Educating Rita is a stage comedy by British playwright Willy Russell . It is a play for two actors set entirely in the office of an Open University tutor.
26-507: William Russell (born 23 August 1946) is an English dramatist, lyricist and composer. His best known works are Educating Rita , Shirley Valentine , Blood Brothers and Our Day Out . Russell was born in Whiston , Lancashire (which is now Merseyside ). On leaving school, aged 15, he became a women's hairdresser, eventually running his own salon, until the age of 20 when he decided to go back to college. This led to him qualifying as
52-541: A highly successful Broadway run in February 1989 to November 1989, and a Tony Award as Best Actress for Collins. Both Educating Rita (1983) and Shirley Valentine (1989) became feature films with Michael Caine , Julie Walters and Pauline Collins all receiving Oscar nominations for their respective roles, as did Russell for his Educating Rita screenplay. Russell's other worldwide theatrical success has been Blood Brothers , "a Liverpudlian folk opera" about
78-530: A pair of twins separated at birth and brought up in completely different environments. It won the Olivier Award for Best New Musical in 1983. Its 1988 revival had over 10,000 consecutive performances during its 24-year West End run, which ended in November 2012. Simultaneously, there were UK touring and international productions, including a two-year run on Broadway starting in 1993. The Broadway production
104-752: A production Off-Broadway at the Westside Theatre produced by the Steppenwolf Theater Company. From June to July 2001, the Williamstown Theatre Festival mounted a production of Educating Rita at the Nikos Stage starring Jacqueline McKenzie as Rita and Edward Herrmann as Frank. The production was directed by Bruce Paltrow and was critically acclaimed with critics touting McKenzie's performance as "wonderfully beguiling and irrepressible...one of
130-629: A teacher. During these years, Russell also worked as a semi-professional singer, writing and performing his own songs in folk clubs. At college, he began writing drama and, in 1972, took a programme of three one-act plays to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe , where they were seen by writer John McGrath , who recommended Russell to the Liverpool Everyman , which commissioned the adaptation, When The Reds… , Russell's first professional work for theatre. Russell's first play
156-442: Is impressed by Susan's verve and earnestness and is forced to re-examine his attitudes and position in life; Susan finds Frank's tutelage opens doors to a bohemian lifestyle and a new self-confidence. However, Frank's bitterness and cynicism return as he notices Susan beginning to adopt the pretensions of the university culture he despises. Susan becomes disillusioned by a friend's attempted suicide and realises that her new social niche
182-400: Is rife with the same dishonesty and superficiality she had previously sought to escape. The play ends as Frank, sent to Australia on a sabbatical, welcomes the possibilities of the change. The play deals with the concept of freedom, change, Britain's class system, the shortcomings of institutional education, and the nature of self-development and of personal relationships. The play borrows from
208-537: The Royal Shakespeare Company , Educating Rita premièred at The Warehouse , London, in June 1980 starring Julie Walters and Mark Kingston . The play was directed by Mike Ockrent . The plays follows the relationship between a 26-year-old Liverpudlian working class hairdresser and Frank, a middle-aged university lecturer, during the course of a year. In the play Frank has no surname, but when
234-855: The West End where it ran for over a year, winning the Evening Standard and London Theatre Critics awards for the best musical of 1974. It premiered at the Everyman Theatre , Liverpool, and then transferred to the Lyric Theatre in the West End in 1974. Alongside further stage works, One for the Road (1976) and Stags and Hens (1978), Russell was a screenwriter with television films, Death of A Young Young Man (1975, BBC1), Daughters of Albion (1979), Our Day Out (1977) and
260-408: The "House of Bea", a family-owned garment factory run by her father and stepmother, which is now losing money. The series is chiefly memorable for the high-octane performance of Stephanie Beacham as the eponymous Connie, snarling her way through such camp, metaphorical 1980s capitalistic dialogue as "My spoon is going into the gravy, my snout is going into the trough. I'm having some of that." It
286-470: The 1913 George Bernard Shaw play Pygmalion , itself based upon archetypes from Greek myth . The play was adapted by Russell for a 1983 film with Michael Caine and Julie Walters , directed by Lewis Gilbert . The play was adapted by Russell for radio in 2009. It starred Bill Nighy and Laura Dos Santos directed by Kirsty Williams , and was a 90-minute play broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on Boxing Day 2009. In 1987, Laurie Metcalf starred as Rita in
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#1732798244797312-615: The Chichester Festival staged a production with Lenny Henry and Lashana Lynch as Frank and Rita. The original production received the 1980 Olivier Award nomination for Comedy Performance of the Year for Julie Walters and won for Comedy of the Year. Connie (TV series) Connie is a 1985 British television drama series. Produced by Central Television for the ITV Network , it starred Stephanie Beacham in
338-660: The Moon on Pure Records. Russell also co-produced the Tim Firth album Harmless Flirting . In 2013, the Archive and Special Collections department of Liverpool John Moores University established the Willy Russell Archive containing manuscripts, programmes, publicity and media material including newspaper cuttings and press releases, correspondence, legal, financial and administrative documents, records relating to
