World premiere of The Van Gogh Musical in Eastbourne
The world premiere of Vagabond Skies – The Van Gogh Musical will be staged at the Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne from September 12-14, the culmination of a journey going back more than 50 years for Tony Norman who created it with Mark Edwards.
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00:00Okay.
00:01Good afternoon, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers. Now we have
00:07something very exciting happening in Eastbourne. We have the world premiere of the new musical
00:11Vagabond Skies, the Van Gogh musical, which is going to be staged at the Devonshire Park
00:16Theatre in Eastbourne from September the 12th to the 14th from the creative team of Tony
00:21Norman and Mark Edwards. Lovely to speak to Tony. Now Tony, this is a musical which in
00:27your life goes back more than 50 years, doesn't it?
00:30Yeah, that's right, Phil. I got the idea 50 years ago when a friend gave me a copy of
00:35the Van Gogh letters. I read them and realised what a sensitive man Vincent Van Gogh was
00:41and how his life would work very well as a musical. I didn't think I'd be the one to
00:46write it because I wasn't writing songs at that time. But over the years, things developed
00:52and now, as you say, in a few weeks' time, we have our world premiere here in Eastbourne.
00:58And the lovely thing is you're wanting to get it in just before your 77th birthday.
01:03Yes, that's right.
01:04You are going to do so, aren't you?
01:07That's right, the 77th, the week after we have our run at the Devonshire Park. And every
01:13step of the way, writing Vagabond Skies sounds like it'd be an enormous chore, but it wasn't.
01:19Every time I worked with it, because obviously there were gaps away from it, but every day I
01:24worked on Vagabond Skies, I loved it. And I felt closer and closer to Vincent Van Gogh.
01:30And you're wanting to show something specific about him. You're challenging the cliches that he was mad at.
01:37Yes, very much so, Phil. Basically, there's a lot of dark humour about the fact he cut his ear off,
01:48which obviously I don't have any time for. And also, he's often seen as a bit of a mad figure,
01:55daubing paint manically on canvases. But actually, he was a great craftsman. And just for one small
02:02example, if you look at his paintings of flowers and how delicate they are, then they're absolutely
02:08beautiful, including, of course, a series of paintings he did down in Provence, which are the
02:14sunflowers. You look at those and you think, these weren't created by a madman. These were created
02:19with someone who had real hearts, and also real skill as an artist.
02:24And you would say also real strength of personality.
02:27Yeah, well, if you think...
02:28It's a misconception that he was somehow a weak figure, but your point is he wasn't, there was strength.
02:33That's exactly it. I mean, if you think of anything that you might like to do for 10 years,
02:38and you do it for that period of time, and you receive no encouragement whatsoever,
02:43that's a long, lonely time. But that was Vincent van Gogh's life, and he never faltered. He always
02:50wanted to, he loved painting, and his quest was to be accepted as an artist. He did it for 10 years,
02:56and only sold one painting, right near the end of his life, which was the Red Vineyard.
03:01It's called Beautiful Painting.
03:03Well, it's a fascinating show. It's at the Denver Park Theatre, Eastbourne, September 12th to the 14th.
03:12Good luck. I hope it goes brilliantly.
03:14Thank you very much, Phil.