New THE HARD BOILED EGG & THE WASP Musical Set for May-June, London

The Hard Boiled Egg and the Wasp is an entirely original musical about the legendary English comedian Dan Leno written by actor, singer-writer and voiceover artist, Jonathan Kydd and Andy Street, one of the leading figures in British and American television music. The show runs at The Giant Olive Theatre at The Lion & Unicorn from Tues 22nd May to Sunday 10th June.

With Street based in LA and Kydd in London The Hard Boiled Egg and the Wasp is perhaps the first musical entirely written via Skype and MP3. Jonathan Kydd will also direct.

Dan Leno (20 December 1860 – 31 October 1904), was the greatest comedian of the English music hall. From 1886 to his death in 1904 he was immensely popular, pioneering the style of stand-up comedy which held sway until the gag-men of the 1930s took over.

The Hard Boiled Egg and the Wasp is set in 1904.Dan Leno has been confined to a lunatic asylum by his wife. Fellow inmates include Queen Victoria, Napoleon, Catherine the Great and two men who think they’re Jesus. Even music hall legend George Robey makes an appearance as a young rival. Dan Leno faces life-threatening surgery to cure him of his appalling headaches but maybe he’s not mad; maybe he’s just no longer funny.

With casting soon to be announced, Street and Kydd have assembled a house band of John Knight, MD of The Alberni Quartet on violin, Geoffrey Grey on piano, Myrtle Bruce-Mitford on cello and the Spanish classical tenor and percussionist, Jose Maria Guerrero.

Television programmes featuring the music of Andy Street are watched in over 100 countries throughout our world. His compositions, arrangements and musical direction have won many major industry awards in England, Europe and the United States. Andy's work with Simon Cowell’s collaborator Nigel Lythgoe consisted of hundreds of television shows during the 1980s and 1990s and continues to this day with incidental music he writes for 'American Idol' and 'So You Think You can Dance'.

Jonathan Kydd is the son of well loved actor, Sam Kydd. He is a top voice over artist and has voiced over 6,000 radio and TV commercials, documentaries, CD Rom games, corporates, cartoons and promos. Jonathan was the original voice for the infamous Ferrero Rocher ad- his ‘eccelente’ entered common parlance - he was the voice of ‘L’Oreal’ for 12 years, the man who had his car buried in the sand in the classic AA ad and the voice of Hagrid in the Harry Potter computer games.

Radio 4 comedies include the hit sketch show ‘Dial M for Pizza’, ‘The Castle’ and the Radio 4 series ‘Chambers’. His acting career has been largely in comedy series working with Richard Wilson, Smith & Jones, Rory Bremner and Alan Davies amongst others. He was in David Jason’s award winning series ‘The Quest’.

Kydd and Street met on the Brian Conley Show in the 90s when Jonathan found himself writing all Conley’s comedy songs, including one for the Royal Variety Show. Recent song-writing includes an album of straight songs ‘Eggshell Heart,’ which he also performed as ‘Jonny Kydd’, and a comedy act ‘The Bay Citee Molars’ which last year sold out the Henley Festival performing songs from their album, ‘Dentura Highway’. Jonathan’s previous musical, which was on in Dublin, was ‘Hey Get a Life’.

Design is by Alison Cartledge. Lighting design by Phil Hunter. Assistant director is Jon Glover

The Giant Olive Theatre at The Lion & Unicorn is located at 42-44 Gaisford Street, London NE5 2ED. The show runs Tues 22nd May - Sunday 10th June, Times: Tues - Sat 7.30pm and Sun 3.30pm. Tickets are £15/£12 from www.ticketweb.co.uk / 08444 771 000, www.hmvtickets.co.uk, or www.lastminute.com.

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