Posted on May 23rd, 2019
RUST
Written by Kenny Emson
Directed by Eleanor Rhode
Designed by Max Johns
Lighting Design by Jess Bernberg
Sound Design by David Gregory
Associate Director – Natalie Denton
Lighting Associate – Kieron Johnson
Casting by Sophie Parrott CDG
Cast – Jon Foster and Claire Lams
26 June – 27 July
Bush Theatre, 7 Uxbridge Road, London, W12 8LJ
31 July – 25 August
Assembly Roxy Downstairs, 2 Roxburgh Place, Edinburgh EH8 9SU
10 – 15 September
Pumphouse, HighTide Festival Aldeburgh, 44 Park Road, Aldeburgh IP15 5EU
Kenny Emson’s Rust, a new play about modern relationships opens at the Bush Theatre on 26 June (press night 1 July) prior to a run at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August, and at the HighTide Festival Aldeburgh in September.
‘Rule number eleven: We don’t talk about them. Not here. They don’t exist here.’
Nadia and Daniel have a secret. In fact, they have quite a few. They’ve just signed on the dotted line for a studio flat. Under a pseudonym, naturally – Mr and Mrs White.
After years of school pick-ups, TV takeaways, and the day to day drudgery of married life, this is their chance to wipe the slate clean. But as much as they try and re-define the rules, and themselves, the outside world is closing in. Ultra-contemporary, sexy and funny, Rust pushes the boundaries of trust, love and lust to the limit.
Jon Foster plays Daniel. His theatre appearances include: Dear Elizabeth; The Unknown Island; Idomeneus; Trojan Women; Dream Story; Mud (Gate Theatre); Every Day I Make Greatness Happen (Hampstead Theatre); Othello (The Globe); F*ck The Polar Bears (Bush Theatre); Buckets (Orange Tree); All I Want (UK Tour); Cheese (fanSHEN); A Beginning, A Middle and an End; Tenet (Greyscale); Invisible (Transport Theatre); The Alchemist (Firehouse Creative); A New Way To Please You; His Fall; Speaking Like Magpies; Thomas More (RSC); How To Tell The Monsters From The Misfits (Birmingham REP); Long Time Dead (Paines Plough); After Haggerty (Finborough Theatre); Food (Traverse Theatre); Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (Babayaga Theatre Company); Free From Sorrow (Living Pictures); Romeo and Juliet (Creation Theatre Company); Oliver Twist (Instant Classics); The Melancholy Hussar (Etcetera Theatre); Two Gentlemen of Verona (Pentameters Theatre); Treasure Island (Palace Theatre); The Bear (The Bear).
His television appearances include: Sanditon (Red Planet Ltd); Prime Suspect 1973 (Noho for ITC); Fortitude (Tiger Aspect); Da Vinci’s Demons (BBC Worldwide and Starz); The Great Fire (Ecosse Films); New Tricks (Wall to Wall Television for the BBC); Rev (Big Talk Productions); Mrs Biggs; Come Rain Come Shine (ITV); Abroad (Abroad Films); Eastenders; Silent Witness; The Last Enemy (BBC); Law and Order (Kudos); The Bill (Thames Television); Clone (Roughcut); The IT Crowd (Talkback); Instinct (Granada).
On film he has appeared in The Rabbi and The Tooth (Zoe Griesdale-Sherry Productions); Alba (Rabblewise Films); Tides (Elation Pictures); Nice Guy (Red Bike Films); Love’s Kitchen (Eyeline Entertainment). Radio includes: The Duchess of Malfi (BBC World Service).
Claire Lams plays Nadia, her theatre appearances include: Paradise (Hampstead Theatre); Kiss Me (Hampstead Theatre and Trafalgar Studios); The Lottery of Love (Orange Tree Theatre); The Kings Speech (Chichester and Birmingham Rep); The Little Mermaid (Bristol Old Vic); Routes; Harvest (Royal Court); One Man, Two Guvnors (Broadway, West End and National Theatre); The Spies in Room 502 (Latitude Festival); W11 (Gate Theatre); While You Lie (Traverse Theatre); Educating Rita (Watermill Theatre); Absent Friends (Watford Palace Theatre); The Miracle; DNA; Baby Girl (National Theatre); Faustus (Headlong); Fabulation (The Tricycle Theatre); Presence (Theatre Royal Plymouth); Chimps (Liverpool Everyman); Citizenship (National Theatre Studio); Fields of Gold; Soap (Stephen Joseph Theatre); Coming Around Again; Huddersfield (West Yorkshire Playhouse); The Happiest Days of Your Life (Royal Exchange Theatre); The Dice House (Birmingham Stage Company).
