Rhys Ifans is back on the Welsh Stage for the first time in more than 20 years! ☆ On Bear Ridge
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- Опубліковано 28 сер 2024
- Rhys Ifans is back on the Welsh stage for the first time in more than 20 years! 🎭🎭🎭👏
"Poetic, lyrical, crazy, heartbreaking, funny..." - Rhys Ifans tells to ITV Wales News why he's delighted to be back on the Welsh stage, starring in 'On Bear Ridge' for The National Theatre Wales/Sherman Theatre in Cardiff and The Royal Court Theatre in London.
National Theatre Wales' On Bear Ridge, written by acclaimed playwright and Hinterland creator Ed Thomas, is being staged at the Sherman Theatre in Cardiff before transferring to The Royal Court Theatre.
🎥 VIDEO FROM: Mike Griffiths TV on Facebook ➡️ / 2349836785264863
Rhys Ifans is back on the stage in Wales for the first time in more than 20 years and says he is "loving being home".
Rhys Ifans stars in On Bear Ridge, a co-production between National Theatre Wales and the Royal Court theatre.
It is being staged at the Sherman in Cardiff before transferring to London next month.
Notting Hill and Twin Town star Ifans said it was "special" to be back in Wales.
It is his first appearance on stage at the Sherman, a theatre he knows very well from the stalls.
"I've performed in the bar a few times, back in the day" he jokes. "I've seen many, many plays here. It's great to be back on stage in Wales, the last time was at Theatr Clwyd more than 20 years ago - I can't lie, I'm loving being home."
Ifans plays butcher John Daniel in a shop in an imagined village in Wales, deserted by war. He shares his remote existence with Noni, played by Cardiff-born actress Rakie Ayola.
Characters in On Bear Ridge include a slaughterman who lives with the family and a captain who has lost his battalion "and all sense of what it is to be a human being".
"When I first read it, I described it as a 'quantum play' - it happens simultaneously in the past, present and future," said Ifans.
"It's about how we engage with memory, utilise memory to sooth, stimulate or to sedate and what a frail entity memory is, how undependable it is often, how we use it to tell stories and continue trauma.
"But it's also very vivid, vital, emotional and very funny, human and very relatable".
Ayola said she fell in love with the play a few pages in and her return to the Sherman will also mark her 30th year as an actor, in her home city.
"I'm getting waves of nostalgia that almost knock me off my feet, it's lovely."
Writer Ed Thomas - co-creator of BBC Wales TV crime drama Hinterland - based the play - a "tragic farce" on memories of his childhood and family at Penwyllt in the upper Swansea valley.
"The play is a narrative based on themes I've been obsessed with - identity, memory, absurdist humour, resilience and joy," he says.
"Theatre's where I started and theatre's the most fertile place to mess around with shape. Hinterland was a police genre, and you stray away from those genre rules at your peril, but with a play you can be far more playful...it doesn't have to follow the accepted rules, it's freer.
"And also the world is pretty bonkers at the moment so it felt if I didn't write it now, I'd always find an excuse not to."
Ifans, 52, said he was very affected by the writing and knew he wanted to do it.
"It feels special to me because I grew up with Ed's writing - The House of America - I would have watched his plays in this theatre," he said.
"So it's amazing he's had such a long sabbatical - I believe he had to buy a shed to write this play!"
Thomas confirms the shed - and that the play was written in long-hand "because it still feels like me". "There's a lot of paper in my shed, I may have to burn some of the early drafts."
Ifans believes it speaks beyond Wales.
"To take this play, which has a Welsh voice but international eyes on a dawn raid over the border is a wonderful feeling," he said. "Although the voices in this play are Welsh, the themes are human."
⚠️On Bear Ridge is at the Sherman in Cardiff, 20 September until 5 October and then at the Royal Court Theatre, London from 24 October to 23 November.
● TICKETS AVAILABLE: 👇👇👇
☆ National Theatre Wales/ Sherman Theatre ➡️ www.nationalth...
☆ Royal Court Theatre ➡️ royalcourtthea...
✔ INFORMATION FROM: www.bbc.co.uk/...
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⚠️On Bear Ridge is at the Sherman Theatre in Cardiff, 20 September until 5 October and then at the Royal Court Theatre, London from 24 October to 23 November.
● TICKETS AVAILABLE: 👇👇👇
☆ National Theatre Wales/ Sherman Theatre ➡️ www.nationaltheatrewales.org/ntw_shows/on-bear-ridge/
☆ Royal Court Theatre ➡️ royalcourttheatre.com/whats-on/onbearridge/?Twitter&Social&OnBearRidge
Lovely boy !!
Excellent actor
Love you always Rhys. X
You are a star that brightens a dark sky. X
I stil love u Rhys Ifans
Wow! He would look 20 years younger without that beard, dunno if that is necessary for the play or this is just how he feels, but even the fact that his hair looks a but nicer makes a difference. His lovely attitude is refreshing, he genuine delight to do this lay is catching. Pity I cannot see him on the stage, I live very far away.
The beard was for the role. Like all great actors, he changes his appearance for each character being portrayed.
Eyeball Paul