Nevermore

Nevermore description

Nevermore – The Imaginary Life and Mysterious Death of Edgar Allan Poe is a gothic musical play that follows the American writer Edgar Allan Poe on his final journey.

On a rainy night in Richmond, Virginia, Poe boards a steamship for New York, a city he will never reach. The crossing becomes a voyage through his memory and imagination, revisiting the tragedy, addiction, poverty and loss that marked his life and fed some of the most original stories and poems of his age. Blending fact and fiction, the show leads Poe to the realisation that the bleakest tale he ever told was the story of his own life. Poe died in unexplained circumstances in 1849, at the age of 40.

The piece was created by Canada's Catalyst Theatre in Edmonton in 2009 to mark the bicentenary of Poe's birth, commissioned by the Magnetic North Theatre Festival and co-commissioned by Luminato. It has played across Canada and at the Barbican in London in 2010, received its New York premiere at the New Victory Theater and ran Off-Broadway at New World Stages in 2015, where it earned three Lucille Lortel Award nominations, including Outstanding Musical. The New York Times called it "exquisitely stylish... a gothic fantasia", and TheaterMania found it "startling, beautiful, and haunting". It now returns to London for a limited season at Charing Cross Theatre.

Jonathan Christenson, artistic director of Catalyst Theatre, wrote the book, music and lyrics and also directs. His work as a writer, director and composer has been recognised with Canada's Sterling and Betty Mitchell Awards and with Fringe First and Herald Angel Awards in Scotland. Bretta Gerecke, Catalyst's resident designer, designs the sets, costumes and lighting; her credits include work for Cirque du Soleil, the National Theatre and the RSC. Choreography is by Laura Krewski, and Krewski and Gerecke both received Lucille Lortel nominations for the show. Orchestrations are by Christenson with Matthew Skopyk, with sound effects design by Wade Staples and sound design by Andrew Johnson.

The London production is cast by Neil Rutherford, former Head of Casting at the Ambassador Theatre Group, and produced by M. Kilburg Reedy for MKR Entertainment Group, Martin Hummel and Catalyst Theatre.

Book now to join Poe on his last, haunted voyage in a musical that turns his life into one of his own dark tales.

Playing at Charing Cross Theatre

The Arches, Villiers Street, London, WC2N 6NL GB (venue info)

Directions