Press Release: Sadler's Wells and Universal Music UK present Message In A Bottle

[Jan McNulty]

13 December 2019

 

Message In A Bottle: Choreography by Kate Prince, set to the most celebrated hits of world-renowned artist, Sting 

 

Sadler’s Wells and Universal Music UK present Message In A Bottle, a new dance theatre production by Sadler’s Wells Associate Artist Kate Prince, set to the music of 17-time Grammy Award-winning artist Sting.

 

Message In A Bottle receives its world premiere at Sadler’s Wells’ West End theatre, The Peacock, from Thursday 6 February - Saturday 21 March 2020, followed by a UK and international tour. Gravity-defying lyrical hip hop dance and breath-taking music combine in an uplifting story of humanity and hope.

 

Message In A Bottle sees a village alive with joyous celebrations suddenly come under siege. In the chaos, three siblings, Leto, Mati and Tana are separated from their parents; they undertake a perilous journey to new lands and set out on their own extraordinary adventures. Songs include Every Breath You Take, Roxanne, Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic, Walking On The Moon, Englishman In New York, Shape Of My Heart and Fields Of Gold.

After its run at The Peacock, Message In A Bottle tours to Theatre de la Ville Luxembourg (26 - 28 March), The Lowry, Salford (1 - 4 April), Birmingham Hippodrome (8 - 11 April) and MAAG, Zurich (15 April - 3 May), with further international dates to be confirmed.

 

The production features exceptional dancers from ZooNation: The Kate Prince Company, including Lukas McFarlane as Leto – winner of Sky 1’s Got to Dance(2013); Tommy Franzen as Mati – BBC One’s So You Think You Can Dance (2010) and the Tom Hooper-directed CATS, in cinemas winter 2019; and Natasha Gooden – Blak Whyte Gray (Boy Blue) and Strictly Come Dancing – as Tana. 

 

Alongside these outstanding performers, the production also features a multi-award-winning creative team, including Alex Lacamoire (Music Supervisor and New Arrangements), Grammy and Tony Award winner for his work on musicals including Hamilton (2016), In The Heights (2008) and Dear Evan Hansen (2017). Music production and additional arrangements for the show are by multi-Grammy Award winner Martin Terefe, who has written and produced for artists such as Jason Mraz, Sean Mendes, KT Tunstall, Tom Odell and Train.

 

The team also comprises set design by Ben Stones (MEN 2011 Award winner for Best Design for Doctor Faustus at the Royal Exchange); video design by Andrzej Goulding (winner of the inaugural Theatre and Technology Award for Creative Innovation in Video Design for Room in 2017); costume design by Anna Fleischle (Olivier Award winner, 2016 for Hangmen); and lighting design by Natasha Chivers (Olivier Award winner, 2007 for Sunday in the Park with George). 

 

Sound design is by David McEwan (Music Producers Guild Award winner (2011)); music co-production and mixing is by Grammy Award-winning Oskar Winberg; and dramaturgy is by Lolita Chakrabarti, whose writing credits include the Uk Theatre Award-winning Life Of Pi. Alongside his performing role, Lukas McFarlaneappears as Associate Choreographer.

 

LISTINGS INFORMATION

Kate Prince & Sting
Message In A Bottle
The Peacock, WC2A
Thursday 6 February - Saturday 21 March 2020
Performances: Tuesday - Sunday; times vary
Tickets: £14 - £89
Ticket Office: 020 7863 8000 or www.sadlerswells.com

A Sadler’s Wells and Universal Music UK Production. Co-produced with Birmingham Hippodrome and The Lowry

Research and Development for the production is supported by The Movement, a dance producing partnership between Birmingham Hippodrome, The Lowry and Sadler’s Wells. Supported by Arts Council England, The Movement aims to nurture talent and bring large scale dance productions to even wider audiences

The Monument Trust supports new commissions at Sadler’s Wells 

Tickets for Message In A Bottle are on public sale via www.sadlerswells.com and 020 7863 8000
 

