By Mark Shenton at Playbill.com

Charity Wakefield, Celia Imrie, Ella Smith  and Harry Hadden-Paton are among the cast of a new production of Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s 1776 comedy, The Rivals, that will begin performances at London’s Southwark Playhouse Jan. 12, 2010, prior to an official opening Jan. 15, for a run through Jan. 30.

Acording to press materials, the play will be brought “bang up to date” in the production that also features live musicians and dance. Presented by Red Handed Theatre Company in association with Primavera, it is directed by Red Handed’s artistic director Jessica Swale (also Associate Director at Out of Joint), and also features Cian Barry, Oliver Hollis, Frank Laverty, Christopher Logan, Jenni Maitland, Tom McDonald, Robin Soans and Sam Swainsbury. Set and costume design is by recent Linbury Prize finalist Cara Newman, lighting design is by Tim Bray, with an original score by Laura Forrest-Hay.

The play follows the meddling Mrs Malaprop (Imrie) on her quest to marry off her spirited niece Lydia Languish (Wakefield). But Lydia has ideas of her own about the poetic but penniless Beverley, unaware that he and the handsome Captain Jack Absolute are one and the same person (Hadden-Paton). Meanwhile, her cousin Julia (Smith) is betrothed to the jealousy-prone Faulkland (McDonald), and the stage is set for a tale of romantic entanglement and disguise.

Imrie was recently seen on the London stage in Mixed Up North at Wilton’s Music Hall and Nicholas de Jongh’s Plague Over England at the West End’s Duchess Theatre. She is best known for her TV and stage collaborations with Victoria Wood, including “Dinnerladies” and “Victoria Wood – As Seen on TV” on television, and the stage version of Acorn Antiques – the Musical, based on the scenes from the latter, in which she created the role of Babs, owner of the eponymous store, and won the 2006 Olivier Award for Best Performance in a Supporting Role playing She has also appeared in the films “Calendar Girls” and “Bridget Jones’ Diary.”

But Freddi has a problem. Having made enough money for five lifetimes, he’s not sure what to do with one.

Matron Eva Luckes returns in the powerful series from the London hospital, dramatised from original records.

Revolution grips the East End as an explosion brings fears of a bomb, and Ethel Bennett and Dr Millais Culpin struggle to control the angry victims. When detectives arrive, Matron Luckes and Chairman Sydney Holland fear the hospital is in danger of becoming an extension of Scotland Yard.

Meanwhile, Sister Ada Russell battles with irascible star surgeon Mr Henry Dean, whose addiction to cocaine is an open secret. And ambitious young Dr Ingrams faces catastrophe in the operating theatre.

After originally opting to keep the pilot in contention for midseason, the network has decided to pass on making the show.

I just hope that means we will get to see her more on UK TV!!!

 

 

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) – Meet David E. Kelley’s newest discovery — Charity Wakefield.

 

After making Calista Flockhart a household name by tapping her as the title character in “Ally McBeal,” the prolific producer has cast the 27-year-old English actress as the female lead in “Legally Mad,” his new quirky legal drama for NBC.

Jon Seda also has been cast in the show, in which Wakefield plays a woman who takes a job at her father’s law firm and quickly becomes the practice’s center.

Her character is deeply devoted to her father and chose to work for him despite being offered several prestigious clerkships out of law school. She is easygoing, deadpan funny and disarms with charm.

Seda (“Homicide”) will play a rugged, grumpy but lovable equal-opportunity offender. The two join previously cast Kristin Chenoweth.

Wakefield, a graduate of the Oxford School of Drama, got her break last year as a star of the BBC’s latest adaptation of Jane Austen’s”Sense and Sensibility.” In the miniseries, which aired in the U.S. on PBS, she portrayed Marianne Dashwood, a role played by Kate Winslet in the 1995 feature.

 

Plunging viewers into London’s East End, Casualty 1907 delivers a gritty, realistic experience of life just over a century ago in Whitechapel. This was a time when the average person lived to be 45 years old and one in five children died by the age of 10. Then, as now, the Royal London was the most advanced emergency hospital in Britain, but with antibiotics and public funding from the NHS still 40 years away, life was tough.