Claire’s television appearances include Casualty; Call The Midwife; The Wrong Mans; Silent Witness; Doctors; Holby City; Eastenders (BBC); Humans (Kudos); Obsessed (October Films); Random (Hillbilly Television); The Bill (Thames Television); The Brief (Granada Television).
On film she has appeared in Beyond the Blade (The Guardian); Pumpkin Head 4 (Clubdeal PH Film Company); Southwalk The Movie (T-Max Media); Danielle (Independent Film).
Writer Kenny Emson is an award-winning playwright and screenwriter. His plays include Quadrophenia (Mercury Theatre), Parkway Dreams (Sir John Mills Theatre) Terrorism (Bush Theatre), This Must be the Place (Vault Festival – co-written with Brad Birch) and Plastic (Old Red Lion). He was co-creator, co-writer and associate producer on the BAFTA Craft, SXSW and Prix Italia nominated The Last Hours of Laura K and adapted Agatha Christie’s The Coming of Mister Quin which was nominated for a BAFTA CYMRU games award. He has written for EastEnders, Doctors, BBC Radio 3 and 4 and has been shortlisted for the Bruntwood, Red Planet and Papatango Prizes as well as winning the Adrienne Benham, Off West End Adopt a Playwright and Mercury/Weinberger Playwriting awards.
Director Eleanor Rhode is an Associate Artist for HighTide, for whom she directed the musical Thor and Loki for the Edinburgh and HighTide Festivals with Vicky Graham Productions. Her most recent work includes the world premiere of Boudica by Tristan Bernays for the Globe Theatre, Blue Door for Theatre Royal Bath, and Wendy and Peter Pan for The Royal Lyceum in Edinburgh.
In 2009 she co-founded Snapdragon Productions to bring neglected and unknown works to new audiences. Work for Snapdragon includes the critically acclaimed production of Toast by Richard Bean (UK Tour and New York), which was nominated for Best Touring Production at the 2016 UK Theatre Awards; and the award-winning world premiere of musical Teddy by Tristan Bernays and Dougal Irvine, which she revived last year for a national tour and London run at the Vaults.
Other recent work includes: Frankenstein (Watermill Theatre and Wilton’s Music Hall); Terrorism (Bush Theatre); Beauty and the Beast (Watford Palace Theatre); When We Were Women (Orange Tree Theatre); Toast and Thark (both Park Theatre); Generous; The Drawer Boy and A Life (all Finborough Theatre) and the world premiere of the musical For All That for Centerstage Theater, Seattle.
Forthcoming productions include King John for the Royal Shakespeare Company.
Max Johns trained in theatre design at Bristol Old Vic Theatre School and was the recipient of a BBC Performing Arts Fellowship in 2015. Prior to this he worked for a number of years as a designer in Germany. His most recent UK productions include Strange Fruit for the Bush, The Half God of Rainfall for Kiln/Birmingham Rep/Fuel, Wendy and Peter Pan for The Royal Lyceum Edinburgh, Kes and Random for Leeds Playhouse, Utility for the Orange Tree Theatre, Buggy Baby for the Yard Theatre, Yellowman for the Young Vic, Baddies for Synergy Theatre Project, Fidelo for the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Enron for the Egg, There Shall Be Fireworks for the Plasticine Men, Twelfth Night for the Orange Tree Theatre, Life Raft, Medusa and Under A Cardboard Sea for Bristol Old Vic, Strawberry And Chocolate for Tobacco Factory Theatres, Infinity Pool for Bedlam, Bucket List for Theatre Ad Infinitum, and Hamlet and All’s Well That Ends Well for Shakespeare at the Tobacco Factory. Max has also had work produced at the V&A and Theatre Royal Bath. Forthcoming productions include King John at the Royal Shakespeare Company, directed by Eleanor Rhode.
