Buster Keaton at the Hollywood Canteen | Space Arts Centre | 15-19 March

Buster Keaton at The Hollywood Canteen (as told by Orson Welles) is a new play by Mike Carter. It imagines a meeting between two of Hollywood’s most celebrated figures during World War II.

In the silent era, nobody matched Vaudevillian Buster Keaton for the inventiveness and scale of his imagination. Without the sentimentality of Chaplin, Keaton brought us epic train crashes, underwater photography, hurricanes and battle scenes – all delivered fearlessly with his famously stoic, beautifully photogenic stone face. By the 1940s, however, he was washed up, unemployable and a by word for has-been.

Orson Welles, on the other hand, is infamous for his ambition. After an Academy Award win for his first film, Citizen Kane – still often quoted as the best film ever made – his reputation suffered from a string of bad choices. Did he waste his talent? How much talent did he have in the first place?

In this world premiere Oddservants Theatre Company recreate a meeting between two stars who gained and lost fame and fortune as they charted Hollywood’s Golden Age.

Anthony Cozens (Dr Who, Sherlock, Doctors and Casualty) and John-Paul Conway (The Knight from Nowhere, Spit ‘N Polish) star as Buster and Orson respectively. Guleraana Mir (London Playwriting Lab, BBC and Old Vic long lists) directs.

Claim the Offer:

The Space Arts Centre is offering Under 25s the chance to see this piece of new writing about the history of cinema for £10. Discounted tickets are available by quoting the promo code under25 when booking online.

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