In Casualty 1907, the streets are teeming with trouble and gangland rivalry is rife. One of the first people to stagger through the doors is the leader of the Blind Beggar Gang, Nobby Clark, who has a bullet wound. Under the watchful eye of Matron Eva Luckes, Nurse Ada Russell has to deal with a team of probationary nurses while facing the painful dilemma of taking the job of Ward Sister, even though it threatens to ruin her engagement to Dr James Walton.

The Light Department at the hospital is using a radical new technique – ultra-violet light – to treat appalling cases of skin disease brought on by the cramped, insanitary conditions and lack of sunlight in the East End. The hospital’s chairman, Sydney Holland, is preparing for a visit from the hospital’s patron, Queen Alexandra, who wants to see such a case.

This powerful drama uses case notes, ward reports, autopsy records and intimate diaries to bring actual doctors, nurses and patients from The Royal London Hospital vividly back to life.

Ethell Bennett is played by Charity Wakefield, Nobby Clark by Alfie Allen, Matron Eva Luckes by Cherie Lunghi, Nurse Ada Russell by Sarah Smart, Dr James Walton by Tom Riley and Sydney Holland by Nicholas Farrell.

Sense and Sensibility’s Charity Wakefield will star in upcoming soap spin-off, Casualty 1907.That period drama is just one of two major projects set to boost her profile this year.

She can also be seen with The Bill’s Amita Dhiri in new movie Act of God.

That thriller will feature Max Brown, who played Mark Russell in the revamped Crossroads.

Peter O’Brien, star of Neighbours, The Bill and Casualty, has also signed up to appear in the big-screen offering.

Four classic fairy tales made famous by The Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Andersen and Charles Perrault – Rapunzel, Cinderella, The Emperor’s New Clothes and Billy Goats Gruff – are re-invigorated and updated by contemporary writers Ed Roe, Richard Pinto, Anil Gupta, Debbie Horsfield and Jeremy Dyson and brought to life by a host of British acting talent.

Rapunzel, the first fairy tale in the anthology, has been updated by Ed Roe (Smack The Pony, Teachers) and tells the story of Jimmy Stojkovic, a terrible tennis player. Ranked a humiliating 1,004th in the world, he has never won a tennis competition in his life. His father, Sava, is desperate to see his son win a Grand Slam tennis final but the only way he can see this happening is if he disguises Jimmy as a woman.

After a narrow escape from baseball bat-wielding thugs, Jimmy discovers his father owes money to gangster loan sharks – exactly the same sum as the competition prize money at the forthcoming British Tennis Open at English tennis club, Rampion. So Jimmy, reluctantly, decides to don a tennis dress.

All seems to be going to plan until Jimmy, now called Martina, falls in love with the beautiful reigning champion, Billy Jane Brooke. Known to the public as Rapunzel, because of her unusually long hair, Billy Jane still lives with her over-protective mother and coach. Training together at Billy Jane’s fortified home does wonders for Jimmy/Martina’s game and he/she finally starts winning. However, as they grow closer Jimmy finds it harder to keep up the pretence, and he must decide whether to come clean to Billy Jane or stay quiet and win the prize money for his father.

The comedy Drama stars Lee Ingleby as Jimmy/Martina Stojkovic, Shaun Williamson as his father, Sava; Charity Wakefield as Billy Jane Brooke/Rapunzel; and Geraldine James as Mrs Brooke, her over-protective mother and coach. Oliver Chris is Vuk, Jimmy’s tennis nemesis and smarmy love rival; Tony Way is Jimmy’s brother, Boris; Alex Jennings is ex-tennis player-turned-pundit, Roger Bateman; Emily Joyce is Roger’s competitive colleague; and tennis legend Pat Cash also makes an appearance as a tennis commentator.

