A Theatrical Modern Classic To Start New Season

To open their full and varied programme of theatrical delights for Spring-Summer 2007 the Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse Theatres present the first of five 'Made in Liverpool' productions - Timberlake Wertenbaker's award-winning modern classic, Our Country's Good. Set in Australia in a penal colony in 1789 and based on historical records, this tribute to the transforming power of theatre sees convicts and Officers unite as they present their amateur production of The Recruiting Officer.

Rising star Edward Dick makes his Playhouse directorial debut with an exceptional cast including John McArdle, Colin Tierney, Michael Thomas, Andrew Schofield, Charlie Brooks, and Tracey Wilkinson at the Playhouse from Friday 2 until Saturday 24 February 2007.

'I ask you to keep in mind the play, to cling to the play as the thing which will give you your spirit back.'

Australia 1789. Under the command of Arthur Phillip the first fleet of British prison ships have settled at Port Jackson - current day Sydney. Most of the prisoners have been convicted of minor thefts and many of their wardens are military men. They have all of them been condemned to the task of founding a self-sustaining colony in a land where farming is difficult, disease is rampant, and the labourers unwilling. At a time of extremely low supplies and low hopes, with the future of the colony in question, 2nd Lieutenant Ralph Clark decides to stage a production of George Farquhar's comedy The Recruiting Officer using convicts, many of them illiterate, as his cast. The project immediately takes on political dimensions and meets with opposition among the other officers. With only two copies of the text, a cast of convicts, and one leading lady who may be about to be hanged, conditions are hardly ideal"¦

The basis for Timberlake Wertenbaker's play is the novel The Playmaker by Thomas Keneally, which used the letters and journals of Ralph Clark, Watkin Tench, David Collins, and other First Fleet officers as primary sources. In 1988 Our Country's Good won the Olivier Award for Play of the Year. Timberlake Wertenbaker was Resident Writer for 'Shared Experience' (1983) and the RoyalCourtTheatre (1984-5). Her other plays include The Third, which won an all-London playwright's award, New Anatomies, Inside Out, Home Leave, Abel's Sister, Three Birds Alighting on a Field, which won the Critics' Circle London Theatre Award and the Writers' Guild Award for Best West End play of 1991, The Break of Day and Galileo's Daughter. She is also a world-renowned translator of the French playwright Marivaux.

A wonderful ensemble cast of ten take the roles of both officers and convicts with the exception of Nick Barber who plays the patient and enthusiastic 2nd Lieutenant Ralph Clark. Nick makes his Playhouse debut following roles in Faust (Punch Drunk); The Canterbury Tales (RSC); An Inspector Calls (PW Productions) and Romeo and Juliet (Southwark Playhouse). Consummate actor Michael Thomas's impressive theatre credits include Pillars of the Community, The Winters Tale, The Rivals (National Theatre) and much work for the RSC at Stratford including The Malcontent, Edward III and Comedy of Errors.

John McArdle makes a welcome return to Liverpool theatre following extensive work in theatre around the country and successful television roles in The Bill, Blue Murder, Casualty, Merseybeat and Brookside. Colin Tierney returns to the Playhouse following The Lady of Leisure in May 2006. His distinguished theatre credits include Paul, Guiding Star, Othello and The Machine Wreckers (National Theatre), How Love is Spelt (Bush Theatre) and Cold Meat Party, The Seagull (Manchester Royal Exchange). Charlie Brooks makes her Playhouse debut and is well known to television audiences as Janine Butcher in EastEnders and was seen most recently in BBC dramas Angel of Death and Bleak House. Liverpool actor Andrew Schofield returns to the Playhouse straight from The Flint St Nativity, and following Breezeblock Park and Neville's Island.

A favourite on stage in Liverpool, Andrew's recent credits include Brick Up The Mersey Tunnels (Liverpool Royal Court) and On Tour (Liverpool Everyman and Royal Court, London). Leanne Best is also back at the Playhouse following her successful performance in The Flint St Nativity and acclaimed roles in The Way Home and Unprotected last year at the Liverpool Everyman. Tracey Wilkinson is best known to television audiences as playing Di Barker in Bad Girls for 5 years and her theatre credits include Guiding Star (National Theatre) and Animal Farm and Starts in the Morning Sky (Northern Stage). Sarah Ozeke's theatre work includes One Under (Tricycle Theatre) and My Dad's A Birdman (Young Vic), and on television in Life Begins and White Teeth. Gabriel Fleary comes to the Playhouse following roles in Romeo and Juliet (Birmingham Rep) and BBC's Holby City.

Director Edward Dick is Artistic Director of Nevertheless for whom he has recently directed 'Tis Pity She's A Whore at the Southwark Playhouse, in which Mariah Gale's performance as Annabella won the Ian Charleson Award, the Critics Circle Most Promising Newcomer Award and the Time Out Theatre Performance of the Year Award. Other directing includes: Fewer Emergencies (National Theatre, Prague); The Age of Consent (Bush Theatre and Edinburgh Fringe); The Hollow Men (Village Theatre, New York); The Misanthrope, The Mysteries, The Country Wife, Cloud Nine and The Memory of Water (Guildhall School of Music and Drama); Modern American Classics (National Theatre). Edward also teaches acting at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and is a member of the Lincoln Center Theater Directors' Lab in New York City.

Prepare to see the Playhouse auditorium as you have never experienced it before with a radical design by TMA award-winning designer Robert Innes-Hopkins, who is joined by highly acclaimed lighting designer Rick Fisher. -- www.everymanplayhouse.com