Go crazy for love story at the Belgrade

[dutchman]

Real-life couple Callum Roberts and Hannah Farquharson are playing leading roles in Coventry Musical Theatre Society’s Crazy for You.



Joining them as Bobby Child and Polly Baker is a company of 40 singers and dancers, plus an orchestra of 14 musicians.

Chairman Andy Watts says it costs the award-winning amateur musical society around £50,000 to stage one production a year at the theatre. He said: “None of the performers or technicians get paid, they do it for their own enjoyment and for the benefit of the local community. We employ a professional creative team and orchestra, who we pay to work with us on each production.

“We receive no grant to help us stage our work and rely upon the support of the people of Coventry to come and buy a ticket to support this 103-year old city society.”

George and Ira Gershwin’s romantic musical comedy tells the story of a well-to-do young New Yorker, Bobby Child, who is sent to Nevada to foreclose on a theatre owned by the family business.

Falling in love with the local postmistress, Bobby produces a show to save the theatre. But the path to true love isn’t straightforward, and on the way he encounters inept cowboys, beautiful follies girls, an irate hotel owner and a Broadway impresario.

The company has wanted to stage this musical since it first opened in London’s West End in the 1990s. Andy said: “We now have a company with the musical and dancing ability to do the piece justice and I promise audiences will thoroughly enjoy this terrific show.” Also in the cast is local performer Jamie Sheerman as theatre impresario Bella Zangler, and Claire Griggs and Matt Everett, as tourists Patricia and Eugene Fodor.

* Crazy for You runs from tomorrow until Saturday, including two matinees – tomorrow at 3pm and Saturday at 2.30pm. Tickets start at £12.25. Ring the box office on 024 7655 3055 or go to http://www.belgrade.co.uk .