History of the Show

The play arose out of a desire of Nicholas Hytner the artistic director of the National Theatre to find a play for James Corden to star in. Corden had been in Hytner’s production of Alan Bennett’s The History Boys and he was concerned that his career was in the doldrums after negative media attention. Also both he and playwright Richard Bean wanted to make an accessible popular comedy that would also bring in new audiences for the National.

The result was an adaptation of Goldoni’s A Servant of Two Masters that was going to be updated – initially this was thought to be shortly after World War II – but the period was thought to be to drab so the decision was made to set it in 1963 where there would be the opportunity for more primary colours. Also important to them was retaining many of the elements of commedia dell’arte.

After 6 weeks of rehearsals and technical rehearsals the play opened at the Lyttelton Theatre at the National in September 2011 and was an immediate sensation. During this period the play was further fine-tuned before touring the UK for 5 weeks after which the original cast played a season at the Adelphi Theatre in the West End – theatre that normally houses musicals and seats 1500 – an indication of the incredible success. During the Adelphi run 10 minutes’ worth of cuts were made to the running time – but gradually with all the improvisation involved the running time gradually crept up to the original running time!

After the Adelphi run the original cast had a well-deserved break before transferring the show to Broadway. An entirely new company was rehearsed which then moved into the smaller 900 seat Haymarket Theatre – and there have been 2 subsequent tours of the show after the run there.

For a show that is so quintessentially British it became an immediate hit on Broadway winning James Corden a Tony award for best actor in a play. This confirmed his return to favour and directly led him to him starring in the film musical of Steven Sondheim’s Into the Woods and his current role as the host of the Late Late Show on American television.  Theatres loss is televisions gain!