Eilenberg’s Shrunk marks Olivier winner’s return

Published 24 February 2010

Playwright Charlotte Eilenberg, who won the Laurence Olivier Award for Most Promising Playwright in 2003, is to premiere her new piece Shrunk at the Cock Tavern theatre.

A comic two-hander about a successful, content psychoanalyst whose life is changed by the arrival of new client Celia, Shrunk runs at the Kilburn venue from 18 May to 12 June (press night 21 May).

Eilenberg’s first play, The Lucky Ones, for which she won her Laurence Olivier Award, played at Hampstead theatre in 2002. It proved so successful that in addition to the Olivier, Eilenberg also collected the Critics’ Circle Award for Most Promising Playwright. Yet since her initial success, the former press representative has slipped from prominence.

Her comeback is staged at the Cock Tavern theatre by first time producer Mark Shenton, who is better known as an arts journalist and critic, writing for publications including The Stage and the Sunday Express.

The Cock Tavern theatre is among London’s youngest venues, having been formed in January 2009. Its focus on new writing and selected revivals has seen it quickly build a reputation for itself, winning the Dan Crawford Pub Theatre Award at the 2009 Peter Brook Empty Space Awards. It is currently staging an acclaimed production of Puccini’s La Bohème which moves the story of troubled love to contemporary Kilburn.

MA


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