We’re pleased to announce the cast of Cuban playwright Abel Gonzáles Melo’s play Chamaco, which translates as ‘Kiddo’, part of our ¡Viva! Spanish and Latin American Festival. Directed by our Artistic Director of Theatre Walter Meierjohann, the eight-strong cast includes a number of actors well-known to Manchester theatre-goers…
David Judge, known to millions as Danny in Channel 4’s Hollyoaks, plays Karel, the ‘Chamaco’ of the piece; Jamie Samuel, winner of the Best Actor Award for Jumpers For Goalposts at the Bush Theatre in 2013, plays Miguel; Jason Furnival, who was Albert in the Library Theatre Company’s Christmas 2011 production at The Lowry of The Wind in the Willows, is Saul; and Katie West, with credits at the Royal Exchange Theatre, the Almeida Theatre, and the Manchester International Festival, and who recently played the title role of Lela in Lela & Co at the Royal Court Theatre, is Silvia.
Taking on the role of Paco is Kenny Thompson, who appeared in the LTC’s Mother Courage and her Children in 2013; Jacqueline Pilton, currently appearing in ITV’s Second World War drama Home Fires, plays Roberta; Robin Simpson, seen locally last year in Oldham Coliseum’s Boeing Boeing, and also this month in Home Fires, is Alejandro; and finally, award-winning Manchester theatre actor and director David Fleeshman, with extensive theatre credits to his name including the recent international tour of Warhorse UK (Royal National Theatre), plays Felipe.
Born in Havana in 1980, Abel Gonzáles Melo is one of Cuba’s best-known playwrights. Chamaco, which is set on Christmas Eve night in Havana, centres on a knife fight over a few pesos which leads to the death of a young man. Meanwhile, at home, his sister waits patiently for his brother to return home for a meal he will never eat.
“The Rolling Stones have just played a concert in Havana,” says Walter Meierjohann, “Barack Obama has recently visited the country, two things which were thought unimaginable a few short years ago. Cuba is on the cusp of major and irreversible change, and few people in the country are as well placed to be documenting this pace of adjustment as Abel Gonzáles Melo, who shines an unforgiving spotlight on the Havana which Western holiday-makers to Cuba do not often get to see. To have Abel with us in rehearsals is a huge thrill and a real honour.”
We are delighted that Abel Gonzáles Melo will be present for the performance on Thu 21 Apr, which will be followed by a post-show discussion. Abel will be joined by Walter Meierjohann, and Elyse Dodgson, the international director at London’s Royal Court Theatre.
David Judge, Katie West, Robin Simpson and Jamie Samuel will also be taking part in a staged reading of Abel’s new play, Weathered, which illuminates the reality of a broken Cuba, a country divided between the past and the present; the island and exile. Weathered has been developed as part of an Arts Council England and British Council-funded World Stages project, devised to create a series of 12 linked international residencies and exchanges between major UK producing venues and international artists. The staged reading of Weathered is on Sat 23 April 2016 at 11:30.