NOTES TO EDITORS

A Sadler’s Wells and Universal Music UK production

Tour Dates

6 February - 21 March 2020 - The Peacock, London

26 - 28 March - Theatre de la Ville Luxembourg

1 - 4 April - The Lowry, Salford 

7 - 11 April - Birmingham Hippodrome

15 April - 3 May - MAAG, Zurich


Creatives

Director and Choreographer                            Kate Prince

Music and Lyrics                                               Sting

Music Supervisor and New Arrangements     Alex Lacamoire             

Music Producer and Arranger                          Martin Terefe

Set Designer                                                    Ben Stones

Video Designer                                                Andrzej Goulding

Costume Designer                                           Anna Fleischle

Lighting Designer                                            Natasha Chivers

Sound Designer                                              David McEwan

Music Co-Producer and Mixer                         Oskar Winberg

Dramaturg                                                        Lolita Chakrabarti

Associate Choreographer                                Lukas McFarlane

Musical Associate                                            DJ Walde

Resident Director/Choreographer                     Robia Milliner Brown                 

Assistant Choreographers                              Tommy Franzen and Lizzie Gough

 

Cast

Samuel Baxter

Nafisah Baba

Annie Edwards

Onyemachi Ejimofor

Tommy Franzen

Nestor Garcia Gonzalez

Natasha Gooden

Lizzie Gough

Anna Holmström

Emma ‘Shortbread’ Houston

Ajani Johnson-Goffe

Daniella May

Lukas McFarlane

Kino McHugh

Michael Naylor

Aaron Nuttall

Daniel Phung

Hannah Sandilands

Delano Spenrath

Gavin L Vincent

 

About Kate Prince, MBE

Choreographer / Director / Writer

Kate Prince is Artistic Director of ZooNation: The Kate Prince Company, which she founded in 2002. She is an Associate Artist at the Old Vic and at Sadler’s Wells, where ZooNation is also a Resident Company. ZooNation: The Kate Prince Company is also an Associate Company at Birmingham Hippodrome and The Mayflower, Southampton.

 

ZooNation productions include: Into the Hoods (Novello Theatre 2008) which was the West End’s first hip hop dance show, Some Like It Hip Hop (Sadler’s Wells Peacock 2011-13, and UK tour, and 2019 revival), Groove on Down the Road (SouthBank Centre 2013-14), ZooNation: Unplugged (Sadler’s Wells 2013), The Mad Hatter’s Tea Party (Royal Opera House Linbury Studio 2014 and the Roundhouse 2016), Into the Hoods: Remixed (Sadler’s Wells Peacock 2015-16 and UK tour) and SYLVIA (Old Vic 2018). The company also created special performances for Nelson Mandela’s 90th birthday celebrations in Hyde Park 2008 and for the Laurence Olivier Awards in 2011 creating new choreography for West Side Story with the BBC Symphony Orchestra.

 

For TV Kate’s credits include choreography for Strictly Come Dancing, So You Think You Can Dance, The Royal Variety Show, Top of the Pops, Ant & Dec’s Saturday Night Take Away, CD:UK, Blue Peter, Strictly Dance Fever, Sport Relief, The Album Chart Show, Discomania and PopWorld.

 

Her film work includes choreography for Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, StreetDance 3D and a short film, The Holloway Laundrette, which she wrote & directed for BAFTA/Channel 4.

 

Other theatre work includes Everybody’s Talking About Jamie for Jonathan Butterell (Sheffield Crucible & West End, nominated for Olivier Award for Best Theatre Choreographer), Enda Walsh’s Ballyturk (National Theatre), Stephen Mear’s Shoes (Sadler’s Wells), I Can’t Sing! The X-Factor Musical (Palladium) and It’s A Mad World My Masters (RSC), both for Sean Foley.

 

With ZooNation she has also created choreography for sporting events, including the Beijing Olympic and Paralympic Handover Ceremonies (2008), the Opening Ceremony of the Tour de France (2007) and the IOC opening ceremony for the London 2012 Olympics at the Royal Opera House.

