Kiss Me Kate

Minack Theatre

May 2005

Director – Wesley Henderson Roe
MD – Martin Wilcox
Choreographer – Melanie Edwards
Production Manager – Clare Williams

Kiss Me, Kate is a musical with music and lyrics by Cole Porter. It is structured as a play within a play, where the interior play is a musical version of The Taming of the Shrew. Kiss Me, Kate was a comeback and a personal triumph for Cole Porter. After several successful musicals in the 1920’s and 1930s, notably Gay Divorce, Fifty Million Frenchmen, and Anything Goes, he experienced an equestrian accident in 1937 that left him in constant pain. Following the accident, he continued to write songs and musicals but with limited success, such as Mexican Hayride, Let’s Face It!, and Something for the Boys, and some thought he was past his prime. Kiss Me, Kate was a response to Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma! and other integrated musicals, and it proved to be his biggest hit and the only one of his shows to run for more than 1,000 performances on Broadway. It won the first Tony Award presented for Best Musical, in 1949.

Reviews

CAST

Fred Graham / Petruchio – Bryan Cardus
Lilli Vanessi /Kate – Sue Astbury
Lois Lane /Bianca – Lucy Anne Clement
Bill Calhoun – Howie Corlett
Gangster – Loz Keal, Paul Kirkbright
Harrison Howell – Charles Halford
Harry Trevor / Baptista – Andrew Yeates
Suitor – Mark Burgess, Mark Stewart
Hattie – Jane Poole-wilson
Paul – Edz Barrett
Ray (Stage Manager) – Lynne Shirley
Dancers – Clare Burgess, Veronica Callow, Rachel Hughes, Helen Lowe, Cathy Makepeace, Juliet Manners, Deb McDowell, Gemma Melhuish, Claire O’Dell, Denise Truscott, Claire Ward-Dutton, Fiona Weir
Chorus – Michelle Fittus, Fiona Hedger-Gourlay, Tim Hedger-Gourlay, Spencer Jones, Lizzy Ross, Janet Simpson, Angela Sturgeon, Jim Trimmer

CREW

Stage Manager – Eric Williams
Deputy Stage Manager – Claire Williams
Lighting Designer – Rob Arundel
Sound Design – David Gates
Wardrobe – Sian Walters
Front of House – Clare Henderson-Roe
Set design – Wesley Henderson Roe