Jess Bernberg is a London based Lighting Designer. She trained at Guildhall School of Music and Drama and was the 2018 Laboratory Associate Lighting Designer at Nuffield Southampton Theatres. Her designs include: Rejoicing At Her Wondrous Vulva The Young Woman Applauded Herself (Ovalhouse); Out of Water; Cougar (Orange Tree Theatre); The Crucible; Sex Sex Men Men; A New and Better You; Buggy Baby (The Yard); The Town that Trees Built (Young Vic); And the Rest of Me Floats (Birmingham Rep/Bush Theatre); The Borrowers (Tobacco Factory); Fabric; Drip Feed (Soho Theatre); Victoria’s Knickers; Consensual (NYT); Medusa; Much Ado About Nothing; Dungeness; Love and Information (Nuffield Southampton Theatres); Homos, or Everyone in America (Finborough Theatre); Songlines (HighTide); Punk Rock; Pomona (New Diorama/Mountview); Devil with the Blue Dress; FCUK’D (Off West End Award nomination) (The Bunker).
In 2017 Jess was awarded the Association of Lighting Designer’s Francis Reid Award.
David Gregory has sound designed many productions across the West End, UK and Internationally. He won the TTA Award for Sound in 2015. He is an associate sound designer at The Watermill Theatre in Newbury. David’s most recent and upcoming credits include: King John (RSC); A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Macbeth (Watermill Theatre and UK Tour); Pope (Royal and Derngate); Blue Door (Theatre Royal Bath); Cat In The Hat (Curve & UK Tour); Fantasia (Vaults); Thor & Loki (Assembly Roxy); Tartuffe (Theatre Royal Haymarket); Twelfth Night (Wilton’s Music Hall); The Selfish Giant (Vaudeville/Northampton); A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Watermill); George’s Marvellous Medicine (Curve & UK Tour); The Borrowers (Watermill); Boudica (Shakespeare’s Globe); Bombay Roxy (Dishoom); Cunning Vixen (ENO & Silent Opera); Gabriel (UK Tour); Twelfth Night and Romeo & Juliet (Watermill & Euro Tour); Grapes of Wrath (UK Tour/Nuffield); Frankenstein (Wilton’s Music Hall); These Trees Are Made Of Blood (Arcola); Terrorism (Bush Theatre); Queens of Syria (Young Vic & UK Tour); Alice in Wonderland (Watermill); The First Man (Jermyn Street Theatre); Our Friend The Enemy (UK/NYC); Pocket Merchant (Propeller Theatre Company); When We Were Woman (Orange Tree).
Casting Director Sophie Parrott CDG. Theatre credits include: Sweeney Todd; Othello; Paint Your Wagon; Clockwork Orange; The Big I Am; A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Liverpool Everyman); One Night In Miami; Wonderland (remount); Shebeen (Nottingham Playhouse); Songlines (HighTide); An Octoroon (Orange Tree Theatre / National Theatre); Blood Knot; The March On Russia (Orange Tree Theatre); The Crucible; Buggy Baby; This Beautiful Future (Yard Theatre); Big Aftermath of a Small Disclosure; Winter Solstice (Actors Touring Company); The Claim (Shoreditch Town Hall & National Tour); All The President’s Men?; Pomona (additional casting) (National Theatre); Death Of A Salesman (Royal and Derngate / Tour); Wish List; Yen (Royal Court and Royal Exchange Manchester); A Streetcar Named Desire (co-casting director, Royal Exchange Manchester); Bird (Sherman Cymru & Royal Exchange Manchester); Britannia Waves the Rules (Tour); Billy Liar (Royal Exchange Manchester); My Mother Said I Never Should (St James Theatre); The Crocodile (Manchester International Festival). Casting Director TV credits include: Call The Midwife (Series 9); Doctors (BBC). Casting Associate and Assistant TV credits include: Howards End; Delicious (two series); Rillington Place; Thirteen; Call the Midwife (five series); Silent Witness (two series); The Game; Esio Trot; Mr Stink; WPC56; The Preston Passion; The Night Watch; Holby City (four series); The Riots: In Their Own Words; Undeniable. Film credits include: The Secret Agent; Whirlpool; A Street Cat Named Bob (as Casting Associate).
Sophie was recently nominated for ‘Best Casting in a Theatre Production’ at the Casting Directors’ Guild Awards for An Octoroon (Orange Tree Theatre / National Theatre).
Following the Bush Theatre run, Rust will transfer to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, and then HighTide Festival Aldeburgh.
