After just five sell-out performances at the Young Vic in 2008, Street Scene - winner of the Evening Standard Award for Best Musical - returns for a full run and national tour.
The Opera Group's artistic director John Fulljames (The Human Comedy, The Enchanted Pig, Tobias and the Angel) directs an 80-strong ensemble of singers drawn from the world of theatre and opera and a community chorus of young people local to each venue.
The BBC Concert Orchestra will play Weill's glorious score of Broadway musical and American opera for the opening performances, conducted by their Principal Conductor Keith Lockhart who is also Music Director of the Boston Pops Orchestra. Tim Murray, who has conducted for The Opera Group, Royal Opera House, Opera Holland Park and Welsh National Opera, will lead the Southbank Sinfonia for the rest of the run.
Street Scene won the first ever Tony Award for Weill's music. It was adapted by Elmer Rice from his own Pulitzer Prize-winning play with lyrics by the great poet of Harlem Langston Hughes. Set in a brownstone tenement building over a long hot summer's day and night, Weill called it "a simple story of everyday life in a big city - a story of love and passion and greed and death." The score combines a dazzling array of show tunes, arias, jazz and blues in a musical melting pot that captures the diversity of working class New York in 1947. It features some of Weill's most compelling music including Lonely House, What Good Would the Moon Be and the big dance number Moon Faced, Starry Eyed.
Many of the acclaimed original cast will reprise their roles including Elena Ferrari as Mrs Maurant, Paul Featherstone, John Moabi, Kate Nelson, Charlotte Page, Paul Reeves, Simone Sauphanor, Joseph Shovelton and Harriet Williams. Joining them are Nathan Vale, Paul Curievici, Susanna Hurrell, James McOran-Campbell and Geoffrey Dolton.
John Fulljames has recently been appointed associate director at the Royal Opera House. His credits at the Young Vic include The Human Comedy, The Enchanted Pig (which enjoyed a revival last year at the Linbury ROH and New Victory Theatre, NY) and Tobias and the Angel. Other recent credits for The Opera Group include Seven Angels, Into the Little Hill (shortlisted for a South Bank Show Award), The Lion's Face, Varjak Paw and The Shops (all at Linbury ROH and on tour).
Kurt Weill collaborated with Bertolt Brecht in the late 1920s (The Threepenny Opera, Rise and Fall of the City Of Mahagonny.) In the 1930s Weill fled Nazi Germany for New York where he composed extensively for Broadway. He transformed classic European forms into Broadway musical theatre. He considered Street Scene to be his greatest musical achievement and most significant legacy.
Listings information 15 September - 1 October 2011
Tickets and information www.youngvic.org 020 7922 2922
Times
Monday - Saturday (excl. 20 September: 7pm) 7:30pm
Wednesday & Saturday matinees (excl. 24 September: 2pm) 2:30pm
Tickets: £10, £17.50, £25, £29.50
Previews: (15 - 18 Sept) £10 & £17.50
