Jane Eyre in Ellesmere

Polly Teale's Jane Eyre opens today at the Ellesmere College, Shropshire, UK:

Jane Eyre
by Charlotte Bronte
adapted by Polly Teale
Tuesday 24th
& Wednesday 25th March
7.30pm - Arts Centre

Charlotte Bronte’s timeless classic is brought to the Ellesmere Stage in this exciting adaptation by Polly Teale. Will Jane Eyre be able to be true to herself and still find happiness.
Ellesmere senior students will be presenting this innovative staging of the favourite novel for a limited number of performances before taking the production on tour in the USA.

A cast of 10 Senior School pupils at Ellesmere College have been spending much of their free time recently rehearsing for a production of Jane Eyre. Adapted by Polly Teale, the play has been directed by Margaret Hutchings, English and Media Studies Teacher. Following two performances next week in the School's Arts Centre, the cast and technical crew will be making their final preparations before touring the play in the USA during the Easter holidays.

The play is being staged in two Acts. Polly Teale's adaptation of Charlotte Bronte's 1847 novel, 'Jane Eyre', was first staged by the Shared Experience Theatre Company in 1997. In keeping with the original staging of the play, a total of twenty-six characters are played by only ten actors, with minimal set and props, allowing the audience's imagination to create the various locations and settings portrayed in the novel.

Margaret Hutchings commented, 'Central to Teale's adaptation of the novel is the idea that hidden inside the sensible, frozen Jane, played by Charlotte Boffey, exists another self who is passionate and sensual. This second self becomes the character of Bertha Mason, played by Charlotte Shearer, Mr Rochester's mad wife, who is trapped in the attic of Thornfield Hall. At the climax of the novel, therefore, when Jane comes face to face with Bertha, she is in fact also coming face to face with her own passionate nature. The essence of the play has been well embraced by the cast and we are all looking forward to the audiences' reactions.'

Categories: Jane Eyre, Theatre