Anna Maxwell Martin
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Casting has been announced for the
West End revival of John Kander and Fred Ebb’s
Cabaret, directed by Rufus Norris. Anna Maxwell Martin will star as Sally Bowles. She will be joined by James Dreyfus as the Emcee, Michael Hayden as Clifford Bradshaw, Sheila Hancock as Fraulein Schneider, Geoffrey Hutchings as Herr Schultz, Harriet Thorpe as Fraulein Kost and Andrew Maud as Ernst Ludwig.
Maxwell Martin, who will be making her West End musical theatre debut in Cabaret, inherits a role previously played in London by Judi Dench (in the original 1968 transfer of Hal Prince’s Broadway staging) and most recently by Jane Horrocks (in Sam Mendes’ 1993 Donmar Warehouse revival). After training at LAMDA, Maxwell Martin made her London stage debut in The Little Foxes at the Donmar Warehouse in 2001. Her other London theatre credits include The Coast of Utopia at the National, the original 2003 London production of Honour, Katie Mitchell’s production of Anton Chekhov’s Three Sisters, Joe Penhall’s Dumb Show at the Royal Court in 2004. Earlier this year, she appeared in a rehearsed reading of John Osborne’s The Entertainer (due to be revived at the Old Vic next year) at the Royal Court and in Other Hands at Soho Theatre. She was nominated for an Olivier Award for playing Lyra in Nicholas Hytner’s first National Theatre stage version of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials in 2003. For her television work, she has won the 2006 British Academy Television Award (BAFTA) Best Actress Award for he role as Esther Summerson in the 2005 BBC TV adaptation of Charles Dickens’ Bleak House. Other TV roles include a guest appearance in last year’s series of Doctor Who, and she played Bessie Higgins in the BBC adaptation of Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South.
Dreyfus is currently appearing in Michael Frayn’s Donkeys’ Years at the Comedy Theatre. The comic actor, who is best known for his TV roles in the series The Thin Blue Line and Gimme Gimme Gimme and from appearing in the film Notting Hill, also starred in Bette Midler’s short-lived sitcom Bette. He starred in the original London cast of The Producers as Carmen Ghia, and other musical roles include the National Theatre’s 1997 production of Lady in the Dark, winning an Olivier Award for Best Supporting Performance in a Musical.
Hayden, an American actor who made his London debut playing Billy Bigelow in Nicholas Hytner’s 1992 National Theatre production of Carousel, went on to
Michael Hayden and director Rufus Norris
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reprise that performance on Broadway in 1994. He has previously played the role of Clifford Bradshaw in
Cabaret in 1999, taking over the role in Sam Mendes and Rob Marshall’s Studio 54 production. His other Broadway credits include
Judgment at Nuremberg (2001),
Enchanted April (2003), Prince Hal in
Henry IV (2004) and
Festen earlier this year. This production of
Cabaret reunites him with Norris, who also directed
Festen.
Stage, film and television veteran Hancock was Mrs. Lovett in the 1980 production of Sweeney Todd, and before that had also starred as Mrs. Hannigan in the original 1978 London production of Annie. Last year she appeared in the West End in a revival of the play The Anniversary at the Garrick.
Hutchings, a veteran of the RSC, also has an extensive film and television profile that includes playing Emily Lloyd’s father in Wish You Were Here, and such films as White Hunter, Black Heart, Henry V, Topsy-Turvy, Clockwise and The Affair of the Necklace. On television, he played building contractor John Edwards in Our Friends in the North.
Thorpe, who most recently played Mrs. Lovett in the tour of John Doyle’s production of Sweeney Todd, has appeared regularly in musicals, including starring in Brighton Rock at the Almeida, and as Madame Thenadier in Les Miserables at the Palace. Last year she appeared in the season at the Open Air Theatre, Regent’s Park, playing Maria in Twelfth Night and The Queen in Cymbeline.
Maud, who appeared as Lars in Norris’s production of Festen throughout its London run from the Almeida to its transfer to the Lyric, has also worked extensively with the RSC, appearing in productions of The Merchant of Venice, Measure for Measure, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, King John, American Soap and Julius Caesar.
Cabaret will open at the Lyric Theatre on 10 October. Previews begin on 22 September.