Cast

Synopsis

We have done it before but the popular question: “Why don’t we put on again…..?’ has brought this play with music to mind and so to the theatre. Don Quixote gave his name to our language; quixotic; absurdly generous and unselfish. Cervantes created him in the sixteenth century, but this play with music makes him our romantic knight too, pursuing chivalrous ideals that we all would like to own but occasionally flinch from. With marvellous music such as “I am Don Quixote’ ‘To Dream the Impossible Dream’ ’ and ‘Dulcinea’.

Directors Notes

Cervantes was the late sixteenth-century author of the well known though I suspect not much read novel, Don Quixote. (Everyone knows about battles with windmills, however.) He was also a playwright who travelled around Iberia with his own theatrical company. No financial wizard, debt was his besetting condition for which he was frequently imprisoned. So much for biography.

Spanish prisons then were uncomfortable places but there’s no doubt that his gift as story teller would have made his life inside more tolerable.Whether or not he actully performed plays in prison using the prisoners as actors, that he might have done makes a good basis for a show. The Governor, top dog prisoner, is a godfather figure, and Cervantes is careful to give him a decent part – to keep him sweet, so to say – though he casts himself in the best part – Don Quixote de la Mancha.

The show takes place entirely in the prison so there is no fancy scenery. All the resources for Cervantes’ play come either out of his basketful of theatrical props and costumes or from what he improvises from bits he finds lying about.

It’s been a privilege for me to work with John Cockerill, John Tempest and this talented cast. We all hope you see the justification for our dreams.