The Rink, Kander & Ebb, Southwark

Yay. Fantastic news 😄

Hoorah! Bring back Chita and Liza. And Liza's plastic hips.

Now on sale! Booked for the last night.

southwarkplayhouse.co.uk/show/the-rink/

Linzi played Angel at the Leicester Haymarket with a fabulous performance from Kathryn Evans as Anna. There was a poor production at the Orange Tree in Richmond with Gay Soper. Good to see it resurface.

I've said many times that this is the perfect space for The Rink and i was listening to it just last week!!

Linzi Hateley could definitely play Anna this time

Ive booked for the last preview

Ruthie Henshall singing 'Chief Cook and Bottle Washer' would be heaven.

Laura Pitt Pulford can play Liza. Terrific!

Boom. Casting done.

On the one hand, I'll go and see it, and suppress the urge to giggle during Fred Ebb's worst-ever lyric ("We can make it, we'll survive/Danny, you're too stoned to drive!"). That line aside, I love the score, although the show isn't perfect by any means.

On the other... it's a show about the relationship between two women. Were there really no women available to direct or choreograph?

No, this isn't the "new line to trot out". It's an old, old story that does nobody much credit. Let's just consider for a moment how criminally underrepresented half the population still are in creative posts in theatre in this country, shall we? I'm sure it'll be safe in Adam Lenson's hands, and I certainly intend to see it, but it's a valid point.

In the immortal words of Neil Tennant: Oh, pur-lease.

Some individual jobs, sure - but then look at how many directing jobs go to women. Look at how many directing jobs go to people whose heritage isn't white Anglo. Look at how many women are running institutional theatres up and down the country. Aside from artistic directorships, look at how many women are represented on those theatres' boards of directors/trustees. Then look at how many women hold theatre degrees, directing degrees and all the rest of it, and look at how many women are in the audience. There's a big representation problem in theatre in this country, and the "best man for the job" argument isn't going to explain it away.

Yep. Saw it in sunny Wythenshawe in the day. Paul Kerryson, one of his great shows, Pacific Overtures etc. Happy days

There is a hell of a lot of sexism at the top on the big leagues, proper boys club. And there are certainly rolls within the industry where women seem to get preference. It goes both ways. Though woman are preferred in minor roles and men in the big ones, creatively speaking.

But we don't know the particulars guys. A director is often key in pushing a show to happen, talking to a producer and convincing them the show would be a good idea. They have may have seen or worked with other creatives (choreo, lighting anything) and gone "That fits my vision perfectly. This is it!" We can't stiffle the creative process and say "You've got to pick a female choreographer" when someone who happened to be male produced work work fitted what the project required in the director's or producer's head. It is an artistic creation, no one has the exact same style or qualification.

To decide that anyone shouldn't be directing a story because it is centred on people of the opposite gender is absurd anyway.