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14 Phonebox Magazine | June 2025Tales of the tavern are played out in this latest Bourne classic, The Midnight Bell, as Tom Johnston discovers.The master is at it again: Matthew Bourne%u2019s award-winning dance-theatre show The Midnight Bell is back on the road for a UK tour. It%u2019s a magical tour of London%u2019s streets that takes theatre goers to places they have never been before.In 1930s London ordinary people emerge from cheap boarding houses each evening to pour out their passions, hopes and dreams in the pubs and taverns along the fogbound streets of Soho and Fitzrovia. And you%u2019re invited to step inside The Midnight Bell, a tavern where one particular lonely-hearts club gathers to play out their lovelorn aff airs of the heart, bitter comedies of longing, frustration, betrayal and redemption. Matthew Bourne%u2019s The Midnight Bell is inspired by the work of the great English novelist and playwright Patrick Hamilton, who created some of the most authentic fi ction of his era; stories borne out of years of social interactions with working men and women at their favourite location %u2013 the London pub.As with many Bourne productions, this one has a pedigree already. The show premiered to great acclaim in 2021 and received five nominations at the 2022 National Dance Awards, with Matthew Bourne winning the award for Best Modern Choreography and Michela Meazza for Outstanding Female Modern Performance. %u201cThe Midnight Bell, with its entangled tales of lonely souls looking for love, was rather appropriately the piece that brought us back to national touring following nearly two years away due to the Covid pandemic in 2021,%u201d said Matthew.%u201cAt that time, audiences and the company were masked and socially distanced but immensely grateful to be back and particularly with a piece that explored the deep-rooted need for human connection. %u201cTouring was necessarily limited and audience confi dence still slowly returning, so I am particularly thrilled to be bringing back this heartfelt piece and to be presenting it in many venues for the fi rst time,%u201d he added.%u201cWe look forward to, once again, opening the doors of The Midnight Bell in 2025. Please join us%u2026 Mine%u2019s a gin and tonic!%u201dThe cast for this tour features 14 of charity and producer New Adventures%u2019 fi nest leading actor/dancers in roles that challenge and reveal the darker reaches of the human heart. They include Cordelia Braithwaite, Reece Causton, Glenn Graham, Daisy May Kemp, Hannah Kremer, Michela Meazza, Andy Monaghan, Liam Mower, Dominic North, Bryony Pennington, Edwin Ray, Danny Reubens, Ashley Shaw and Alan Vincent.The Midnight Bell takes the Derngate Theatre stage in Northampton from Tuesday 15th to Saturday 19th July.The Midnight Bell takes the Derngate Theatre stage in Northampton from Tuesday 15th to Saturday 19th July.Drunken stories from darkest Soho