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Story by Jack Foley
THE Girl in the Yellow Dress, who provided such a mesmerising
presence, in posters and on stage, for Contact last year,
in the West End, is in big demand, if her current schedule is
anything to go by.
Leigh Zimmerman is to join the cast of the keenly-anticipated
London version of The Producers,
alongside Richard Dreyfuss and Lee Evans, as well as a new comedy
at The King’s Head Theatre, from March 29 to April
25.
The comedy in question is Carl Djerassi’s Three on a
Couch, a three-hander, set in New York, about an egomaniac
writer, his neurotic shrink and a cross but beautiful wife.
It co-stars Rolf Saxon (Chicago, The Graduate, The Seven Year
Itch) and Owen Brenman (One Foot in the Grave) and
is a keenly anticipated work from Djerassi, a world-famous scientist,
best known for the synthesis of the contraceptive pill in the
1960s.
Three on a Couch will be directed by Andy Jordan and designed
by Nicky Shaw.
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Following her Fringe run at the King’s Head, Zimmerman,
an American whose Broadway credits include A Funny Thing Happened
on the Way to the Forum, Crazy for You and Follies,
will head back to the West End for the Broadway transfer of Mel
Brooks’ award-winning The Producers.
She will play Ulla, starring alongside Dreyfuss and Evans, as
washed-up theatre producer, Max Bialystock and his timid accountant,
Leo Bloom, who hatch a scheme to make a fortune by presenting
a sure-fire flop, called Springtime for Hitler.
It is a considerable coup for the talented actress, who first
came to West End prominence in Chicago, before her eye-catching
turn in last year’s Contact, which was also choreographed
and directed by Susan Stroman.
The London production of The Producers will also reunite
the rest of the original Broadway creative team, including scenic
designer, Robin Wagner; costume designer, William Ivey Long, and
Steve C Kennedy, on sound.
The musical is presented in London by Rocco Landesman, David
Ian for Clear Channel Entertainment, the Frankel Baruch Viertel
Routh Group, Bob and Harvey Weinstein, Rick Steiner, Robert FX
Sillerman and Mel Brooks in association with James D Stern/Douglas
Meyer.
And it will receive its London premiere at the Theatre Royal
Drury Lane on November 9, 2004, with previews from October 22.
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