Holding Fire!

Play From 28 July 2007 to 5 October 2007

Shakespeare's Globe Theatre 21 New Globe Walk, Bankside, London

The Shakespeare's Globe Theatre in London presents Jack Shepherd's play Holding Fire! during the 2007 Season.

England 1837: a country on the cusp of revolution. A young girl is propelled on a journey from a London slum to the servants' quarters of a great house, and from first love to murder. In her flight from authority she comes across the Chartist William Lovett, a man striving to steer a middle course between the brutal coalition of Parliament and Industry and the angry forces gathering against it. But can his rational, moderate voice be heard above the din of government militias on one side and the roaring militancy of Feargus O’Conor on the other?

Ranging from East End squalor to Nottingham mills, Jack Shepherd tells a picaresque tale of tavern assemblies and prize fights, gin palace communists and bullying do-gooders, industrialists and whores, bringing to the Globe for the first time the sordid, violent times of early Victorian England.

Jack Shepherd's Holding Fire! in London is directed by Mark Rosenblatt.

Jack Shepherd has worked at the Globe many times before – both as actor and director – and makes a welcome return as writer with his latest play, Holding Fire! Shepherd is author of Chasing the Moment, In Lambeth and Through A Cloud. His play will be directed by talented young director, Mark Rosenblatt. Rosenblatt is Artistic Director of Dumbfounded Theatre, currently an Associate Company at the Young Vic. His credits include Arthur Schnitzler’s Professor Bernhardi (Arcola Theatre) and The Circle (Oxford Stage Company).

Othello From 4 May to 19 August 2007
In Extremis From 15 to 26 May 2007
The Merchant of Venice From 2 June to 6 October 2007
Love's Labour's Lost From 1 July to 7 October 2007
Holding Fire From 28 July 5 October 2007
We The People From 2 September to 6 October 2007