Cole Porter's ALADDIN Runs In LOST MUSICALS Season, From Aug 2012

The 2012 LOST MUSICALS™ season continues with Cole Porter's last ever work – the magical 1958 ALADDIN at the Lilian Baylis Studio, Sadler's Wells from 19 August 2012.

Cole Porter never wrote another note of music or lyric after this show. Uniquely this was not a theatre show but a one off live TV broadcast seen by millions of Americans on that one night in 1958........the live broadcast was not recorded. "After many years of writing for the theatre and motion pictures I find it very exciting writing for our newest entertainment medium television. I hope you will like these new songs which I have written especially for ALADDIN".

CBS television teamed PORTER with America's most important great wit of the 20th Century S J PERELMAN (his essays are renowned and his foray into theatre included his collaboration with Kurt Weill and poet Ogden Nash with One Touch Of Venus and the Marx Brothers film Monkey Business / Horse Feather). This 1958 work has not been seen anywhere since that one night on live television. LOST MUSICALS™ has researched and reconstructed that one evening's TV broadcast and, at last, in an historical event, ALADDIN by PERELMAN and PORTER will be seen again.

IAN MARSHALL FISHER's expertly produced concert productions are a spectacular celebration of shows that have been lost since their first incarnation, but now get to see the full light of day in these exclusive weekend performances, in the intimate space of the Lilian Baylis Studio. MARSHALL FISHER is the world expert on Cole Porter and faithfully reconstructs this wonderful neglected show.

John Savident (Coronation Street) will play The Magician, with John Rawnsley (title role Don Giovanni at the Met NY) as Aladdin; and Richard Dempsey (current world tour of Henry V and Winter's Tale, Jack in original London cast of Into The Woods) as The Astrologer. The original TV production starred Basil Rathbone and Sal Mineo and featured the song Come To The Supermarket In Old Peking –"If you want to buy a kite / Or a pup to keep you up at night / Or a dwarf who used to know Snow White / Or a frog who loves to sing / Come to the supermarket in old Peking."

With nothing but a piano, the script, the lyrics, the music and a full company of 20 actors (drawn from the West End, RSC and RNT), the LOST MUSICALS™ allows the expertly crafted material to once again speak for itself, in this unique revival of ALADDIN. The musical director is GREG ARROWSMITH (Chitty Chitty Bang Bang). Cast includes: Vivienne Martin, Stewart Permutt, Michael Roberts, Richard Stemp, Emma Sewell, Rhiannon Drake, Gary Albert Hughes, Candy Ma, Aaron Romano, John Savident, John Rawnsley and Richard Dempsey.