HARROGATE director Mark France has formed a new company, Well-fangled Theatre, to produce theatrically innovative, powerful and visually striking theatre in Yorkshire, working with the best regional talent.

First up will be his December production of Thomas Middleton's Jacobean drama The Revenger's Tragedy in the Black Box Studio, Department of Theatre, Film and Television, Heslington East, University of York.

Mark, formerly artistic director of The Mooted Theatre Company in York and Leeds, says of his new venture: "I’ve taken a break from directing to write a PhD and look after my daughter Juno while she was young.

"I’ve also been teaching theatre at the University of York for the past few years, but with my PhD nearing completion the time felt right to throw myself back into producing and directing my own work."

The new company’s name, Well-fangled, is a riff on the phrase "new-fangled", a saying first popularised by Shakespeare. "I really felt that we wanted to stress the craft of making popular, thought-provoking theatre, and not to get too caught up in whether we were producing classics or new writing," says Mark.

"Our work should be innovative, exciting and produced to the highest standards we can achieve, regardless of whether it is a 400-year-old play, or has never been performed before. Our identity as a company will come from the quality of what we do and the dynamism of our approach, the aesthetic shaped by my own tastes as a director and those of the collaborators I work with.

"Hence, we decided that we should be not old or new-fangled, but Well-fangled, placing the emphasis firmly on well-crafted, quality theatre."

The company seeks relevance in all its work. "Along with many, I've found myself increasingly angry with the politics of our country in recent years, and though my theatre has always been politically engaged, with Well-fangled I hope we can address issues in contemporary British society much more robustly than perhaps we did with Mooted," says Mark.

"Certainly our take on the first play we''e staging, The Revenger’s Tragedy, is a political one, and I'm very interested in the future in pursuing a theatre that is passionately engaged with contemporary British society while still remaining rooted firmly in the mainstream."

Well-fangled's theatre will be "sometimes shocking, sometimes amusing, and always produced to the highest possible standards". "I'll be working with some of the best actors and creative collaborators in the region and hope to excite, entertain and provoke audiences throughout the region over the weeks, months and years to come."

York Press:

Director Mark France. Picture: Michael J Oakes

Director's profile

Mark France’s directing credits include: Macbeth, Dead Man's Shoes, Murder In The Cathedral, The Taming Of The Shrew, 'Tis Pity She's A Whore and A Life In The Theatre (all for Mooted); Othello, Henry VI and A Midsummer Night’s Dream (York Shakespeare Project); Wealth, Anton’s Shorts, A Yorkshire Tragedy, Much Ado About Nothing and Four Nights In Knaresborough (Icabod); also Henry V, The Dispute, The Tempest, Macbeth, Romeo And Juliet, Ghosts, Death Of A Salesman and A Man For All Seasons.

He has worked at Hull Truck Theatre as an assistant director and on new writing projects at the Theatre In The Mill, Bradford, and West Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds. He is at present teaching theatre and completing a PhD at the University of York.