A Jane Austen 200th anniversary drama transfers from one historic theatre to another

A STYLISH stage version of Jane Austen’s earliest novel – Northanger Abbey – will be performed at Richmond’s historic Georgian Theatre Royal on Friday 24 February at 7.30pm and Saturday 25 February at 2.00pm and 7.30pm as part of a national tour marking the 200th anniversary of the novelist’s death.

This touring production comes direct from the Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds – the only surviving example of a Regency theatre in the country – and has been adapted by acclaimed Austen specialist Tim Luscombe. It is directed by Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds’ Artistic Director Karen Simpson with an eight-strong cast.

The play opens in Bury St Edmunds at the beginning of this month and then goes on national tour with Richmond’s Georgian Theatre Royal as one of its first venues and the only one in the North East. Bury St Edmunds’ previous adaptation of Austen’s Mansfield Park toured in 2012 and 2013 to great critical acclaim.

“We are really looking forward to hosting Northanger Abbey which promises to be an absolute delight: witty, fast-moving and stylish,” said Clare Allen, Chief Executive at The Georgian Theatre Royal, the UK’s oldest working theatre in its original form. “It is particularly fitting that it should have been devised on the stage of another of the country’s landmark historic theatres, which was built just over forty years after our own Theatre in Richmond.

“Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds has a strong reputation as a producer of high quality drama so we are sure that Jane Austen fans and lovers of classic costume dramas are in for a treat,” she added.

The play offers an inventive, fun-filled retelling of this captivating first novel which sees the 17-year-old Catherine Morland taken by her aunt to Bath. Here she encounters the social whirl denied her at home and befriends Isabella Thorpe and the boorish brother John. She also meets the charming but eccentric Henry Tilney and his sister Eleanor and works hard to get to know them better. However, John Thorpe has other plans and is determined to have Catherine for himself. Following a string of deceptions, Catherine finally sees through his tricks and lies. When she is invited by her beloved Henry to his home, Northanger Abbey, fact and fiction collide fuelled by the horror of the Gothic fantasy The Mysteries of Udolpho and her wild imaginations get the better of her judgement. All misunderstandings are eventually resolved and, as in all the best Jane Austen novels, the young heroine finally gets her man.

Tickets from £11 to £26 are available from the Box Office on 01748 825252 or via the online booking service at: www.georgiantheatreroyal.co.uk