Make Me A Song - The Music of William Finn

THE MUSIC OF
WILLIAM FINN

Conceived by
Rob Ruggiero
Directed by
Andrew MacBean

With
Louise Dearman
Frances Ruffelle
Gareth Snook
Simon Thomas
Sally Ann Triplett
Ian H Watkins

Musical Director
Matthew Brind
Production Designer
Ben M Rogers
Costume Designer
Claire Bilyard
Sound Designer
Gareth Owen for Orbital Sound

Gareth Snook, Simon Thomas, Frances Ruffelle and Ian H Watkins

Creative Team

DirectorAndrew MacBean

Andrew MacBean has been Trevor Nunn's associate director on three West End and Broadway shows: The original Aspects of Love, Sunset Boulevard and Anything Goes- the latter at the Royal National Theatre and Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. With Andrew Lloyd Webber, he developed the premiere of Sunset Boulevard, directing both workshops prior to the West End opening. He was subsequently responsible for directing Betty Buckley, Elaine Paige and Petula Clark into the West End, later to take their performances to New York.

He trained as a director at the acclaimed Playwrights Horizons in New York City where he began his professional life assisting on the world premiere of Sondheim's Into The Woods. He then became the associate director for the American national tour of Nunsense!. As well, he was a senior member of the BMI musical theatre workshop. From New York, by sheer chance - he came to London to assist on a Simon Cadell/Lisa Harrow two hand play and met Trevor Nunn-- and his life moved to London with Aspects of Love. He most recently directed the 50th Anniversary production of West Side Story, taking a West-End cast to Larnaca for the Cyprus Festival.

With Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Lanford Wilson, he has created the musical Raindogs, based on Wilson's ground-breaking play Balm in Gilead. This was first seen as a one night showcase this year with a cast drawn from West-End shows. For three years he travelled the world staging shows for Coca Cola, creating their Lifehouse experiential events as well as large events such as Madison Square Garden, with Donald Sutherland, Dave Chappelle, Bon Jovi and Broadway stars.

He has devoted his life to the development of new, innovative musical theatre, creating West End Theatreworks -- a forum for London professional actors to develop new works for the stage, while perfecting their craft and continuing to work in shows at night. With Theatreworks, he developed and directed a 165-cast strong version of Maury Yeston's NINE, performed at Royal Festival Hall and recorded on CD starring Jonathan Pryce and Elaine Paige. Closer to Fellini's original concept of the film 8 1/2, it was hailed by its creators and theatre critics as "The most definitive, thrilling and extraordinary version of NINE to be seen or heard".