01/05/2025
G Live Studio, Guildford
Educating Rita at The Bellerby Studio GLive. 8 – 10 May 2025
JEFF THOMSON – SURREY ADVERTISER ‘Samantha Remnant gave us an engaging Rita with a saucy slant that kept Frank (and us) slightly off-balance and waiting for more……. the softer, appealing, effect Remnant created was appreciated by the wider audience. Neil James presented the alcoholic Frank in a stylishly, urbane manner. Here was a man, suave and outwardly successful but actively hiding demons……. director Gilly Fick knows her audience too, choosing not to wander into social or political polemics and ensured the play moved along at an enviable pace: with some tweaking the production could hold on the London Fringe – an environment I know well.”
Educating Rita by Willy Russell – 8 & 9 May. Directed by Gilly Fick
When married hairdresser Rita enrols on an Open University course, little does she know where her journey will take her. Having left school at 16 and now 29, she’s hungry to learn – EVERYTHING. Her tutor Frank is a frustrated poet, brilliant academic and dedicated drinker, who’s less than enthusiastic about taking Rita on, but the two soon realise how much they have to teach each other.
Sometimes students make the best teachers……
This hilarious and heart-warming comedy won the Olivier award when it was produced in London’s West End by the RSC and was adapted into the multi award winning film which starred Julie Walters and Michael Caine.
Guildburys Theatre Company is bringing this iconic play to the Bellerby Studio at GLive – theatre that’s up close and personal!
NODA REVIEW – Pauline Surrey. ‘The Bellerby Studio is a new venue for the Guildburys, and rather a nice one, providing an intimate atmosphere with a wide but shallow stage, plenty of room for Rita to strut about….. once again Guildburys’ set designers produced the most stunning set, with so much to absorb….. This is such a well-written play, which of course deserves some great performers to carry it off to its full advantage. Great comic timing, as well as great sensitivity is required, to bring out all the nuances of character here.
Director Gilly Fick found two such fine actors in Neil James as the reliable, kind of, Frank, and Samantha Remnant as the whacky, loveable Rita. A fine production!’
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This amateur production of Educating Rita is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals Ltd. on behalf of Samuel French Ltd
