Peter Gill, playwright and theatre director
Major Barbara
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Major Barbara

by George Bernard Shaw

National Theatre

Lyttleton Theatre, 27 October 1982

(before visiting the Grand Theatre, Leeds, 8 to 13 November)

See also George Bernard Shaw and the World of Major Barbara, by Peter Lewis, from the production programme.

Winter 1906
Act I:
Lady Britomart's house in Wilton Crescent. After dinner.
Act II:
The yard of the West Ham shelter of the Salvation Army. The following morning.
Interval
Act III:
Scene 1
Lady Britomart's house. The next afternoon.
Scene 2
Perivale St Andrews. Later the same day.

Length: about 3 hours 10 minutes, including interval.

Credits
Stephen Undershaft David Yelland

Theatre includes: three years with Glasgow Citizens' Company; Travesties, Sleuth, A Room with a View (Bristol Old Vic), The Circle (tour), Deathtrap (Garrick Theatre). NT: Phaedra Britannica, Hamlet, John Gabriel Borkman, The Shoemaker's Holiday, Summer. TV: includes: Affairs of the Heart, David Copperfield, Jolly Old Jean Jacques Rousseau, Rumpole of the Bailey, The Copyist, Emmerdale Farm, Secret Army, Facing the Sun, Othello, Nancy Astor, The Spider's Web. Film Chariots of Fire (as the Prince of Wales).

Lady Britomart Siân Phillips

Theatre includes: in London: Hedda Gabler, The Holiday, The Lizard on the Rock, Gentle Jack, Maxibules, The Night of the Iguana, Ride a Cock Horse, Man and Superman, Man of Destiny, The Burglar, Epitaph for George Dillon, A Nightingale in Bloomsbury Square, The Gay Lord Quex, Spinechiller, You Never Can Tell, Pal Joey, Dear Liar. At Chichester: A Woman of No Importance, The Inconstant Couple TV: includes: The Other Man, Don Juan in Hell, Women Can be Monsters, Platonov, Lady Windermere's Fan, Shoulder to Shoulder, Jenny Churchill, How Green Was My Valley, I Claudius, The Achurch Letters, Heartbreak House, Off To Philadelphia in the Morning, The Oresteia, Crime and Punishment, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Barriers, Churchill The Wilderness Years, Smiley's People, How Many Miles to Babylon. Films include Becket, Goodbye Mr Chips, Laughter in the Dark, Murphy's War, Under Milk Wood, The Clash of the Titans. Record Pal Joey single.

Barbara Undershaft Penelope Wilton

Theatre includes: in London: Widowers' Houses, King Lear, The Alchemist (all transferred from Nottingham), The Philanthropist (also in New York), West of Suez, The Great Exhibition, Something's Burning, The Norman Conquests, Bloomsbury, All's Well That Ends Well, Measure for Measure, Play, Tishoo. NT Plunder, The Philanderer, Betrayal, Othello, Sisterly Feelings, Man and Superman, Much Ado About Nothing. TV: includes: An Affair of Honour, Mrs Warren's Profession, The Sullen Sisters (Country Matters), Song of Songs, The Pearcross Girls, King Lear, The Widowing of Mrs Holroyd, The Norman Conquests, Able's Will, Othello, and most recently playing the title role in Beatrix Potter Films: Joseph Andrews, The French Lieutenant's Woman.

Sarah Undershaft Carolyn Courage

Theatre includes: repertory at Coventry (The Lion in Winter, School for Wives, The Man Most Likely To, When Did You Last See My Mother), Stratford on Avon (Charley's Aunt), Bromley (Hotel in Amsterdam), Guildford (On Such a Night), Royal Exchange Manchester (The Three Musketeers), Bristol Old Vic (Twelfth Night) In London two plays at Westminster Theatre; Henry IV (Her Majesty's), The Taming of the Shrew (Open Space). TV includes: Julius Caesar, The Onedin Line, Z Cars, New Scotland Yard, Van der Valk, Sutherland's Law, Love and Mr Lewisham, The Kitchen, Life at Stake, Instant Enlightenment Including VAT, Buccaneer, The South Bank Show. Film: Terror.

Adolphus Cusins Nicholas Jones

Theatre includes: seasons at the Bristol Old Vic and Oxford Playhouse. NT The Second Mrs Tanqueray. TV: includes: Hamlet, Twelfth Night, Candide, Private Affairs, Our Mutual Friend, Anna Karenina, Wings, Kilvert's Diaries, Lillie Langtry, Cover, The Flame Trees of Thika Films include: The Blockhouse, Daisy Miller.

Charles Lomax Mark Tandy

Theatre for the RSC Othello, Julius Caesar, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Nicholas Nickleby (London and New York), She Stoops to Conquer (Nuffield Theatre Southampton). TV: Aubrey Beardsley, Nicholas Nickleby,Jewel in the Crown.