 

Kate has been nominated for three Olivier Awards, a South Bank Sky Arts Award, a WhatsOnStage Award and two Critics’ Circle National Dance Awards. Kate is a graduate of the University of Edinburgh with an MA in General Arts and has an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Winchester. She was awarded an MBE for services to dance in the Queen’s Birthday Honours, 2019.

 

In 2017, ZooNation: The Kate Prince Company became an Arts Council National Portfolio Organisation for 2018-22.

 

About Sting
Music & Lyrics

Composer, singer-songwriter, actor, author, and activist Sting was born in Newcastle, England before moving to London in 1977 to form The Police with Stewart Copeland and Andy Summers. The band released five studio albums, earned six GRAMMY Awards® and two Brits, and was inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2003. 

 

As one of the world’s most distinctive solo artists, Sting has received an additional 11 GRAMMY Awards®, two Brits, a Golden Globe, an Emmy, four Oscar nominations, a TONY nomination, Billboard Magazine’s Century Award, and MusiCares 2004 Person of the Year.  In 2003, he was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) by Queen Elizabeth II for his myriad of contributions to music. Also a member of the Songwriters Hall of Fame, he has received the Kennedy Center Honors, The American Music Award of Merit and The Polar Music Prize. Sting has been awarded Honorary Doctorates of Music by the University of Northumbria (1992), Berklee College of Music (1994), University of Newcastle upon Tyne (2006) and Brown University at its 250th Commencement ceremony (2018). 

 

Throughout his illustrious career, Sting has sold 100 million albums from his combined work with The Police and as a solo artist. 

 

Following his critically-acclaimed album, 57th & 9th, his first rock/pop collection in over a decade, Sting and reggae icon, Shaggy released a collaborative, island-influenced album, entitled 44/876, drawing from the many surprising connections at the heart of their music. With its title referencing their home country codes, 44/876 first and foremost honors the duo’s mutual love for Jamaica: Shaggy’s homeland, and the place where Sting penned such classics as The Police’s “Every Breath You Take.” Their chart-topping release debuted at #1 in Germany and Top 10 in the UK. It spent over 20 weeks atop Billboard’s Reggae Album chart in the US, earned Gold certifications in Poland and France and received the GRAMMY Award® for Best Reggae Album. 

 

The duo recently reunited to release a new, festive reggae song entitled “Silent Night (Christmas is Coming)” available on all streaming and digital platforms. https://smarturl.it/StingSilentNight

 

Earlier this year, Sting was honoured at the BMI Pop Awards for his enduring hit single “Every Breath You Take,” which has become the Most Performed Song, with 15 million radio plays, from BMI’s catalog of over 14 million musical works. 

On May 24, a new album entitled My Songs, featuring contemporary interpretations of his most celebrated hits, was released and followed by a world tour of the same name. Sting’s ‘My Songs’ World Tour is a dynamic and exuberant show featuring his most beloved songs spanning the 17-time GRAMMY Award® winner’s prolific career with The Police and as a solo artist. 

 

The special edition release of Sting’s album, My Songs was released November 8 and includes a bonus CD with new live recordings from the My Songs World Tour.  At the same time, a digital album titled My Songs: Live containing 11 new live recordings also captured along the My Songs World Tour was also released on November 8. 

 

Next year, Sting will headline a Las Vegas residency, “My Songs,” set to open at The Colosseum at Caesars Palace Friday, May 22, 2020. The show will present a compendium of Sting’s songs with dynamic, visual references to some of his most iconic videos and inspirations. 

