Fram - National Theatre (Olivier)
Preview by Lizzie Guilfoyle
FRAM, a new play by Britain’s foremost theatre poet, Tony Harrison, opens in the Olivier Theatre on April 17, 2008 (previews from April 10). Part of the Travelex £10 Season, it will run for a limited season – until May 22, 2008.
Described as an epic sweep of a play, Fram takes audiences from a contemporary Westminster Abbey to the Arctic ship Fram – or Forward – specially built by the famous Norwegian explorer Fridtjof Nansen who, with his suicidal companion, Johansen, makes a bid on foot for the North Pole in the 1890s. Though incompatible, they share a bear fur sleeping-bag through the long winter.
Nansen, still haunted by Johansen’s ghost, is appointed to the League of Nations. As a figurehead of Russian famine relief in 1922, he conducts the first celebrity campaign, searching for means, however shocking, to make people care.
Tony Harrison and Bob Crowley direct a cast that includes Mark Addy (as Johansen), Jasper Britton (as Nansen), Viviana Durante, Jeff Rawle and Sian Thomas.
Harrison’s previous work at the National includes The Mysteries, The Oresteia and The Trackers of Oxyrhynchus, which had its world premiere in the ancient stadium of Delphi. His many collections of poems include The Loiners, winner of the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize; V which was broadcast on Channel 4 in 1987 and won an RTS Award; The Gaze of the Gorgon, winner of the Whitbread Prize for Poetry; and Under the Clock.
Crowley has designed over twenty productions for the National Theatre, most recently The History Boys (for which he won a Tony Award), His Girl Friday and Mourning Becomes Electra. His other recent work includes Tarzan, Mary Poppins and The Year of Magical Thinking.
Fram has set design by Bob Crowley, costume design by Fotini Dimou, lighting by Mark Henderson, choreography by Wayne MacGregor, music by Richard Blackford and video by Jon Driscoll.