Morrison Ralph Nossek

Theatre includes: Comedians (first at Nottingham Playhouse, then NT at the Old Vic and Wyndhams, later on TV), Flowers for Algernon (Queens). NT: The Prince of Homburg, Danton's Death. Recent TV: includes: Brideshead Revisited, Collision Course, Prince Regent, Telford's Change, Poldark, The Sweeney, We the Accused, The Bolgias. Films include: Orders to Kill, Guns of Darkness, Fraulein Doktor, Alfred the Great, Performance.

Andrew Undershaft Brewster Mason

Theatre: first professional appearance: 1948 at the Lyric Hammersmith in An English Summer. Work in London since then includes: The Winter's Tale, Much Ado About Nothing (Phoenix), Richard II, The Way of the World, Venice Preserved (Lyric Hammersmith), The Flowering Cherry, Ross (Haymarket), Look on Tempests (Comedy) RSC: King Lear, The Wars of the Roses, The Birthday Party, The Merchant of Venice, Love's Labour's Lost, Timon of Athens, Hamlet, The Government Inspector, Twelfth Night, Coriolanus, All's Well that Ends Well, Macbeth, Julius Caesar, The Merry Wives of Windsor, The Relapse, Women Beware Women, Henry VIII, Major Barbara, Othello, Henry IV Parts 1 and 2. Films include The Dam Busters, Private Potter TV: includes: The Wars of the Roses, Cone of Silence, Flowering Cherry, Brief Tales from the Bench, Jack the Ripper, Edward VII, The Pallisers, The Breakthrough, Pit Strike, True Patriot, Quatermass, The Voysey Inheritance, The Greeks, The Best of Everything, Fraulein Else.

Rummy Mitchens Patricia Hayes

Theatre: made her first stage appearance in 1921 in The Great Big World at the Court Theatre. Since then, work includes: creating the role of Ruby in When We Are Married, and more recently, appearing in Habeas Corpus (Lyric Theatre), Twelfth Night (RSC), Liza of Lambeth .(Shaftesbury), Filumena (Lyric). NT: True West. Numerous TV: appearances include: The Benny Hill Show, Eric Sykes Show, Ken Dodd Show, Arthur Haynes Show, Hugh and I, Maigret, Bootsie and Snudge, The Trouble With You Lilian, The Last of the Baskets, Spooner's Patch, Edna the Inebriate Woman (1972 TV actress of the year), Till Death Us Do Part, 1 Tell You It's Burt Reynolds, London Belongs to Me, Storm in a Teacup. Films include Epitaph for a Spy, Nicholas Nickleby, The Deep Blue Sea, Reach for Glory, Kill or Cure, The Sicilians, Hard Day's Night, Heironymous Merkin, Goodbye Mr Chips, Fragment of Fear, Love thy Neighbour, The Corn is Green.

Snobby Price Ewan Stewart

Theatre includes: at the NT A Month in the Country, Serjeant Musgrave's Dance, Don Juan TV: includes: The Quiet Days of Mrs Stafford, Ill Fares the Land Films include: Remembrance.

Jenny Hill Julia Watson

Theatre includes: founder member of Bruvvers community theatre in Newcastle, repertory at Nottingham, Plymouth, Basingstoke, Watermill Newbury, Crucible Sheffield, Thorndyke Leatherhead. NT: Danton's Death, Don Juan. TV: includes: Tales of the Unexpected, Shoestring, Company and Co, Maybury, Never the Twain.

Peter Shirley Ron Pember

Theatre in London includes: appearing in 30 plays at the Mermaid and directing 18 others. NT includes: Othello, Much Ado About Nothing, Royal Hunt of the Sun, Uncle Vanya (all at the Old Vic), and A Month in the Country, Serjeant Musgrave's Dance, Don Juan, Danton's Death (South Bank) West End includes: Lock Up Your Daughters, Blitz. Over 200 TV: appearances. Films include: Young Winston, Land That Time Forgot, Oh What a Lovely War, Julius Caesar, Poor Cow, Aces High.

Bill Walker Brian Croucher

Theatre includes: Find Your Way Home (Open Space), Duck Song (RSC), Saved, Narrow Road to the Deep North, Early Morning, Christie In Love, Only Way Out, Class Enemy, The Removalist, Inside Out (all at the Royal Court), The Provok'd Wife (Greenwich), Dick Turpin (Mermaid), Double Exposure (Intimate Theatre Palmers Green) TV: includes: Blake's Seven, Quatermass, Out, The XYY Man, Cranford, The Jensen Code, Father Brown, Callan, The Hanged Man, Ten Commandments, Warship, Treasure Island, Shoestring, Minder, The Professionals, The House That Bled to Death, The Gentle Touch, Blood Royal - Blood Money, The Chinese Detective, Billy's Blues, Jangles, The Deadly Game, also presented Play School Films: A Nightingale Sang, The Set Up, Dream House, Take It Or Leave It.

