Following nine sell-out seasons at Lamb House, Rye, The Lamb Players are to play their first season at Fairlight Hall. West End and Broadway favourites Jonathan Broadbent, (My Night With Reg, Donmar), Jessica Regan (Doctors, Long Day’s Journey on Broadway) and Radio 4’s Carrie Quinlan lead the company in Shakespeare’s As You Like It. Played in the round with beautiful original music, don’t miss this exclusive event, Friday to Sunday August 17-19. Picnics encouraged. Book early at www.thelambplayers.com.
One of Shakespeare’s best loved comedies, As You Like It is a magical and musical romp through the often turbulent affair of falling in love. When strangers Rosalind and Orlando are banished from court, both escape to the Forest of Arden. Reams of brilliantly drawn characters help, (and hinder) as the strangers come together and make a match. Amid cross-dressing aplenty, the age-old battle of the sexes is blown apart as four sets of lovers battle it out away from the constraints of court. This Lamb Players production features original music and a stellar cast of 10 actors. The action is transported to 1942 in the thick of the Second World War, the court is a dangerous and Blitz-blasted London, and the Forest of Arden is an idyllic English country garden.
The Lamb Players is a theatre company dedicated to producing high-quality, high-energy productions of Shakespeare’s plays against the backdrop of beautiful homes and gardens. Founded in 2008 by Francesca Rowan-Plowden, The Lamb Players has been directed by Tamara Harvey, (artistic director Theatre Clywd) and Robert Hastie, (artistic director Sheffield Theatres) and the acting company has more than 40 actors with CVs boasting Royal Shakespeare Company, National Theatre, BBC, film and radio credits.
Last year, 2017, saw the end of The Lamb Players at their long-standing home, Lamb House, Rye, which led to this exciting development as the company plays its first away season at Peel Fold, Henley, and Fairlight Hall, near Rye.
The gardens open one hour before performances, and remain open for picnics two hours after. Seating is provided, though blankets, etc can be set down.
[Editor’s note: It seems a shame that Lamb House and its wonderful garden – now under the direct control of the National Trust – no longer welcomes live performances, and the people of Rye are deprived of the music, plays and readings that used to be such a delight there, and which kept alive the creative atmosphere of past occupants. One can only hope that the building will not share the fate of some others and become a dead and antiseptic place with little useful purpose other than to serve teas to tourists.]
Source: The Lamb Players
With the rooms open upstairs there is far more to interest the visitor to Lamb House than before and it is succeeding in giving the place a vibrant burst of new life!
And serving teas to tourists is not to be sniffed at as a ‘fate’ – there are many wonderful people in Rye who make their living doing so in surroundings that are far from dead!
I’m all for teas and tourists. The more the merrier!