Tobacco Factory on tour at Stephen Joseph Theatre with Beckett's Waiting For Godot

Christopher Bianchi, Colin Connor, John Stahl and David Fielder are joined in Mark Rosenblatt's cast by young North Yorkshire actors Seth Pickering and Sam Tennant in the role of The Boy. Fielder was last seen at the SJT in last year’s touring production of And Then Come The Nightjars.

When first performed in Paris in 1953, Waiting For Godot shook the foundations of the theatrical landscape. Brought to London by the late Sir Peter Hall two years later, its British premiere prompted the theatre critic Kenneth Tynan to remark that Beckett's play had "changed the rules of theatre".

Now, 65 years later, Waiting For Godot is as fresh and urgent as ever in Tobacco Factory's production directed by Rosenblatt, who was associate director at the West Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds, from 2013 to 2016. Earlier, he was the National Theatre Studio's associate director from 2011 to 2013 and ran Dumbfounded Theatre from 2001.

"There aren’t many plays that make a splash in popular culture," says Rosenblatt, assessing Waiting For Godot's impact. "It’s a high-wire act and yet it is written with such certainty and confidence, so precisely and with such brilliant comic patterns.

"It plays with the biggest universal ideas – hope, trying hard to get through life, filling time, purpose, wondering what it all means and how we use and abuse relationships. And yet, somehow – and I think this is where its magic really lies – it manages to do so in a way which resists explaining itself. It’s rich and specific and inexplicably about everything and nothing."

Waiting For Godot is designed by Janet Bird with sound design and composition by Dave Price and lighting design by Matthew Graham. Evening performances start at 7.30pm on November 22, 24 and 25 and at 7pm, November 23; matinees at 1.30pm, November 23, and 2.30pm, November 25. Tickets cost £10 to £25 on 01723 370541 or at sjt.uk.com