Sunny prospects for outdoor shows

It looks like sunshine all the way for the programme of four outdoor plays to be staged at Lytham Hall this summer. With five weeks to go before the opening play, Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, on Sunday 14 June, interest and ticket sales are booming.

Pat Booth from Plackitt and Booth’s Booksellers in Lytham’s Clifton Street has received many favourable comments on the programme for the 2015 season and is dealing with ticket enquiries daily. “Brontë, Shakespeare and Gilbert and Sullivan is a diverse and appealing line-up and the choice of The Sorcerer’s Apprentice as the family show is excellent. Many ofthe youngsters know the story and the music from the Disney Fantasia movie,” he said.

Julian Wilde, organiser of the outdoor season, is delighted with the willingness of local venues and businesses to sell tickets. “I think it’s important to give everyone the opportunity to buy tickets on-line directly from the companies, but also to provide plenty of convenient local ticketpoints. You can buy tickets in person in Lytham, Kirkham, Ansdell and St.Annes which many people like to do. Sales are going extremely well and I think we are in for a very well-supported season once again.”

Chapterhouse Theatre Company from Lincoln will come to Lytham Hall at the start of their nationwide open air tour of Jane Eyre. The Lytham show is one of 54 performances in 89 days which will take them to Bantry House in Cork, Ireland, Castle Kennedy in Scotland and Aberglasney Gardens in Wales, as well as English venues from Northumberland to the Isle of Wight.

Richard Main, artistic director of Chapterhouse believes that all is set for a successful night at Lytham Hall following recent cast auditions. “The absence of traffic noise and the sheltered arena make it an ideal venue at the start of our tour for a new cast. I think that the audience, always a very appreciative one at Lytham, will be surprised at the amount of humour even in a very tense play. It’s a very skilful adaptation for the stage of Charlotte Brontë’s most renowned novel by Laura Turner who has established a national reputation for her work.”

Tickets at £13, with concessions at £10/£6.50, are on sale now on Chapterhouse’s own website at www.chapterhouse.org and locally from Lytham Hall phone 01253 736652; Plackitt and Booth, Booksellers, Lytham 796958; Lowther Pavilion 794221; Stringers Department Store and Stringers Homelife, 740700; Bennetts Bakers, Ansdell 736318; Storytellers Inc St. Annes, 781690; Silverdell Books Kirkham 01772 683444.