18 – 23 March
Acclaimed Broadway production of The Kite Runner is bound for Bath as thrilling staging of international best-seller tours to the Theatre Royal
Direct from Broadway, The Kite Runner visits the Theatre Royal Bath from Monday 18th to Saturday 23rd March as part of a new nationwide tour. Epic, exhilarating and accompanied by evocative and virtuosic live drumming by Tabla player Hanif Khan, this unforgettable, theatrical tour de force is a faithful adaptation of a true modern classic.
Afghanistan is a country on the verge of war and best friends are about to be torn apart. It’s a beautiful afternoon in Kabul, the skies are full of colour and the streets are full of the excitement of a kite flying tournament, but no one can foresee the terrible incident that will shatter their lives forever.
Based on Khaled Hosseini’s bestselling novel, this haunting tale of friendship spans cultures and continents as it follows one man’s journey to confront his past and find redemption. Matthew Spangler’s stage adaptation, directed by Giles Croft, has garnered international acclaim with two West End runs and a Broadway season.
The company includes Stuart Vincent as the show’s narrator, Amir, and Dean Rehman in the pivotal role of Baba. Hassan is played by Yazdan Qafouri, who also appears as Sohrab. Bhavin Bhatt reprises the role of Assef, after winning Best Newcomer at the Asian Media Awards when he starred in The Kite Runner in the West End. The cast also features Daphne Kouma as Soraya, Tiran Aakel as Ali and Farid, Ian Abeyesekera as General Taheri, Christopher Glover as Ramin Khan, Aram Mardourian as Kamal, Stanton Wright as Wali, with Amar Aggoun and Sulin Hasso in the Ensemble.
Hanif Khan has been the resident Tabla player for The Kite Runner since 2013. During his career, Hanif has performed internationally in Europe, the Middle East and North America, as well as nationwide in the UK, including at the Royal Albert Hall, Royal Festival Hall, The Royal Opera House, Edinburgh International Festival, and the Glastonbury and Womad Festivals.
Published in 2003, The Kite Runner was Khaled Hosseini’s first novel. It became an instant bestseller across the globe and has since been published in seventy countries, selling more than thirty-one million copies, in sixty languages.
Matthew Spangler, who has adapted The Kite Runner for the stage, is a playwright, director, and professor based in the San Francisco Bay Area. His other plays include Mozart!, a musical theatre adaptation of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s letters; adaptations of James Joyce’s Dubliners and Finnegan’s Wake; A Paradise It Seems, an adaptation of John Cheever’s short stories, and stage adaptations of John Steinbeck’s fiction, Ernest Hemingway’s short stories and T.C. Boyle’s Tortilla Curtain, which received an Edgerton Foundation New American Play Award.
Writer Khaled Hosseini was born in Kabul, Afghanistan, in 1965. His father was a diplomat in the Afghan Foreign Ministry and his mother taught Farsi and History in Kabul. In 1976, the Foreign Ministry relocated the Hosseini family to Paris. They planned to return to Kabul, but their homeland witnessed a violent communist coup and invasion by the Soviet Army. Granted political asylum in America, the Hosseinis moved to California in 1980. Twenty years later, whilst practicing medicine, Khaled Hosseini began writing his first novel, The Kite Runner in 2001. Published in 2003, his debut went on to become an international bestseller and beloved classic, spending over a hundred weeks on the New York Times’ Bestseller List. In 2007, his second novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns, debuted at number one on the New York Times’ Bestseller List, remaining in the top spot for fifteen weeks and spending nearly an entire year on the Bestseller List.
The Kite Runner appears at the Theatre Royal Bath from Monday 18th to Saturday 23rd March. To book tickets contact the Theatre Royal Bath Box Office on 01225 448844 or visit theatreroyal.org.uk
Photo credit: Mark Douet
