GUILLOTINE! 15TH-18TH MAY

Guillotine! 15th-18th May

**** EARLY BIRD OFFER £12 Adults and £10 Concessions BEFORE 15th MARCH ****

“Guillotine!” made its first public appearance as “A Tale of Two Cities”, a musical play staged at the Madrid Theatre in Woodland Hills, California.

The show has been re-worked into a fully sung-through musical, which was workshopped in February 2023 as a concert version under the banner of the Bewdley Festival.
This latest fully-staged production with live orchestra is a collaboration with Carpet Trades Musical Theatre Company.

Written by Jim Ineson & Jerry Cahill (with additional music by Jonathan Clarke)

Director: Darren Richards
Musical Director: Russell Painter

Orchestrations: Jonathan Clarke
Choreographer: Emily Hamer

JI Productions: Jim Ineson & Stephen Martinelli

The Story

“It was the best of times it was the worst of times.”

Dickens’ novel, “A Tale of Two Cities”, contains all of Dickens’ classic themes of human suffering, poverty, sacrifice and nobleness of spirit. The two cities are London and Paris at the time of the great social upheaval that led to the French Revolution of 1789.

The show tells the story of Dr. Manette, who is freed from the Bastille after being unjustly imprisoned for 20 years, and his daughter Lucie. They return from France to live in London, where Lucie marries Charles Darnay, a French aristocrat who has renounced his inheritance because of his family’s cruel and selfish treatment of the common people.

Darnay is later tricked into returning to France, where he is arrested and sentenced to death at the hands of Madame la Guillotine. He is only saved by the sacrificial act of Sydney Carton, a worthless and drunken lawyer who is redeemed by his selfless dedication to Lucie.

“It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known.”

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