In line with government advice, we have decided to close the ABR office for the time being - but all of us will be working from home and will be available on the phone and on email to continue to provide any support you might need during office hours. Please continue to call the office number as normal.
This is a difficult time for everyone in the entertainment business, particularly for those working in the freelance sector. We will just have to hope that this will pass quickly and that we can return to normality soon.
In the meantime, why not read some of our scripts?
Perhaps John Godber's Scary Bikers...
When retired miner Don and former private school teacher Carol meet in a graveyard, they could never have imagined how their lives would merge. An innocent coffee leads to a bike ride through the Yorkshire dales, which in turn leads to a tandem ride across Europe to Florence. All seems set for a budding romance, but the date is June 23rd 2016, and Don and Carol are on the opposite sides of the Brexit fence.
What follows is a rollercoaster romance, with an unstoppable force meeting an immovable object. One thing is for sure: it takes two to tandem.
Or Tim Firth's Calendar Girls...
When Annie's husband John dies of leukaemia, she and best friend Chris resolve to raise money for a new settee in the local hospital waiting room. They manage to persuade four fellow WI members to pose nude with them for an "alternative" calendar, with a little help from hospital porter and amateur photographer Lawrence. The news of the women's charitable venture spreads like wildfire, and hordes of press soon descend on the small village of Knapeley in the Yorkshire Dales. The calendar is a success, but Chris and Annie's friendship is put to the test under the strain of their new-found fame. Based on the true story of eleven WI members who posed nude for a calendar to raise money for the Leukaemia Research Fund, Calendar Girls opened at the Chichester Festival Theatre and has since become the fastest selling play in British theatre history.
Or maybe Noel Coward's Private Lives...
Revived in 2002 by the Royal National Theatre in a production that sparkled on Broadway, Private Lives is one of the most sophisticated, entertaining plays ever written. Elyot and Amanda, once married and now honeymooning with new spouses at the same hotel, meet by chance, reignite the old spark and impulsively elope. After days of being reunited, they again find their fiery romance alternating between passions of love and anger. Their aggrieved spouses appear and a roundelay of affiliations ensues as the women first stick together, then apart, and new partnerships are formed. A uniquely humorous play boasting numerous successful Broadway runs with stars like Coward himself, Laurence Olivier, Tallulah Bankhead, Gertrude Lawrence, Tammy Grimes, Richard Burton, and Elizabeth Taylor.
A final word from Coward himself:
‘In spite of blitzes, discomforts, inconveniences, and alarms, the theatre can still function…. I am proud to make even the small contribution of this play towards our universal valiant determination to get on with the job.’
We couldn't have said it better ourselves!
Wishing everyone safety and sanity in this difficult time,
The Alan Brodie team