Emerging star of the small screen Charity Wakefield plays the impulsive Marianne Dashwood in this stylish, new Andrew Davies adaptation of Jane Austen’s classic 19th-century novel, Sense And Sensibility.

Appearing alongside an impressive cast, including David Morrissey, Janet McTeer and Mark Gatiss, the 26-year-old actress explains that she was delighted to land such a choice role.

“Marianne is the embodiment of youth and hope,” the Sussex-born actress tells Catharine Davey. “I was so excited to be offered the part because I felt that it was a role which I could really attack. I understand her character and feel that we have lots in common. She goes on such a tremendous journey and that is why she’s exciting to play.”

The Oxford School of Drama graduate plays one of the three Dashwood sisters, who struggle to build a new life when they find themselves penniless and uprooted on the death of their father.

“She’s quite a wild thing,” laughs Wakefield. “Certainly, in those days, Marianne would have been talked about as ‘hot-headed’. She refuses to be bound by traditional codes of conduct. She’s very honest and earnest, and she wants to tell the truth.”

Wakefield’s musical grounding in the piano and her trained soprano singing voice meant that she was able to learn the advanced pieces that the music-loving Marianne performs.

“In order to make sure that I knew what I was doing, I bought myself a keyboard and practised the pieces a lot,” says the accomplished actress. “It’s not me playing on the soundtrack but I wanted to be familiar with the music in the scene. And I wanted to give the camera crew the freedom to shoot me from a variety of angles.”

The romantic Marianne is forced to choose between the young and dashing Willoughby, played by Dominic Cooper, and the brooding war hero, Colonel Brandon, played by David Morrissey.

“I learnt so much from just watching David,” she says of her well-known co-star, Morrissey. “He is so experienced in filming and I felt very inexperienced when I arrived. I knew the heart of what I should be doing but I learnt a lot about the technical side from him.”

The actress, whose previous small-screen roles include Miss Temple in the BBC adaptation of Jane Eyre, explains that her character’s tempestuous nature was matched by some fearsome Devonshire weather with which cast and crew had to contend.

“While we were filming, we had almost constant rain storms,” says Wakefield. “It was a bit of an obstacle, really. Everybody, by the end of the day, was absolutely soaked and I had very frizzy hair. There is a great wet-shirt scene, where Dan Stevens, who plays Edward Ferrars, is chopping logs in the rain. He does look rather dashing!”

Wakefield is descended from good acting stock. As the granddaughter of British film actor James Hayter – who appeared in The 39 Steps and Tom Brown’s School Days – she showed an interest in the stage from an early age. Encouraged to follow an academic path by her mother, it was on finishing her A Levels that she chose to attend drama school. The actress, whose career has blossomed since her 2003 graduation, has a great love for theatre and has appeared as Elaine Robinson in The Graduate at Staffordshire’s New Vic Theatre and as Desdemona in Othello at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre on London’s South Bank.

“This year, I feel like I’ve been away quite a lot,” she says. “Amongst other things, I’ve been filming Rapunzel [also being screened over the holiday season] – one of a four-part mini-series for the BBC. It is adapted by Ed Roe, who wrote for Smack The Pony. It’s a really fast-paced comedy based on the traditional fairytale but set in the modern day. I play a famous tennis player who is controlled by her ‘wicked stepmother’, Geraldine James. It’s wacky and fun.”

When given the opportunity to relax, Wakefield admits that she cherishes the freedom to explore London, the city in which she lives.

“I go and see as much film and theatre as I can,” she says. “When I’m filming, it’s a long day and, in the evening, I just learn my lines for the next day. But, when I’ve got some time out, there’s so much to do in London. It makes me feel like a kid in a candy store!”

The actress admits that she and her actor boyfriend are often separated by work commitments, so she’s looking forward to Christmas and the opportunity to spend time with him at his North London family home.

And, as far as the future is concerned, Charity claims that, for now, all she’s hoping for is a good haul of Christmas presents.

“What I’d like is a surprise,” she laughs. “You don’t get many surprises as an adult. So that’s what’s going on my list this year – a Christmas surprise!”