The stage adaptation of Kay Mellor‘s A Passionate Woman presents an exciting cast, including Katherine Dow Blyton, a familiar face on stage and screen.
The new production is staged in Kay Mellor’s home City, in her memory, and at the theatre where her first breakthrough play was staged 30 years ago. Kay Mellor, a leading British dramatist, died in May 2022.
Katherine Dow Blyton (Emmerdale; This is England) plays Betty, who locks herself in her loft on her son’s wedding day, struggling to accept that he’s leaving home.
The story is a deeply personal one – of reinvention and rediscovery, as extraordinary as the woman who wrote it.
Director Tess Seddon: “I’m delighted to be working with such an incredibly talented cast and creative team on this brilliant play with such a long history with Leeds audiences. I’m looking forward to re-sharing this much-loved production in Kay’s beloved home City, 30 years after it was first staged. It has such a deeply rooted connection with the Playhouse and it feels wonderfully apt to be making A Passionate Woman on the stage that Kay first saw her work receive a rapturous reception in front of an audience all those years ago. I hope we do justice to this wonderful play, and to the legacy of this incredible writer.”
Tom Lorcan (The Damned United; Coronation Street) plays Betty’s son, Mark. David Crellin plays Donald and Michael Bijok is Craze.
Anthony, Yvonne and Gaynor Mellor: “A Passionate Woman is an incredibly important and personal piece and, as a family, we are delighted there is a chance to bring new audiences to see the play and with such a wonderful cast. We miss Kay every day and her absence is an ache that will never disappear. Celebrating her life with events like this helps to fill the void and keep her incredible legacy alive.“
Completing the creative team with Tess Seddon (she/her) are: Set & Costume Designer Rose Revitt, Dr Korczak’s Example, Leeds Playhouse, which won her the 2019 Linbury Prize for Stage Design and Best Designer at The Stage Debut Awards 2020; Lighting Designer Amy Mae (she/her),Say Yes to Tess, There Are No Beginnings Leeds Playhouse; Sound Designer Annie May Fletcher (she/her), sound designer on Hedwig and the Angry Inch in 2022, leading to a What’s On Stage Award nomination for Best Sound Design; Asha Jennings-Grant (she/her), Movement and Intimacy Coach; and Assistant Director Xolani Crabtree (she/her), A Little Night Music, Leeds Playhouse and Opera North.
Cover image: Tom Lorcan (Mark) and David Crellin (Donald). All photography from A Passionate Woman rehearsals by Marc Brenner.
Courtyard Theatre, Leeds Playhouse 20 May – 10 June Box office 0113 213 7700 Book online leedsplayhouse.org.uk |
