Thalidomide!! A Musical | |
---|---|
Music | Mat Fraser |
Lyrics | Mat Fraser |
Book | Mat Fraser |
Premiere | 2005: Battersea Arts Centre, London, UK |
Thalidomide!! A Musical is a British musical written and composed by Mat Fraser, who was born with phocomelia as a result of the drug thalidomide being taken during his mother's pregnancy. Fraser and Anna Winslet play all the roles in the show.
The musical was developed with director Bill Bankes-Jones and premiered at the (London) Battersea Arts Centre's Octoberfest in 2005. It has since played across Britain and at festivals in Cardiff and Versailles, France.
The production tells the story of a love affair between Glyn, a thalidomide survivor (Fraser) and a non-disabled woman, Katie Crawford (Winslet), attracted by his phocomelia. Fraser calls the story a "cartoon version" of his own life. Winslet won the role in part because she did not shirk at an audition request to mimic Fraser himself. [1]
The Daily Telegraph summarized the show as "sharp and original, but not for the squeamish". [2] One Wolverhampton councillor, Malcolm Gwinnett, criticised the show, arguing that, "To exploit people in this way is, frankly, sick", while Fraser said that, "It makes Jerry Springer look tame".
Thalidomide, sold under the brand names Contergan and Thalomid among others, is an oral medication used to treat a number of cancers, graft-versus-host disease, and many skin disorders. Thalidomide has been used to treat conditions associated with HIV: aphthous ulcers, HIV-associated wasting syndrome, diarrhea, and Kaposi's sarcoma, but increases in HIV viral load have been reported.
Kate Elizabeth Winslet is an English actress. Primarily known for her roles as headstrong and complicated women in independent films, particularly period dramas, she has received numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a Grammy Award, two Primetime Emmy Awards, five BAFTA Awards and five Golden Globe Awards. Time magazine named Winslet one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2009 and 2021. She was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 2012.
Andrew Lloyd Webber, Baron Lloyd-Webber, is an English composer and impresario of musical theatre. Several of his musicals have run for more than a decade both in the West End and on Broadway. He has composed 21 musicals, a song cycle, a set of variations, two film scores, and a Latin Requiem Mass.
Phocomelia is a congenital condition that involves malformations of human arms and legs which result in a flipper-like appendage. A prominent cause of phocomelia is the mother being prescribed the use of the drug thalidomide during pregnancy; however, the causes of most cases are to be determined.
Geoffrey Roy Rush is an Australian actor. Known for often playing eccentric roles on both stage and screen, he has received numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a Primetime Emmy Award and a Tony Award, making him the only Australian to achieve the Triple Crown of Acting, in addition to three BAFTA Awards and two Golden Globe Awards. Rush is the founding president of the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts and was named the 2012 Australian of the Year.
Sir Samuel Alexander Mendes is a British film and stage director, producer, and screenwriter. In 2000, Mendes was appointed a CBE for his services to drama, and he was knighted in the 2020 New Years Honours List. In 2000, Mendes was awarded the Shakespeare Prize by the Alfred Toepfer Foundation in Hamburg, Germany. In 2005, he received a lifetime achievement award from the Directors Guild of Great Britain. In 2008, The Daily Telegraph ranked him number 15 in their list of the "100 most powerful people in British culture".
Metrosexuality is a British television comedy drama, which aired on Channel 4 in 2001 as a short-run series of six episodes. It was later re-edited into a single feature for DVD release by TLA Releasing. It depicts the interactions of a racially and sexually diverse group of friends and family living in Notting Hill.
Matilda is a 1988 children's novel by British author Roald Dahl. It was published by Jonathan Cape. The story features Matilda Wormwood, a precocious child with an uncaring mother and father, and her time in a school run by the tyrannical headmistress Miss Trunchbull.
Thomas Quasthoff is a German bass-baritone. Quasthoff has a range of musical interest from Bach cantatas, to lieder, and solo jazz improvisations. Born with severe birth defects caused by thalidomide, Quasthoff is 1.34 m, and has phocomelia.
This is a summary of 2005 in music in the United Kingdom.
William Simpson Fraser was a Scottish actor who appeared on stage, screen and television for many years. In 1986 he won the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Comedy Performance for his stage role in the play When We Are Married.
The Holiday is a 2006 romantic comedy film written, produced and directed by Nancy Meyers. Co-produced by Bruce A. Block, it was filmed in both California and in England and stars Kate Winslet and Cameron Diaz as Iris and Amanda, two lovelorn women from opposite sides of the Atlantic Ocean, who arrange a home exchange to escape heartbreak during the Christmas and holiday season. Jude Law and Jack Black were cast as the film's leading men Graham and Miles, with Eli Wallach, Shannyn Sossamon, Edward Burns, and Rufus Sewell playing supporting roles.
Mat Fraser is an English rock musician, actor, writer and performance artist. He has thalidomide-induced phocomelia.
Alison Fraser is an American actress, voice actress and singer who has appeared on Broadway, Off-Broadway, and in television and film. In concert, she has performed at such venues as Carnegie Hall, The White House, Town Hall, The Brooklyn Botanic Garden, The Tisch Center for the Arts, The Folger Shakespeare Library, The Wilma, The Emelin, Joe's Pub, 54 Below, and Symphony Space.
Julie Atlas Muz is a New York City-based performance artist, dancer, burlesque artist, stage director, and actress. In 2012, she married English actor Mat Fraser.
In the late 1950s and early 1960s, the use of thalidomide in 46 countries was prescribed to women who were pregnant or who subsequently became pregnant, and consequently resulted in the "biggest anthropogenic medical disaster ever," with more than 10,000 children born with a range of severe deformities, such as phocomelia, as well as thousands of miscarriages.
Cast Offs is a BAFTA-nominated comedy-drama mockumentary that follows a group of six disabled people sent to a remote British Island for a fictional reality show.
Roald Dahl's Matilda, also known simply as Matilda and Matilda the Musical, is a musical with music and lyrics by Tim Minchin and a book by Dennis Kelly. It is based on the 1988 novel Matilda by Roald Dahl. The musical's narrative centres on Matilda Wormwood, a precocious five-year-old girl with the gift of telekinesis, who loves reading, overcomes obstacles caused by her family and school, and helps her teacher to reclaim her life. After a twelve-week trial run staged by the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) at Stratford-upon-Avon from November 2010 to January 2011, it received its West End premiere on 24 November 2011 at the Cambridge Theatre and its Broadway premiere on 11 April 2013 at the Shubert Theatre.
Stanislaus Berent was an American performer who performed at many freak shows, including the World Circus Sideshow in 1941 under the stage name of Sealo the Seal Boy. He was known for his seal-like arms, which were caused by a congenital medical condition known as phocomelia. In 2001, Mat Fraser's play inspired by Sealo called Sealboy: Freak debuted.
James "Jay" McGuiness is a British singer, songwriter, actor and author best known as a vocalist with boy band The Wanted. In 2015, partnered with Aliona Vilani, he won the 13th series of BBC's Strictly Come Dancing. In February 2024 Jay’s debut fantasy novel ‘Blood Flowers’ was published worldwide by Scholastic.