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HAUNTED STAGE PRESS RELEASE NOTES
David Benson

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Independent on Sunday article

There’s something creepy going on in the old West Drawing Room…

For years, stories of odd sounds, ghostly shadows and unnerving atmospheres have hung about this remote corner of The Assembly Rooms – and not just when the Fringe is on!

How appropriate then that Fringe favourite David Benson should premiere his latest show in this most haunted of rooms.

Famous for his mesmerising portraits of Kenneth Williams and Frankie Howerd, Benson now turns his attention from dead camp comedians to the just plain dead. Or perhaps the ‘not quite dead enough…’

So, what are ghosts anyway? Why, as we race hell-for-leather into the 21st Century, do they continue to haunt us? And has anyone actually seen one?

Benson explores these questions with his audience and illuminates the show with brilliant enactments of stories by the Masters of Terror – Henry James, M. R. James, his distant relative E.F. Benson and others. Plus a true tale of his own, guaranteed to make your hair stand on end.

Expect the unexpected as you enter the old West Drawing Room - and gaze upon the Haunted Stage…

David Benson stunned critics and audiences with his Fringe First-winning show Think No Evil of Us - My Life With Kenneth Williams in 1996. Since then, he has worked the trick again with Mourning Glory (1998 – a wicked meditation on the death and funeral of Diana, subsequently invited to the 1999 Sydney Festival), To Be Frank - Frankie Howerd and The Secret of Happiness (2001); and last year’s hit Star Struck, in which he portrayed all the guests at a disastrous party given by Noel Coward.

David co-devised and directed Janet Street-Porter’s smash hit solo show All The Rage at the 2003 Edinburgh Fringe and contributed material to Linda Marlowe’s solo tour-de-force No Fear!

Benson won rave reviews for his portrayal of Inspector Truscott in Joe Orton’s Loot at Derby Playhouse, directed by Cirque du Soleil’s Cal McCrystal (November 2003) and will be working with McCrystal again later this year in his first panto appearance, at Newbury Corn Exchange.

Benson’s Radio 4 series The Private World of Kenneth Williams was released on CD by BBC Worldwide in April.

For more information contact:
Guido Goetz, Publicity: 07939 393 448 Festival Highlights

Have you ever had a supernatural experience? Know any good, true ghost stories? Why not share them on our Guest Book ?

 

David plugs Haunted Stage on the Vanessa Feltz Show, BBC Radio London 17-7-04

 

David Benson's Haunted Stage - Previews

Friday 9 & Saturday 17 July 8pm, The Plough Inn Theatre, Wood Street, London E17, Tickets £5. Tel 020 8503 7419

Thursday 22 July 7.30pm, Tower Arts Centre, Winchester, Tickets £6.50. Tel: 01962 867986

Tuesday 27 July 7.30pm, The Chelsea Theatre, Kings Road, London SW10. Tickets £12 (double bill with Gone by Glyn Cannon) tel 0870 990 8454
Single show £7 - from box office on the night, subject to availability

Friday 30 July 8pm , Riverside Studios , Crisp Road, London W6. Tickets £10 (double bill with The Elephant Woman) tel 020 8237 1111

Friday 6 August - Monday 30 August (except 17 August) 12.45pm. Assembly Rooms, George Street, Edinburgh. Tickets £5 - £11 tel 0131 226 2428