The Matchgirls | |
---|---|
Poster from a 2008 production of the Musical | |
Music | Tony Russell |
Lyrics | Bill Owen |
Book | Bill Owen |
Basis | London matchgirls strike of 1888. |
Productions | 1965 Leatherhead Theatre Club 1966 Globe Theatre [1] |
The Matchgirls is a musical by Bill Owen and Tony Russell about the London matchgirls strike of 1888. [2] It premiered at the Globe Theatre, London, on 1 March 1966, directed and choreographed by Gillian Lynne.
The musical focuses on the lifestyle of the match cutters at the Bryant and May factory in Bow, London, with strong references to the condition Phossy jaw and the political climate of the era.
After out-of-town tryouts in Leatherhead, Surrey, the show opened on the West End in March 1966. The show closed about three months later. [3]
A cast recording was made of the 1966 Globe Theatre London production. The musical was published by Samuel French Ltd in 1979. [4] [5]
The central character of the musical is Kate, a tenement girl and factory worker, who writes to Annie Besant to ask for help in seeking reform at the Bryant and May factory. The story follows Kate and Annie's attempts to rally the girls, leading Kate to become a reckless strike-leader and a key player in the creation and recognition of the union. With much of the action set in the incongruously named, but fictional, 'Hope Court', the musical portrays Bryant and May as callous and uncaring employers, with factory foreman 'Mr Mynel' representing the threatening and imposing regime in which the girls were forced to work.
There is also a sub plot in which Kate's involvement in the strike puts strain on her relationship with docker Joe.
Despite the subject matter of the musical, a strong emphasis is placed on the positive mentality and natural ebullience of the so-called 'cockney sparrows', this leading to a number of cheerful and entertaining vocal numbers and dance routines. [6]
A match is a tool for starting a fire. Typically, matches are made of small wooden sticks or stiff paper. One end is coated with a material that can be ignited by friction generated by striking the match against a suitable surface. Wooden matches are packaged in matchboxes, and paper matches are partially cut into rows and stapled into matchbooks. The coated end of a match, known as the match "head", consists of a bead of active ingredients and binder, often colored for easier inspection. There are two main types of matches: safety matches, which can be struck only against a specially prepared surface, and strike-anywhere matches, for which any suitably frictional surface can be used.
Oklahoma! is the first musical written by the duo of Rodgers and Hammerstein. The musical is based on Lynn Riggs' 1931 play, Green Grow the Lilacs. Set in farm country outside the town of Claremore, Indian Territory, in 1906, it tells the story of farm girl Laurey Williams and her courtship by two rival suitors, cowboy Curly McLain and the sinister and frightening farmhand Jud Fry. A secondary romance concerns cowboy Will Parker and his flirtatious fiancée, Ado Annie.
Grease is a musical with music, lyrics, and a book by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey, with additional songs by John Farrar. Named after the 1950s United States working-class youth subculture known as greasers, the musical is set in 1959 at the fictional Rydell High School in Northwest Chicago. This fictional high school was based on Taft High School in Chicago, Illinois, and named after rock singer Bobby Rydell. The musical follows ten working-class teenagers as they navigate the complexities of peer pressure, politics, personal core values, and love.
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Jerry's Girls is a musical revue based on the songs of composer/lyricist Jerry Herman.
Peter Gennaro was an American dancer and choreographer.
Bow Quarter is a gated community in Bow in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The building was originally the Bryant and May match factory, and was the site of the Match Girls' strike in the 1880s. The factory was redeveloped in the 1980s, in one of east London's first urban renewal projects.
Bryant & May was a British company created in the mid-19th century specifically to make matches. Their original Bryant & May Factory was located in Bow, London. They later opened other match factories in the United Kingdom and Australia, such as the Bryant & May Factory, Melbourne, and owned match factories in other parts of the world.
The matchgirls' strike of 1888 was an industrial action by the women and teenage girls working at the Bryant & May match factory in Bow, London.
Dame Gillian Barbara Lynne was an English ballerina, dancer, choreographer, actress, and theatre-television director, noted for her theatre choreography associated with two of the longest-running shows in Broadway history, Cats and The Phantom of the Opera. At age 87, she was made a DBE in the 2014 New Year Honours List.
Ilkley Upstagers' Theatre Group, or simply Upstagers, is a well-known amateur theatre group based in Ilkley, West Yorkshire.
The Menier Chocolate Factory is a 180-seat off-West End theatre, which comprises a bar and rehearsal rooms.
Janie Dee is an English actress and singer. She won the Olivier Award for Best Actress, Evening Standard Award and Critics' Circle Theatre Award for Best Actress in a Play, and in New York the Obie and Theatre World Award for Best Newcomer, for her performance as Jacie Triplethree in Alan Ayckbourn's Comic Potential.
Keith Strachan is an English composer and theatre director. He co-wrote the song "Mistletoe and Wine", which got Cliff Richard the 1988 UK Christmas number one. His TV work includes the theme music for the worldwide franchise of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?
Pat Ashton was an English actress. Her engaging cockney, blonde persona is best remembered for appearances in English TV-sitcom film spin-offs On the Buses (1971) and Mutiny on the Buses (1972). She was married to Geoff Godwin 1953–1985.
Enola Holmes 2 is a 2022 mystery film and the sequel to the 2020 film Enola Holmes, both of which star Millie Bobby Brown as the title character, the teenage sister of the already-famous Victorian-era detective Sherlock Holmes. The film is directed by Harry Bradbeer from a screenplay by Jack Thorne that adapts the book series The Enola Holmes Mysteries by Nancy Springer. Unlike the film's predecessor, it does not adapt one of Springer's novels and instead takes real-life inspiration from the 1888 matchgirls' strike. In addition to Brown, Henry Cavill, Louis Partridge, Susie Wokoma, Adeel Akhtar, and Helena Bonham Carter reprise their supporting roles, while David Thewlis and Sharon Duncan-Brewster join the cast.
Sarah Chapman was a British trade unionist who was one of the leaders of the 1888 Bryant & May Matchgirls' strike. Chapman and others involved in the strike have since been recognised as "pioneers of gender equality and fairness at work who left a lasting legacy on the trade union movement".