Preview: Gaslight at Newcastle People’s Theatre

 Gaslight

Newcastle People’s Theatre

Tuesday 29^th March - Saturday 2^nd April 2022

“You’re not going out of your mind,” Detective Rough tells Bella Manningham in the climactic moments of Patrick Hamilton’s Gaslight. “You are slowly, methodically, systematically being driven out of your mind.”

Bella (Catherine Ellis)

Catherine Ellis plays Bella, a young woman on the edge. She’s hearing footsteps in the night, objects are moving by themselves and her husband Jack (Sam Hinton) keeps disappearing. He tells her she may be mad and she starts to believe him. As Bella begins to lose her grip on reality, she finds herself caught up in a scheme most foul.

Bella (Catherine Ellis)

While on the one hand this 1938 thriller is a classic Victorian melodrama, it is also an insightful and before-its-time depiction of an abusive relationship.

Gaslight (verb): to manipulate (a person) by psychological means into questioning his or her own sanity. – Oxford English Dictionary

Jack (Sam Hinton) & Bella (Catherine Ellis) 

The play’s title originated a term that is more relevant than ever. Last month, eighty-four years after the play was written, “gaslighting” was used in a High Court ruling for the first time to describe a husband’s psychological manipulation of his wife.

Rough (Stuart Douglas)

A timeless and enthralling thriller, full of mystery and torment, Gaslight promises to keep audiences on the edge of their seats as the secrets in the Manningham home are revealed. 

Photos: Tim Swinton

 

Cast:          Jack:  Sam Hinton

                    Bella:  Catherine Ellis

                    Rough:  Stuart Douglas

                    Elizabeth:  Val Russell

                    Nancy:  Emily Jeffrey

Director:    Gordon Russell

 

Tickets:

Gaslight is playing at the People’s Theatre in Heaton from Tuesday 29^th March to Saturday 2^nd April. The run includes a socially-distanced performance on Tuesday 29^th.

Find out more and book your tickets at www.peoplestheatre.co.uk