THE HEART OF ROBIN HOOD HEADS TO BROADWAY

****

THE GREAT WHITE WAY

****

The Heart Of Robin Hood

David Mirvish and National Artists Management Company are pleased to present the Broadway premiere of The Heart of Robin Hood, written by David Farr, featuring original music performed on-stage by Parsonsfield and directed by acclaimed Icelandic theatrical artist Gísli Örn Gardarsson. The production will open on Broadway on Sunday, March 29, 2015 at the Marquis Theatre (1535 Broadway). Previews begin on Tuesday, March 10, 2015. The production will play a strictly limited engagement through Sunday, August 23, 2015.

Tickets for The Heart of Robin Hood will be available exclusively to Audience Rewards members, on pre-sale Monday, December 1 through Sunday, December 7. Audience Rewards, the Official Rewards Program of Broadway and the Arts®, aims to reward their members for supporting live theatre in NYC and across the country. To become a member, visit www.audiencerewards.com.

Tickets will be available to the general public on Monday, December 8 at www.ticketmaster.com.

The Heart of Robin Hood comes to Broadway following productions in Winnipeg (November 11-December 6, 2014 at the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre) and Toronto (December 23, 2014-March 1, 2015 at the Royal Alexandra Theatre).

Every legendary hero has to start somewhere. In The Heart of Robin Hood, playwright David Farr presents a wildly imaginative, theatrically dazzling new spin on the familiar fable.

Forget everything you ever knew about Robin Hood. In this reimagining, Robin and his unmerry gang of cutthroats steal from the rich, but it’s never occurred to them to give anything back to anyone. But when wicked Prince John threatens all, bold Marion steps in to protect the poor and transform a thuggish Robin from hood to good.

First staged at the Royal Shakespeare Company in 2011 and at American Repertory Theatre (A.R.T.) in Cambridge, MA., in 2013, the eye-popping, athletic and endlessly inventive production from acclaimed director Gísli Örn Gardarsson, has been cheered by critics and audiences. The Heart of Robin Hood explodes off the stage to take place in front, above and on all sides of the audience. The production features swashbuckling, acrobatics, comedy, drama, cross-dressing, trap doors, aerial work and original music played by on-stage musicians, the acclaimed Connecticut-based roots band, Parsonsfield.

Farr and Gardarsson previously collaborated on the acclaimed staging of Kafka’s Metamorphosis, which dazzled audiences at BAM in 2010.

Set design is by Börkur Jónsson, costume design is by Emma Ryott and sound design is by Jonathan Deans. Casting is by Telsey + Company and Stephanie Gorin Casting. Creative consultant is Walter Bobbie.

David Farr (Playwright, Lyrics) is currently directing his first feature film, The Ones Below for BBC Films and BFI. He is also currently adapting John Le Carre's The Night Manager for BBC television. Other plays as writer: The Heart of Robin Hood and Night of the Soul (RSC); The UN Inspector (National Theatre); The Nativity (Young Vic Theatre); Elton John’s Glasses (London West End); and The Danny Crowe Show (Bush Theatre). Directing credits: Hamlet, Twelfth Night, The Tempest, A Winter’s Tale, King Lear, The Homecoming (Royal Shakespeare Company); Coriolanus (RSC/Old Vic Theatre); Julius Caesar (RSC/Lyric Theatre Hammersmith); adapted and directed The Odyssey, directed the devised piece Water (with Filter Theatre), The Birthday Party (Lyric Theatre Hammersmith). Other credits: Associate director, Royal Shakespeare Company (2009-2013); artistic director of the Gate Theatre, London 1993-97; artistic director of Bristol Old Vic 2002-05; artistic director and co-chief executive of Lyric Theatre Hammersmith 2005-09. Film and television writing credits: Spooks (BBC-TV series), Hanna (co-writer, feature film, Focus Features). David is currently writing screenplays for BBC Film, Cloud Eight, Universal Studios and Parkes Macdonald.

Gísli Örn Gardarsson (Director) Born in Iceland and raised in Norway, Gísli Örn Gardarsson attended the Icelandic Academy of the Arts, where, in his last year (2001), he co-founded Vesturport Theatre. Gardarsson made his debut as a director with his circus-inspired version of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, also playing the role of Romeo, which premiered at the Reykjavik City Theatre in November 2002, and has been performed in London at the Young Vic Theatre (2003) and in the West End (2004). He directed and adapted Georg Büchner’s Woyzeck, with an original score and lyrics by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, which opened at the Barbican Theatre in London (October 2005). He directed and adapted Metamorphosis, along with David Farr, at the Lyric Hammersmith in London, appearing in the role of Gregor Samsa, and with music by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis. He has also written and directed Love, a romantic musical about two people who find love at the end of their lives. Garðarsson directed The Heart of Robin Hood, which opened at the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford (2011), and Bastard, co-written by Richard LaGravenese, presented in Denmark, Sweden and Iceland (2012). Other acting credits include A Matter of Life and Death (National Theatre London), an adaptation of the 1946 Powell and Pressburger film, Angela Carter’s Nights at the Circus, and the title role in Don John (Royal Shakespeare Company), all directed by Emma Rice. Gardarsson starred in and co-wrote the film Children, for which he received a Shooting Star Award at the 2007 Berlinale, and played the main villain in the Disney/Bruckheimer film Prince of Persia, directed by Mike Newell. He has also worked at the National Theatre in Norway, the Malmö City Theatre in Sweden, the Residenz Theatre in Munich, and elsewhere.

Parsonsfield (Music, Lyrics) (previously known as Poor Old Shine) is a roots band with a grassroots ethos. The Connecticut band prizes the human element that underpins their music, from songwriting to recording to album design. Formed at the University of Connecticut, where singer and banjo player Chris Freeman met banjo and mandolin player Antonio Alcorn in a folk music club on campus, an early version of Parsonsfield landed its first gig — opening for a friend’s band at the legendary New Haven club Toad’s Place — before the musicians had even decided what to call themselves. With the addition of Max Shakun on guitar and pump organ, Harrison Goodale on bass, and Erik Hischmann on drums, Parsonsfield’s music is rooted in the folk and Appalachian mountain music tradition and each set mixes the band’s original songwriting with traditional folk ballads, prison work songs, and front porch style jamming. Parsonsfield has played live shows in renowned venues, including the Kennedy Center for the Arts in Washington D.C., Club Passim in Cambridge, Rockwood Music Hall in New York, and Infinity Hall in Norfolk, CT. They travel with an assortment of instruments including guitars, banjos, pump organ, mandolin, string bass, musical saw, washboard, and a yard-sale-scrap-metal drum set. Parsonsfield has released a self-titled debut studio LP on Signature Sounds.

Walter Bobbie (Creative Consultant) directed the international hit, Chicago, the second longest-running musical in Broadway history. Recent work includes Steve Martin/Edie Brickell’s Bright Star at the Old Globe and David Ives’ Venus in Fur on Broadway. Mr. Bobbie is the recipient of the Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle and Tony Awards.

The Heart of Robin Hood was originally produced by the Royal Shakespeare Company.

The American Premiere was produced at the American Repertory Theater at Harvard University, Diane Paulus, Artistic Director; Diane Borger, Producer.