MAT Fraser is to play twisted villain Richard III in Hull Truck Theatre and Northern Broadsides's co-production of Shakespeare's history play this spring.

The May 4 to 27 run will form part of Hull UK City of Culture 2017’s Roots & Routes season, with Hull-born Broadsides artistic director Barrie Rutter being thrilled by Fraser's participation in his cast. "Mat is an actor of scintillating physicality and vocal power," he says.

"He joins a company of Broadsiders new and old, Hullensians aplenty, and will add his percussion skills to a company well noted for its musical invention. His return to the British stage as Shakespeare’s iconic villain heralds a shivering frisson of excitement.”

Fraser is no less enthused. "This fantastic opportunity to play drama’s most famous disabled villain, and to put the visceral reality onstage of a 'rudely stamped' actor in the famous character, is made even more exciting by having it be a Northern Broadsides and Hull Truck Theatre production under Barrie Rutter’s forthright direction," he says.

"The honour of working with all the seasoned classic actors in the cast is one I hope to match with a deep understanding of a life lived differently, combined with a love of this intense violent drama, and joyously delivering the beautiful poetry of Shakespeare.”

Fraser began his acting career with GRAEAE Theatre Company, Europe’s leading company of disabled actors. He has since worked extensively in theatres and on screen in Britain, Ireland, Australia, Canada and the United States, where he starred in the fourth television series of American Horror Story: Freak Show and has just finished playing Roger in Peter Farrelly’s new TV comedy, Loudermilk.

York Press:

Mat Fraser: "Fantastic opportunity"

Fraser appeared with Julie Atlas Muz, his partner in art and life, in their company OneOfUs's production of Beauty And The Beast, playing to equally rave and confused reviews on a British tour and in New York, Adelaide and Chicago. His site-specific solo show in a museum, Cabinet Of Curiosities: How Disability Was Kept In A Box, won the Observer Ethical Award for Arts & Entertainment in 2014.

His British television and film credits include The Fades, Cast Offs, Metrosexuality and Chemical Wedding and he has made documentaries such as Born Freak and Happy Birthday Thalidomide. On stage, he has starred in GRAEAE's What The Butler Saw, the Young Vic's Andorra and In Water I’m Weightless for the National Theatre, Wales, and he played Puck in KAOS Theatre Company's The Dream. He has performed his own work Sealboy:Freak, and Thalidomide!! A Musical too.

Throughout his career, Fraser has taken a keen interest in the representation of disability on all stages, a passionate cause that also led him to host the 2012 Paralympics opening ceremony in London.

Richard III, Shakespeare’s turbulent tale of "the twisted villain who we love to hate", was first staged by Northern Broadsides at Hull’s Marina Boatshed in 1992 with a cast featuring the late Brian Glover, York actor Mark Addy, Edward Peel, Polly Hemmingway and Rutter himself, who also directed.

The full cast for Rutter's 25th anniversary production will be announced shortly as Hull UK City of Culture 2017 looks forward to Fraser's portrayal of Shakespeare's Crookback, the ruthlessly cunning, silver-tongued charmer who will stop at nothing to remove his brothers, wife, nephews and friends from his path to the throne. Surrounded by vengeful ghosts, friends he cannot trust and a terrible curse cast by the old Queen Margaret, it all leads to a final battle at Bosworth Field, where the bloody feud between the houses of York and Lancaster must end at last.

Rutter's Richard III will move on from Hull to Northern Broadsides' home turf of Halifax for a Viaduct Theatre run from May 30 to June 4. In Hull, the 7.30pm evening shows from May 4 to 27 will be complemented by 2pm matinees on May 6, 13, 17, 20, 24 and 27. Hull tickets can be booked on 01482 323638 or at hulltruck.co.uk; Halifax, 01422 250250 or deanclough.com