Mrs Baines Gillian Martell

Theatre includes: seven years in repertory, including two with Nottingham Playhouse In London: Celebration (Duchess Theatre), Serjeant Musgrave's Dance, Macbeth, Trixie and Baba, Narrow Road to the Deep North, The Double Dealer, The Sea, Bingo, The Fool, The Good Woman of Setzuan (all at the Royal Court), Rose (Duke of York's); at Stratford Ontario: Hedda Gabler. TV includes: The Forsyte Saga, The Misfi't, Six Days of Justice, Hunter's Walk, General Hospital, The Winslow Boy, Lady of the Camelias, Two's Company, The Imitation Game, Chalk and Cheese, The Gentle Touch, Cowboys, The Hound of the Baskervilles, The Boy Who Won the Pools. Most recent film: The Patricia Neal Story.

Bilton Anthony Douse

Theatre includes: work at Nottingham, Leatherhead, Edinburgh. At the Royal Court: A Collier's Friday Night, The Widowing of Mrs Holroyd, Lear. ICA: Stone. NT: State of Revolution, Brand, Macbeth, The Woman, Strife, The Fruits of Enlightenment, As You Like It, Richard III, Danton's Death, Don Juan. TV: includes: The Life Swappers, Dickens of London, The Wood Demon, Atrocity. Films include: The Duellists.

Director Peter Gill

Work at the Royal Court, where he was Associate Director from 1970 to 72, includes: A Collier's Friday Night, The Local Stigmatic, The Ruffian on the Stair, A Provincial Life (which he also adapted), A Soldier's Fortune, The Daughter in Law, The Widowing of Mrs Holroyd, Life Price, The Duchess of Malfi, Crete and Sergeant Pepper, The Merry- Go-Round (which he also adapted), and his own plays Over Gardens Out, The Sleepers' Den, and Small Change. RSC Twelfth Night. At Riverside Studios, where he was director from 1976 to 80, directed As You Like It, Small Change, The Cherry Orchard, The Changeling, Measure for Measure, Julius Caesar, Scrape off the Black. Work abroad includes: Much Ado About Nothing (Stratford Connecticut), Hedda Gabler, Macbeth (Stratford Ontario), Landscape, Silence (Lincoln Center, New York), Fishing (Public Theater, New York). NT A Month in the Country, Don Juan, Much Ado About Nothing, Danton's Death.

Designer Alison Chitty

Work includes: designing over 40 plays at Victoria Theatre Stoke on Trent. In London: Old King Cole (Stratford East), Ecstasy, Uncle Vanya (Hampstead), Measure for Measure, Julius Caesar, Plays Umbrella Season (Riverside) Member of the British theatre designers who won 1st prize at 1979 Prague Quadriennale Exhibition NT: A Month in the Country, Don Juan, Much Ado About Nothing, The Prince of Homburg, Danton's Death.

Music Ilona Sekacz

Theatre includes: work with Common Stock, Theatre Royal Stratford East, Recreation Ground, Theatr Clwyd Mold, Soho Poly Huckleberry Finn, Roadshows, Frankenstein, Scapin, Much Ado About Nothing, The Cherry Orchard, The Rover, The Country Wife (all in repertory). Resident composer at Unicorn Theatre writing for 20 productions including The Golden Samurai, School for Clowns, Lizzie Dripping, Cymbeline, The Merchant of Venice. For Shared Experience La Ronde, A Handful of Dust. RSC: King Lear. TV: Plays for Today- Buses, Not for the Likes of Us; The Boys from the Black Stuff Radio includes: Tom Jones, The Dream Play, Serjeant Musgrave's Dance.

Lighting Stephen Wentworth

Recently lit shows at Oxford Playhouse, New End Hampstead, King's Head, Arts. NT: Overruled (Young Vic), Crossing Niagara, Bloody Neighbours (ICA), Emigres, Troilus and Cressida (with David Hersey), Bread (Young Vic), Strawberry Fields, Camilla Ringbinder Show, Bow Down, The Passion (with William Dudley), Half Life, Love Letters on Blue Paper, Herod, Don Juan (Cottesloe), Much Ado About Nothing, Danton's Death (Olivier),

Staff Director John Burgess
Production Manager Rodger Hulley
Stage Manager Ernest Hall
Deputy Stage Manager James Leach
Assistant Stage Managers Judith Garrett
Tony Godel
Sound Rob Barnard
Assistant to the Designer Paul Ghirardani
Assistant to the Lighting Designer Brian Ridley
Assistant Production Manager Susan Usher
Production photographed by John Haynes
Production credits

Set built and painted by NT workshops and Kimpton Walker. Surrounds made and dyed by Ken Creasey Props by NT workshops. Thanks to William L. Maclean Ltd, Brighton, and to the Salvation Army for their help. Costumes by NT workshops, Bonn & Mackenzie, William Baboo at Permode. Wigs by NT workshops Ladies' hats by Lorraine McKee Shoes by Anello & Davide and Gamba Wardrobe care by Lever Brothers.

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