Michael Frayn’s Noises Off tours to Oxford as the sell-out play celebrates its 40^th anniversary

Following its successful West End season, Noises Off heads to the Main Stage to delight Oxford audiences. Touring to The Playhouse from Tuesday 20 to Saturday 24 February, the production will star Liza Goddard as Dotty Otley, Paul Bradley as Selsdon Mowbray and Simon Shepherd as Lloyd Dallas.

With laughs aplenty, Michael Frayn’s celebrated play within a play follows the on and off-stage antics of a touring theatre company stumbling their way through the fictional farce, Nothing On.

From the shambolic final rehearsals before opening night in Weston-super-Mare, to a disastrous matinee in Ashton-under-Lyne seen entirely, and hilariously silently, from backstage, before we share their final, brilliantly catastrophic performance in Stockton-on-Tees.

Liza Goddard’s extensive stage comedy credits include Life of Riley, Communicating Doors, Season’s Greetings and Relatively Speaking.Paul Bradley is best known for playing Nigel Bates in EastEnders and Elliot Hope in Holby City. Simon Shepherd’s many stage and TV credits include Peak Practice and West End productions of Posh, The Duck House, Rapture, Art and Hay Fever.

Hailed as the master of farce comedy, multi award-winning playwright and novelist Michael Frayn has inspired a generation of comedies since his production of Noises Off first opened in 1982. Now considered a comedy classic, Frayn’s legendary play has enjoyed stagings worldwide, including five productions in the West End and three on Broadway.

The ensemble cast includes Simon Coates as Frederick Fellowes, Lucy Robinson as Belinda Blair, Daniel Rainford as Tim Allgood, Dan Fredenburgh as Garry Lejeune, Lisa Ambalavanar as Brooke Ashton and Nikhita Lesler as Poppy Norton-Taylor.

Daniel Rainford returns to The Playhouse after playing Tommo Peaceful in the stage adaptation of Michael Morpurgo’s Private Peaceful in 2022. His stage credits also include Mr Burns: A Post Electric Play, When Darkness Falls and Once Upon a Time in Nazi Occupied Tunisia.

Presented by Theatre Royal Bath Productions in association with Birmingham Rep, Michael Frayn’s Noises Off is directed by Lindsay Posner, with design by Simon Higlett, lighting by Paul Pyant, sound by Gregory Clarke, composition by Will Stuart, movement and fight direction by Ruth Cooper-Brown and casting by Ginny Schiller. The Associate Director is George Jibson.