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Loaded - Jack Studio Theatre

Preview by Lizzie Guilfoyle

AlterEgo Theatre, in association with Harrogate Theatre, is presenting the London premiere of David Bown’s Loaded at the Jack Studio Theatre – from Tuesday, November 11 to Saturday, November 29, 2014.

In a backstreet garage in Sheffield the tensions are mounting. One minute Pete and his co-workers, Mick and Hud, are having a laugh fleecing Mondeo drivers, the next they’re engaged in an unspoken war. It’s got less to do with camshafts and more to do with Carol. Poor, desperate, manipulative Carol.

Carol needs saving – mainly from herself – and money is needed for that. Pete hasn’t got any but Mick and Hud are planning a job, something big, something involving shooters and Pete can be in on it, if he’s got the nerve.

Loaded is directed by Sean McGrath and performed by Andrew Murton, Gemma Paget, Nick Rogers and Christopher Ward.

David Bown is a graduate of Goldsmiths’ College, University of London. He has been an actor, writer and director in theatre and television both in the UK and in America. He is currently Chief Executive of Harrogate Theatre. As well as Loaded, which received the Peggy Ramsay Professional Management Award, his plays include Ballads, Stand (Sunday Times Playwriting Award), Send Me and The Wedding.

Bown’s work for children includes Big Bad Wolf and a musical version of The Emperor’s New Clothes. He has also written the last four pantomimes for Harrogate Theatre.

Loaded was first performed at The Edinburgh Fringe in 1999. Like Bown’s previous play Stand, it received fantastic reviews in the national press and has since been toured in the North of England by Hull Truck and Reform Theatre Company.

AlterEgo Theatre is run by Sean McGrath and Gemma Paget and produces engaging classic, contemporary, and new-writing productions in London and around the UK. Previous projects have included open-air productions of Much Ado About Nothing and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, TheatreLab New Writing events at The Royal & Derngate Theatre in Northampton, David Bown’s Stand at The Clerkenwell Theatre in London and a touring production of She Stoops to Conquer that received 5 stars reviews.

Sean McGrath’s directing credits include As You Like It and Much Ado About Nothing (Cambridge Shakespeare Festival), The Price (Walking Forward Theatre), and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, She Stoops to Conquer and Stand (AlterEgo Theatre). In 2012, he was assistant director on Laurie Sansom’s Made in Northampton production of Hedda Gabler at The Royal & Derngate, part of The London 2012 Festival. He has also written and directed numerous issue based plays for AlterEgo’s education company AlterEgo Creative Solutions.

Loaded is suitable for ages 16+.

Tickets: £14, £11 concessions – available from the box office on 0333 666 3366 (£1.50 fee for telephone bookings only) or online at www.brockleyjack.co.uk/.

Time: 7.45pm.

The Taming of the Shrew continues at the Jack Studio Theatre until October 18, 2014. It will be followed – from October 21 to November 8, 2014 – by Moira Buffini’s Dying For It.