PICK Me Up Theatre are going back to the classroom for a double bill of school dramas, Alan Bennett’s The History Boys and Willy Russell’s Our Day Out, The Musical.

Robert Readman’s productions will run separately, rather than together, at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, where Bennett’s Sheffield play will be staged on February 20, 21, 23, 25 and 26 at 7.30pm and February 28 at 2.30pm.

Russell’s caustic Liverpool comedy will be performed on February 21 and 22 at 2.30pm and 24, 27 and 28 at 7.30pm.

The History Boys, voted Britain’s Most Popular Play, is set in Sheffield in the late 1980s, when eight boys are being groomed for Oxbridge. Hector, the eccentric English master, teaches the boys poetry that he hopes will prepare them for the “long littleness of life”, but the league-table-obsessed headmaster is not willing to leave them in Hector’s hands alone. He duly employs Mr Irwin, a young teacher with a unique view on history and how to get into Oxbridge.

The role of Mr Irwin goes to Bootham School alumnus Neil Foster, by day a BBC Radio York presenter.

“He’s a smart young teacher, brought in from university by the headmaster who wants a clean sweep of all the school’s Oxbridge candidate, but Irwin is described as ‘meretricious’: eye-catching, showy and falsely attractive,” says Neil. “He’s not a bad man, but in the eyes of Hector he is because he undermines his unconventional teaching methods. Hector is all about knowledge for knowledge’s sake, whereas Irwin is driven only by results.

“I would have been more drawn to Hector, who is the more sympathetic teacher, and I doubt Alan Bennett likes Irwin because he’s a man who’s hiding a lot and is not all he seems to be.”

Former Tadcaster Grammar School pupil George Stagnell will play the supremely assured Dakin, the outspoken star pupil.

“I don’t think I ever had Dakin’s attitude at school but I do wish I’d had his intuition and extreme confidence, which is why he’s great fun to play,” he says. “There was the odd cheeky b***er at School but no one as forthright as Dakin.”

Sam Baxter, 17, from Crawshaw Academy in Pudsey, will be making his Pick Me Up debut as the troubled Posner, who is on the cusp of coming out.

“I see elements of myself in his character in that I’m not ashamed to admit that I’ve had my own confusion of sexuality, with all the pressures of school work going on around it,” he says. “For me, when playing Posner, you have to find the balance between a serious issue and its comedic value in Bennett’s writing.

“I think it’s that fusion of comedy and the touching nature of the play that reaches into everyone’s hearts. There are plays that are considered to be good but not everyone can relate to them, but everyone can connect with this play because everyone has been to school, which is where it differs from the subjects of a Pinter play.”

 

York Press:

The cast of Our Day Out

 

Meanwhile, Pick Me Up will be staging Willy Russell’s 1976 play Our Day Out in its 2009 reworking as a musical with a refreshed script. It remains a heartwarming story of Mrs Kay’s Progress Class heading for Alton Towers until Mr Briggs climbs on board, whereupon the destination promptly changes to a zoo in North Wales.

Craig Kirby will play the killjoy Mr Briggs and the class of 24 pupils will include 12-year-old Emily Belcher, from St Aidan’s School in Harrogate, as Amy. Craig was only 15 when he first took the role of Mr Briggs, 30 years ago in his youth theatre days at the Dolman Theatre in Newport.

“I thought of Mrs Kay as the lead role when I was younger, but now when you look at it, Briggs is more of the lead, as you can see the changes he undergoes on the trip,” he says. “He’s a slightly dated character now as you can’t have teachers shouting and bellowing!”

Emily, whose birthday falls today, says: “I love performing in this play; it’s really funny and it’s fun to play because you’re performing with all your friends and it’s such a funny and clever script.”

Tickets are available online from pickmeuptheatre.com or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk and on 01904623568.