Finborough Theatre Announces SOMERSAULTS Cast

Originally produced by The National Theatre of Scotland, the English premiere of Iain Finlay Macleod's Somersaults opens at the Finborough Theatre on Wednesday, 2 January 2013 (Press Night: Thursday, 3 January 2013 at 7.30pm) for a limited four-week season, directed by Russell Bolam.

James is a successful entrepreneur living the metropolitan life with a beautiful wife and a swanky London flat. But when the creditors move in and his wife moves out, James suddenly finds he's left with nothing. Nothing but words.

James' father is dying – his last connection to his childhood and the language of his birth, Scots Gaelic. With this link gone, James fears he will simply cease to exist. As the words start to slip away, he journeys home to confront his past and search for his true identity – as he desperately struggles to remember the language of his birth and the word for 'somersault'.

A stunning new play exploring the role of language and how it defines who we are by the UK's leading Scots Gaelic playwright Iain Finlay Macleod. Somersaults was originally produced by The National Theatre of Scotland, premiering at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh in 2011, directed by National Theatre of Scotland Artistic Director Vicky Featherstone.

Performed in English with some short passages of Gaelic.

Playwright Iain Finlay Macleod made his English theatre debut at the Finborough Theatre in 2009 with I Was A Beautiful Day in a production which subsequently transferred to the Tron Theatre, Glasgow. His play Atman was also produced at the Finborough Theatre in 2011 starring Lucy Griffiths, following a staged reading as part of the Finborough Theatre's Vibrant – A Festival of Finborough Playwrights with Jasper Britton and Alan Cox. Iain Finlay has written many works for theatre, radio, film and television. Writing in both English and his native Scots Gaelic, Iain has also directed numerous documentaries on Celtic folklore and arts, and was series director of the BAFTA-winning show TACSI, which won Best Arts Series in the Scottish BAFTA's and Best Entertainment Programme at the Celtic Film and Television Festival. Television includes Machair which won a Writers' Guild Award for Best Foreign Language Serial Drama. His work for theatre includes Somersaults (National Theatre of Scotland and the Traverse Theatre), St Kilda (Gaelic Arts Agency), Broke, Homers, Alexander Salamander and Road from the Isles (Traverse Theatre), Salvage (Tosg Theatre Company) and Cliff Dancing (National Gaelic Youth Theatre). His work for BBC Radio 4 includes The Watergaw, The Gold Digger and an adaptation of Angela Carter's The Kitchen Child. Other radio includes Frozen and an adaptation of The Pearlfisher for BBC Radio Scotland. His film work includes The Inaccessible Pinnacle. He is also the author of several novels.

Director Russell Bolam returns to the Finborough Theatre where he has directed the sell-out production of John Antrobus' Captain Oates' Left Sock (2009). Trained at Middlesex University and GITIS Academy of Theatre Arts, Moscow. Directing includes Shivered which was nominated for four OffWestEnd awards including Best Director and for Best Production at the WhatsOnStage Awards (Southwark Playhouse), The Seagull (Southwark Playhouse),The Road to Mecca (Arcola Theatre) The Roman Bath (Arcola Theatre and Ivan Vazov National Theatre), Alfred (Vineyard Theatre, New York, as part of the T.S. Eliot Exchange), Lark Ascending (Theatre 503), Three More Sleepless Nights and Fourplay (Tristan Bates Theatre), Fairytaleheart (Old Red Lion Theatre) and The Physicists (The Aphra Studio, Canterbury). Assistant Directing includes The Winter's Tale, Pericles, Days of Significance (Royal Shakespeare Company Complete Works Season and US Tour), An Inexplicable Act of Violence (Old Vic 24 Hour Plays), A Background Noise (Nottingham Playhouse), The Taming of the Shrew, Around the World in 80 Days, The Barber of Seville and The Seagull (Bristol Old Vic).

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