 

He has appeared in more than 15 films, executive produced the critically acclaimed A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, and in 1989 starred in The Threepenny Opera on Broadway.  His most recent theatre project is the Tony®-nominated musical The Last Ship, inspired by his memories of the shipbuilding community of Wallsend in the North East of England where he was born and raised. The show, with music and lyrics by Sting, ran on Broadway in 2014/2015 and completed a UK regional theatre tour which ran from March-July 2018. Thereafter, Sting starred as shipyard foreman Jackie White in the Toronto-based production of The Last Ship at the Princess of Wales Theatre. He will reprise the role for productions in Los Angeles at the Ahmanson Theatre (January 14 – February 16, 2020), San Francisco at the Golden Gate Theatre (February 20 – March 22, 2020), Washington, D.C at the National Theatre (March 27-April 5), St. Paul, MN at the Ordway Center (April 8-19), and in Detroit, MI at the Detroit Opera House (April 22-26). Additional information on The Last Ship International Tour can be found at thelastshipmusical.co.uk. 

 

Sting’s support for human rights organizations such as the Rainforest Fund, Amnesty International, and Live Aid mirrors his art in its universal outreach.  Along with wife Trudie Styler, Sting founded the Rainforest Fund in 1989 to protect both the world’s rainforests and the indigenous people living there.  Together they have held 19 benefit concerts to raise funds and awareness for our planet’s endangered resources. Since its inception, the Rainforest Fund has expanded to a network of interconnected organizations working in more than 20 countries over three continents. 

www.sting.com

Instagram: @theofficialsting

Twitter: @officialsting

Facebook: http://bit.ly/2TU4Y1Z

 

About Sadler’s Wells
Co-Producer

Sadler's Wells is a world-leading creative organisation based in London committed to the making of dance, with over three centuries of theatrical heritage. Since 2005, Sadler’s Wells has created award-winning dance productions, co-productions and touring projects in collaboration with its portfolio of Associate Artists, as well as international dance companies and partners. 

 

These include Russell Maliphant’s multi award-winning production PUSH with Sylvie Guillem; Crystal Pite’s Polaris with Thomas Adès; Gravity Fatigue, directed by fashion designer Hussein Chalayan; Sutra by Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and sculptor Antony Gormley; Michael Keegan-Dolan’s Swan Lake/ Loch na hEala; productions by Carlos Acosta’s company Acosta Danza; Natalia Osipova’s Pure Dance; Botis Seva’s BLKDOG and William Forsythe’s A Quiet Evening of Dance. 

 

Sadler’s Wells plays a significant role in the development of dance, bringing innovative and inspiring works to worldwide audiences. In the last 14 years, it has created 48 productions that have been enjoyed by 2 million people, with over 2,300 performances given at 348 venues in 48 countries. Sadler’s Wells productions have toured to some of the most prestigious theatres and festivals around the world, such as the Sydney Opera House, the Lincoln Center’s White Light Festival in New York, the National Centre for Performing Arts in Beijing and the Chekhov International Theatre Festival in Moscow. 

 

2020 sees the world premiere of four new major productions: Message In A Bottle, a Sadler's Wells and Universal Music UK production by Kate Prince, based on the songs of Sting; Nico Muhly: Drawn Lines, featuring works by Julie Cunningham, Michael Keegan-Dolan and Justin Peck; Enter Achilles by Lloyd Newson, co-produced with Rambert; and The Rite of Spring/ common ground in partnership with the Pina Bausch Foundation and École des Sables.

www.sadlerswells.com/touring

 

"If you could pick up a dance piece, turn it inside out and look at the label, the words 'Made at Sadler's Wells' would be a guarantee of quality. Since 2005, the north London theatre has been a hotbed of dance creativity, commissioning and supporting some of the world's finest choreographers to make work”. The Scotsman

 

About Universal Music UK
Co-Producer

Universal Music UK is a division of Universal Music Group (UMG), the world leader in music-based entertainment, with a broad array of businesses engaged in recorded music, music publishing, merchandising and audiovisual content in more than 60 countries. Featuring the most comprehensive catalogue of recordings and songs across every musical genre, UMG identifies and develops artists and produces and distributes the most critically acclaimed and commercially successful music in the world. Committed to artistry, innovation and entrepreneurship, UMG fosters the development of services, platforms and business models in order to broaden artistic and commercial opportunities for our artists and create new experiences for fans. Universal Music Group is a Vivendi company.

universalmusic.com