Preparations are underway for the much-anticipated revival of Irving Berlin’s 1950 Tony Award-winning Broadway musical Call Me Madam starring Olivier Award nominee Rosemary Ashe and ‘Allo ‘Allo!‘s Richard Gibson. Sneak a peek behind the scenes at rehearsals – and then get booking!
Call Me Madam runs for a limited season at London’s Upstairs at the Gatehouse from 9 September to 10 October 2021, with a press night on 14 September. The new production returns director Mark Giesser to Upstairs at the Gatehouse after his success with two other rarely-seen Broadway musicals: Strike Up the Band and Once Upon a Mattress.
Call Me Madam
In Call Me Madam, a comedy about love and diplomacy, Sally Adams (Rosemary Ashe) is the unconventional ‘queen of Washington society’ who is appointed US ambassador to the tiny Grand Duchy of Lichtenburg. She’s intent on refusing to shore up that country’s finances with American money.
That is, until she meets Cosmo Constantine (Richard Gibson), the Lichtenburg foreign minister, and finds his charms irresistible. Political chaos ensues, not helped by the budding romance between Sally’s aide, Kenneth, and Princess Maria, heiress to the Lichtenburg throne.
Irving Berlin’s score for Call Me Madam features the hit songs ‘It’s a Lovely Day Today’ and ‘You’re Just in Love’. And Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse’s book sparkles with political satire as pertinent today as it was when President Harry Truman ran the White House.
Rehearsal photos
Rosemary Ashe and Richard Gibson are joined in Call Me Madam by Offie nominee Beth Burrows, Daniel Breakwell, Kevin Walsh, Zoë Ann Bown, Andrew Wheaton, Chrissie Perkins and Georgie Faith.
Photography by Flavia Fraser-Cannon.
