Described by Entertainment South Wales as “Wonderfully absorbing” Arnold Evans musical play Novello & Son featuring Rosamund Shelley as Clara Novello Davies and Gavin Roberts as her accompanist will return to Wales for two further dates this summer.
Featuring a selection of Ivor Novello’s best-loved songs and his doting mother to sing them, Novello & Son is a simple enough idea for a show. However, nothing can ever be simple when it’s Madame Clara Novello Davies who takes centre stage. Indomitable, impetuous, with an ego the size of the Ritz, her genius for choral music had once won her international acclaim.
But it’s 1938 and those halcyon days are long past and never to return – not that Ivor could ever persuade her of that. With their relationship at (yet another) crisis point, this drama sees Clara struggle to come to terms with a world that has lost interest in her kind of music and fallen head-over-heels for her son. She is in her seventies, but still harbouring hare-brained schemes to get back into the limelight. And poor Ivor, always the loving son, is doing his best to keep her happy – and to keep her in check.
As she sings his songs and dutifully sings his praises, she finds herself re-living the traumas of a remarkable life that took her from a modest suburb in Cardiff to the epicentre of London’s Theatreland
Novello & Son will play Drill Hall, Chepstow on 18 May, 2023 at 7.30pm and Llantrisant Guildhall or outdoor on Castle Green on 14 July, 2023 at 7.30 pm. Both performances are supported by ACW Noson Allan.
- For further details visit the Novello & Son website.