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WILTON’S

THE CITY’S HIDDEN STAGE

“One of London’s most magical historic venues”Time Out

“This is the most important surviving early music hall to be seen anywhere......It is of outstanding architectural and archaeological significance”The Theatres Trust

Wilton’s is arguably the oldest and last surviving Grand Music Hall in the world, it is a unique survivor of the giant pub music halls of the 1850s. Wilton’s has a fascinating history that has seen this building journey from ale house to music hall and Methodist mission to rag warehouse, eventually being left derelict and half forgotten.

The Wilton’s Music Hall Trust has lovingly coaxed the building back to life and it has been producing shows regularly since 2004. The work you can see at Wilton’s today is imaginative and distinctive, usually with its roots in the early music hall tradition but reinterpreted for an audience of today. There is a veritable mixed bag of surprise and delight – from baroque operas in 3D animation to ping pong tournaments on stage. Wilton’s is situated at the start of the historic East End – on the edge of the City, within easy walking distance from The Tower of London and the river and just south of Spitalfields and Brick Lane.

I first heard the story of a secret buried church from my father, Jeffrey Mayhew, when he came back from one of his trips to Romania (quite a few years ago now) where he would spend the summer holidays in orphanages running drama therapy courses. He had always thought it would make a good play and when Julian Garner (who also got the story from my dad) had the inspiration to write the story as you will see now in Father Nandru & The Wolves, it felt like it was developed alongside Wilton’s own story of survival like parallel lines. The story has many layers, a truly poetic modern folk tale, and as we know the truths from the story – it is a stark reminder that we must bring people and communities together, for that way we can destroy prejudice and become stronger.

During the building work (due to run June 2014 – Autumn 2015), performances will continue as much as possible and you are invited to discover The Chrysalis Club, an exciting pop-up venture. After the works are complete we hope you will not notice that we have repaired the building so extensively as we will endeavour to keep its current charm and character. There will be more performance spaces, studios, educational programmes, visitor rooms, a bakery and brasserie and we will be open more for you to enjoy and engage with Wilton’s.

A history of the hall is available from the box office or online (wiltons.org.uk) or you may want to join one of our regular guided tours.

This production could not have happened without the support of Arts Council England and Backstage Trust.

Frances Mayhew

Artistic and Managing Director

Wilton’s Music Hall Trust

Wilton’s Team

Artistic & Managing Director Frances Mayhew

Technical Director Filippo de Capitani

Development Director Kate Mitchell

Development Director (Maternity Cover) Dorcas Morgan

Office Manager Becky Ruffell

Building Manager Jon Freeman

Marketing Manager Oona Patterson

Archive & Interpretation Manager Gabrielle St John-McAlister

Bar Manager Rebecca Trebilcock

Assistant Bar Manager Nicola Grant

Cocktail Bar Manager Gabriele Barbetti

Researcher & Tour Guide Carole Zeidman

Learning & Participation Officer David Graham

Sound Technologist & Technician Michele Panegrossi

Financial Advisor Mary Coulson

Heritage Lottery Fund Administrator Michelle Card

Finance Team Tracey Williams & Lynn Lindeque

Box Office Rosie Smith Oliver

The Mahogany Bar Team

Cleaners John Thomas & Neli Barekova

The Board of Trustees

Trustees: David Pennock (Chair), Frances Mayhew,

Jeremy Friedlander, Dr John Gayner, Kathleen Herron,

Cllr Denise Jones, Frank Kelsall, Jonathan Kitchen,

George Marsh, Abdus Shukur, Linda Simpson & Lucy Porten

Wilton’s Donor’s and Sponsors

Wilton’s couldn’t survive on ticket sales alone, so thank you to the wonderful patrons and supporters listed below

