Hannah Ellis Ryan Archives - North West End UK

14Feb

By Katie LeicesterNo Comments

North West

Blithe Spirit – Hope Mill Theatre

Director Hannah Ellis Ryan of Her Productions illuminated Hope Mill Theatre with her production of Blithe Spirit. Ellis Ryan has had some fabulous successes in her previous direction of ‘Vignettes’ and ‘Taming of the Shrew’ at Hope Mill, so I was thrilled to be asked to review her latest masterpiece. Blithe Spirit is a High-Spirited Comedy by the Masterful Noël Coward, the play was first seen in the West End in 1941 and ran for 1,997 performances, which was a new record for a non-musical play in London. It also did well on Broadway later that year, running for 657 performances. The play was adapted for the cinema in 1945; a second film version followed in 2020. The plot relates to Charles Condomine (Peter Stone) a novelist, and his wife Ruth (Ntombizodwa Ndlovu), who have invited the...

Hello and Goodbye – Elysium Theatre Company

27Jun

By Brian MaddenNo Comments

REVIEWS

Hello and Goodbye – Elysium Theatre Company

As I sat down on my couch and tuned into the live streamed production of ‘Hello and Goodbye’, I was quite curious about how this would play out. A television production and theatrical production are remarkably different, so trying to do both is quite a challenge. When the lights go up, we are greeted to a shabby living room that looks like it hasn’t been cleaned in years. It’s clear that whoever lives here hasn’t got a lot of money or is extremely lazy - or perhaps both? The window netting is torn and the walls are stained. One of the first things to grab my attention is the hole in the wall that appears to be in the shape of Africa. It is soon confirmed that the play is set in South Africa in the 1960s. Set designers; Caitlin Mills and Lee Ward have done a fantastic job in capturing th...

Manchester theatre company grows from audience of dozens to potentially thousands thanks to live stream performance

21Jun

By Paul DownhamNo Comments

NEWS

Manchester theatre company grows from audience of dozens to potentially thousands thanks to live stream performance

A theatre company’s latest live stream production will see it broadcast to potentially thousands of people worldwide – including the play’s writer 8,500 miles away. Only four years ago Elysium Theatre Company, which has bases in Manchester and Durham, was putting on its first play in front of just dozens of people at the Assembly Rooms, Durham. But its latest offering – Hello and Goodbye, by South Africa’s leading playwright Athol Fugard – will be filmed and streamed across the internet for the world to see, when it is performed at Northern School of Art, Hartlepool, at 7.30pm on Wednesday 23rd June. It will star Manchester-based actor Hannah Ellis Ryan, and fellow Elysium co-founder Danny Solomon. Hannah also runs Hope Mill Theatre in the city and found fame in Coronation Stre...

16Apr

By Paul DownhamNo Comments

NEWS

Manchester theatre company wins prestigious Olwen Wymark Award after taking work online in Covid-19 pandemic

A Manchester theatre company which swapped the stage for a screen due to the Covid-19 pandemic has had its work recognised with a prestigious award. Elysium Theatre Company has just released five new online plays, days after being announced as Olwen Wymark Award-winners by the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain, for its work in supporting new writing. The company, which also has a base in Durham, began producing The Covid-19 Monologues last year on its new YouTube channel after the pandemic closed all theatres, as a way to bring the Arts to audiences on-screen. Elysium co-founder and Director, Jake Murray, can’t wait for the world to see the next five Covid-19 Monologues, which are online now. The pioneering approach involved commissioning writers to pen monologues on any subject,...