing: Plays written for the theatre include The Move (NT Platform and tour), Astonish Me (Not the RSC Festival), Queer Fish (BAC), Free from Sorrow (Tristan Bates), Not the Love I Cry For (Arcola) and Love Your Soldiers (Sheffield Crucible Studio).
Previously Literary Manager for Paines Plough and Royal Court Theatre.
Tutor, MA Text and Performance, RADA.
Anna Leong Brophy
Wilson
Theatre: Includes The Sugar-Coated Bullets of the Bourgeoisie (Arcola Theatre/HighTide), P'yongyang (Finsborough Theatre), Pitcairn (Chichester Festival Theatre and Shakespeare's Globe), Yeh Shen (Yellow Earth), How to Waste Money on Mere Happiness (New Diorama Theatre), Shelf Life (Theatre Delicatessen), The Art of Fugue (Soho Theatre), BattleActs (Roundhouse), Paradise Street (Futures Theatre) and Cure (Underbelly Edinburgh).
Film: Includes The Conversations and GBH.
Sophie Russell
Julia
Theatre: Includes Bottom’s Dream (Shakespeare's Globe); The Comedy of Errors (RNT); Mrs Hudson’s Christmas Corker (Spymonkey/Wilton's Music Hall); The Wolf from the Door (Royal Court); Stuart: A Life Backwards (HighTide/Edinburgh Festival); Every Last Trick (Northampton Royal & Derngate); Get Happy (Told By An Idiot); Stories from an Invisible Town (Hoipolloi/Barbican); You Can’t Take it with You (Told By An Idiot/Royal Exchange, Manchester); King Lear, As You Like It, Antony and Cleopatra, American Trade (RSC); The Comedy of Errors (RSC/Told By An Idiot); Oxygen (RSC/LIFT); Spyski! (Peepolykus/Lyric Hammersmith); The Good Soul of Szechuan (Young Vic); The Crock of Gold, Metamorphosis, Alice Through the Looking Glass (London Bubble); Meat and Two Veg, The Chaingang Gang, The Ratcatcher of Hamlin (Cartoon De Salvo); Oliver Twist, A Christmas Carol (TNT International Tours); I am Dandy (David Gale Ensemble). Other experiences include pantomime in Newark and Southend and a tour of Britain on a narrowboat with Mikron Theatre.
Film and television: Includes Casualty (BBC1), The Invisible Woman (Headline Pictures), Mam (Hoipolloi), Wire in the Blood (Coastal Productions).
Radio: Includes Marley Was Dead, A Disappearing Town (BBC Radio 4.)
Gareth Clarke
Peter
West End: Ghost Stories (Arts Theatre); Private Lives (Vaudeville Theatre and Royal Alexandra Theatre, Toronto); Blithe Spirit (Apollo Theatre and UK tour); Pinter's People (Theatre Royal Haymarket); Whose Life Is It Anyway? (Comedy Theatre).
Other theatre: Death and the Maiden (English Theatre Frankfurt); Love's Pilgrimage (Read Not Dead, Shakespeare's Globe); Francesco/Illuminato (The Arts Pilgrimage, Norfolk); Danny Champion Of The World (Birmingham Stage Company - UK no 1 tour); Cloud Nine (Union Theatre); Captain Oate's Left Sock and Three Sacks Full of Hats (The Finborough); Bedroom Farce (UK no 1 tour); La Musica (The Godot Company); Eddie, A Fans' Club (Wimbledon Studios).
Film: Credits include 12 In A Box (Masses Entertainment); Gecko (NFTS).
Gareth is the Dad in the HSBC Treehouse commercial.
Connie Walker
Mrs Baker
West End: Spring Awakening (Novello Theatre).
Other theatre: Includes Folk (Birmingham Rep); See The Lights (New Vic); To Kill a Mockingbird (Regent's Park/UK tour/ Barbican); An Inspector Calls and Deathtrap (English Theatre of Frankfurt); As You Like It, Hay Fever (West Yorkshire Playhouse); Beauty Queen of Leenane (London Classic); Separate Tables (Chichester); Plunder (Watermill and Greenwich Theatre); Kes, Top Girls (New Vic, Stoke); Inside Out (tour/Arcola); Happy Birthday Brecht (National Theatre); Mother Courage, The Miser (New Wolsey, Ipswich); Much Ado About Nothing (Manchester Royal Exchange); The Caucasian Chalk Circle (Mercury Theatre, Colchester).
Film: Includes The Darkest Light, What Do You See?.
Television: Includes Coronation Street, Vera, Scott & Bailey, Hollyoaks, Holby City, Silent Witness, Casualty, Secret Diary of a Call Girl, New Tricks, Blackpool, Doctors, M.I.T., The Vice, Dream Team, The Bill.
Radio: Includes The Chausseur and the Nun, Stage Fright, Antony and Cleopatra (BBC Radio).
Training: Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
By | Bob Larbey |
Director | Russell Bolam |
Designer | Anthony Lamble |
Lighting Designer | Katharine Williams |
Movement Director | Jack Murphy |