PATRONS

Patron HRH The Prince of Wales

Campaign Patron David Suchet

Honorary Patrons

Marc Almond

Henry Goodman

Rosamund Pike

John Wilton’s Inner Circle

Nidaa Al Ghazal &

Maxime Hennequet

Deborah & David Owen

Stephen & Linda Simpson

Can Can Dancer

Anonymous

Jonathan Kitchen

Champagne Charlie

Anonymous

Kate Bonner

Clyde Cooper

Ruth Finch

Dr. & Mrs. Gayner

Mike Kavanagh & Mark Aspery

George & Ann Marsh

Anna Marzec-Manser

Georgia Oetker

Jeremy Reynolds

Anthony Roberts

Rev’d. David Rogers

FRIENDS

Shilling Boxes

Anonymous

John Bean

Colin & Anna Frizzell Charitable Trust

Jean Hawkins

Nicholas Hedley

David Owen QC

David Pike

Eightpenny Stalls

Anonymous

Archie Andrews Guardians

Ray & Linda Cooney

Fredo Donnelly & Mike Richardson

James Ford

Jeremy Hargrove

Dr. Tony Hollingworth

Gillian Howard

Nick & Chris Hunn

Mrs. H Kalkhoven Dickson

Malsar Kest

Petra Laidlaw

George Law

Liz & Innes Meek

Alex & Susan de Mont

Michael O’Callaghan

Mr. & Mrs. Brian Peppiatt

Lord & Lady Francis & Nathalie

Phillimore

John & Stephanie Riley

Angela Rogers

Ian Salter

Carolyn Saunders

Dasha Shenkman

Brian Smith

Antony Timmins

Ann Vernau

Tom & Elaine Yeo

CORPORATES

Astell Scientific

Gilchrist and Soames

Latham and Watkins LLP

Radisson Blu

Waitrose

TRUSTS AND FOUNDATIONS AND PUBLIC FUNDING

Esmée Fairbairn Foundation

John Ellerman Foundation

CAPITAL PROJECT Phase 2: Saved, Revealed & Alive - The Five Georgian Houses

Thanks to the generous support of those below and others, Wilton’s semi-derelict front of house areas are being sensitively repaired. Keep up to date with the project as it unfolds by following the blog, saved-revealed-alive.tumblr.com

Heritage Lottery Fund

Viridor Credits

The Loveday Charitable Trust

Garfield Weston

Chris Bartram

J Paul Getty Jnr Charitable Trust

Foyle Foundation

Aldgate and Allhallows

The Bernard Sunley Foundation

Corner Shop PR

Backstage Trust

The Wolfson Foundation

Heritage of London Trust

Bernarr Rainbow Foundation

Ken Craig

Bruce Harris

Lindsay Gordon

Mark Hamsher

Ian Gaunt

David Owen QC

Anthony Evans

Anthony Diamond

Anne Burley

Adam Ant

Anthony Burrill

Gavin Graham & Biddy O’Grady

John Crisp

Martin Perkins

Alan Sainer Trust

Lady Jane Rayne

John & Caroline Stephen

Jennifer Taylor

Bruce Rowling

Petra Laidlaw

Barbara Lascelles

Gerald and John Glover

The Worshipful Company of Tyler’s & Bricklayers

The Goldsmith’s Company

Anonymous

From the Writer & Director

The true story from Romania at the heart of Father Nandru & The Wolves originally came to me from my friend Jeffrey Mayhew as the subject for a play he might take to the Edinburgh Fringe. At the time I couldn’t think of an appropriate form for this iconic fable – so the project was put on ice, though it continued to haunt me as I toured rural Finland with CulturaMobila, the community arts organisation I co-founded with Hanne Horte in 2004. Our mission is to create arts events with people living in small communities and the most popular strand of our work has proved to be large scale, site specific mummer’s plays-cum-winter carnivals, frequently involving an entire village. As inexperienced performers seem happier belting out rhyming verse than fumbling with realistic dialogue, we developed a house style based on traditional folk drama, a heady blend of rough theatre, sympathetic magic and the irreconcilable conflicts between light and darkness, good and evil, life and death. Once I explain British mumming techniques as proto-rap, our actors take to it with gusto, adapting it to their own languages and local references, and a fine celebratory time is had by all. In 2012, on-going research into mumming traditions around the world brought me to those of Transylvania, including the fiercely elemental figure of the Capra, or goat, the death and resurrection of which still heralds the coming of spring in the depths of the Romanian winter. Suddenly the story of Father Nandru felt like a continuation of the work I’d been doing for eight years and I was ready to write it... as a mummers play for the 21st century.

Many thanks to Frances Mayhew at Wilton’s for her immediate enthusiasm for the project; to the Swedish Culture Fund in Finland whose travel bursary took Hanne and I on a life-changing trip to Romania; to our splendid guides there, Duncan Ridgley, Maria Borca, Gerhild Gross, and everyone at Tzigania Tours, who took us way off the beaten track and opened our eyes to startling new/old worlds in Breb, Viscri and the Roma communities around Targu Mures. This one’s for you!

Julian Garner

Writer & Director