364-786: The best performances of the year". From 26 March to 8 May 2010, as part of the Willy Russell season at the Menier Chocolate Factory , Laura Dos Santos reprised her radio performance on stage as Rita alongside Larry Lamb as Frank. This was the production's first London West End revival. This production transferred to the Trafalgar Studios in London's West End from 8 July to 30 October 2010, produced by Sonia Friedman . Laura Dos Santos reprised her radio and Menier Chocolate Factory performance as Rita, and Frank
390-520: The cast as "strong", and opined that Beacham "has a whiff of big cat about her." Network released the full 13-part series on DVD as a 4-disc set on 24 September 2012. The set includes a photo gallery as a bonus feature. A tie-in paperback novelisation of the series, also written by series creator Ron Hutchinson, was published by Methuen in 1985. The theme song entitled "The Show" was written by playwright/composer Willy Russell and series creator Ron Hutchinson , and performed by Rebecca Storm . It
416-441: The casting and audition process, audio and film material, and promotional ephemera. The material was produced throughout the course of Russell's career and is a comprehensive representation of his work to date. It also illustrates Russell's collaborative works, both written and musical. In 1969, Russell married Annie Seagroatt; the couple have one son, Rob, and two daughters, Rachel and Ruth. Educating Rita Commissioned by
442-474: The characters and plot of the original but with the action brought forward to today with a new score and lyrics to reflect this twenty first century setting. The musical was produced in 2010 at the Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool . The Wrong Boy , Willy Russell's first novel, was published in 2000. In 2004, Russell returned to his original singer/songwriter roots, releasing his album, Hoovering
468-559: The film was made he became Dr. Frank Bryant. Susan (who initially calls herself Rita), dissatisfied with the routine of her work and social life, seeks inner growth by signing up for and attending an Open University course in English Literature. The play opens as 'Rita' meets her tutor, Frank, for the first time. Frank is a middle-aged, alcoholic career academic who has taken on the tutorship to pay for his drink. The two have an immediate and profound effect on one another; Frank
494-694: The five-part serial One Summer (1983). Commissioned by the Royal Shakespeare Company, Educating Rita premiered at the Warehouse, London in 1980 and transferred to the West End Piccadilly Theatre , London in August 1980, and starred Julie Walters and Mark Kingston . Since its premiere and long West End run (the play ran to "at least" June 1982), the play has been translated and produced in almost every part
520-532: The globe garnering awards both for its author and for many of the actors who have played the roles of Rita and Frank. Returning to the Liverpool Everyman in 1986, Russell wrote Shirley Valentine which went on to an acclaimed West End run, earning Olivier Awards for both its author (Comedy of the Year) and star Pauline Collins (Actress of the Year in a New Play). The play transferred to New York for
546-636: The title role. 13 episodes were made which were broadcast throughout the summer of 1985. Written by Ron Hutchinson as a dry commentary on Thatcherite values in the 1980s, the series was set in the East Midlands garment industry and tells the story of a woman returning to the United Kingdom from Greece after eight years in self-imposed exile. She is determined to claw back control of her chain of high street clothes shops that are now controlled by her stepsister, and also get her foot back into
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#1732798244797572-578: The villainous Nazi agent Arnold Toht in Raiders of the Lost Ark , appeared in several episodes as Crawder, a corrupt, wealthy industrialist with whom Connie must tangle. Writing in The Guardian , TV critic Nancy Banks-Smith gave the opening episode a positive review, depicting the series as a "gritty soap" and stating that the writing has a "nice citrus bite to it, sharp and funny." She praised
598-590: Was Keep Your Eyes Down (1971), written while he trained as a teacher at Saint Katherine's College of Higher Education in Liverpool and performed at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 1971. In 1974 Russell wrote John, Paul, George, Ringo ... and Bert , a musical about the Beatles . Commissioned by the Liverpool Everyman, it ran for a (then) unprecedented eight weeks before transferring to
624-689: Was nominated for the 1993 Tony Award, Best Musical. In 1985, Russell co-wrote the song "The Show", the theme for the TV series Connie with series creator Ron Hutchinson . The song was performed by vocalist Rebecca Storm and released as a single by Towerbell Records in June 1985, reaching number 22 on the UK Singles Chart. Russell (with musical collaborator Bob Eaton) realised a long-held ambition to develop Our Day Out further and after extensive rewriting, and recomposing created Our Day Out – The Musical . This modern musical retelling retains all
650-694: Was partly on the strength of Connie that Beacham won the role of Sable in The Colbys , the spin-off series from the American primetime soap opera Dynasty , which subsequently led to a high-profile career for her in American television. Other notable castmembers in the series included Pam Ferris as Connie's conniving stepsister Nesta, George Costigan as her ex-husband Arnie, Richard Morant as her new love interest David Jamieson, Brenda Bruce as her stepmother Bea and Paul Rogers as Hector, Connie's father. Actor Ronald Lacey , best known for his role as
676-582: Was played by renowned actor Tim Pigott-Smith . Like the Willy Russell season at the Menier Chocolate Factory, the production ran in repertory alongside Shirley Valentine starring Meera Syal . A UK tour played in 2012, starring Claire Sweeney and Matthew Kelly as Rita and Frank respectively. A 35th anniversary production was staged at Liverpool Playhouse from 6 February to 7 March 2015, starring Leanne Best as Rita and Con O'Neill as Frank, directed by Gemma Bodinetz. The same year
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