Campbell, Johnston, McKean and Murphy to Star in West End Love Song
Neve Campbell, Kristen Johnston, Michael McKean and Cillian Murphy will headline John Kolvenbach's Love Song in the West End. The romantic comedy, directed by John Crowley, will begin performances at the New Ambassadors Theatre on November 25. It officially opens there on December 4.
The play centers on Beane Murphy, who is an exile from life–an oddball. His well-meaning sister Joan Johnston and brother-in-law Harry McKean try and make time for him in their busy lives, but no one can get through. Following a burglary of his apartment, Joan is baffled to find her brother blissfully happy and tries to unravel the story behind Beane's mysterious new love Molly Campbell. The piece explores the infectious effects of love and the redemptive power of hope.
Campbell was last seen in the West End in Arthur Miller's Resurrection Blues at the Old Vic earlier this year. Best known for playing Sidney Prescott in Wes Craven's Scream trilogy, her other film work includes The Company, Churchill, Relative Strangers, Panic, Blind Horizon, Drowning Mona, I Really Hate My Job, Closing the Ring and The Death of Harry Tobin. She is also known for her TV roles in Party of Five and The Canterville Ghost.
Johnston, who will be making her West End debut in Love Song , is best known for her two-time Emmy Award-winning roles in 3rd Rock from the Sun and ER. On stage, she has appeared in New York in As You Like It and Portrait of a Woman for the Atlantic Theater Company, The Lights for Lincoln Center, The Women for Roundabout Theatre Company and Much Ado About Nothing at the Public Theater. Her film work includes the recently completed Music and Lyrics By as well as Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me andThe Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas.
McKean first came to fame as Lenny in the 1970s sitcom Laverne & Shirley, and later co-created, composed music for and starred as David St. Hubbins in Rob Reiner's This is Spinal Tap, with Christopher Guest, Reiner and Harry Shearer. He has also collaborated with Guest on A Mighty Wind co-writing the music and composed songs for Waiting for Guffman and Best in Show, and co-writing The Big Picture with Guest. He also has a featured role in Guest's new film For Your Consideration that is to be released shortly. Other films credits include Hopeless Pictures, The Producers, Relative Strangers, The Aristocrats, Auto Focus, Little Nicky, Beautiful, True Crime, Teaching Mrs. Tingle, Mystery Alaska and The Brady Bunch Movie. He has appeared in the Broadway productions of Accomplice in 1990, Hairspray taking over the lead role of Edna Turnblad in 2004 and playing the role of Hines in the revival of The Pajama Game earlier this year.
Murphy had starring roles in Ken Loach's 2006 Palme d'Or Award-winning film The Wind that Shakes the Barley as well as Red Eye, Batman Begins, 28 Days Later, Breakfast on Pluto, Girl with a Pearl Earring and Cold Mountain. In 2003 Crowley directed him in Intermission. His theatre work includes Disco Pigs, which opened at the Dublin Theatre Festival and then toured extensively. Murphy later starred in the film version. His other theatre work includes The Country Boy, Juno and the Paycock, Playboy of the Western World and The Shape of Things, all for Dublin's Gaiety Theatre. He also played Konstantin in Peter Stein's Edinburgh Festival production of The Seagull in 2003.
The New Ambassadors' current tenant, Peter Hall's revival of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, will end its limited run there on November 18. Love Song is initially booking through March 3, 2007.
