CS Lewis's classic set to be a roaring success at Christmas

CLASSIC children's tale The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe is set to be staged in the Capital as part of the upcoming season of shows at Edinburgh's Royal Lyceum Theatre.

The CS Lewis novel will be this year's Christmas show after young theatre-goers voted it above the Harry Potter books as the story they would most like to see adapted for the stage.

Last year's Christmas show, The Wizard of Oz, below, broke the Lyceum's box office records, selling more than 32,000 tickets, and theatre bosses are hoping this year's show will be just as successful.

Other programme highlights include a production of Shakespeare's Macbeth and Arthur Miller's The Man Who Had All the Luck.

The Lyceum's artistic director, Mark Thomson, said: "We are delighted to present a season of plays that together celebrate how vivid and elastic a theatre experience can be.

"Great writers and original voices mean the journey through our season should engage our audiences with a thrilling and unpredictable odyssey driven by masters of their class and genre.

"From Shakespeare's powerhouse Macbeth, through JM Barrie's hauntingly beautiful ghost story, Mary Rose, to Sam Shepard's visceral Curse of the Starving Class, each play stakes its claim as the finest of its kind."

Recently voted the best children's book of all time following a poll by the literary charity Booktrust, The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe was chosen as this year's Christmas show after youngsters were asked which book they would most like to see staged at the Lyceum.

Katherine Solomon, a spokeswoman for Booktrust, said: "It is wonderful to see the enduring popularity of these books, which are enjoyed by generation after generation.

"Our survey shows that The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe hasn't lost any of its astonishing magic since it was first published in 1950."

The theatre has also announced that Liam Brennan will play the lead role in Shakespeare's Macbeth, following his performance in last season's A Winter's Tale.

The first of two co-productions, Macbeth will start the season off in September before travelling south of the Border in October to show at the Nottingham Playhouse.

The other co-production is The Mystery of Irma Vep, a comedy directed by Perth Theatre's Ian Grieve.

Other highlights of the season include John Dove directing his third Arthur Miller play for the Lyceum and a visiting production of Something Wicked This Way Comes, directed by Gill Robertson, who was the director of last year's highly successful Wizard of Oz.

Michael Frayn's Copenhagen, which centres around a meeting that took place in 1941 between atomic bomb physicists Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg, will be the season finale.

Tickets for The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe go on sale on June 2.

WHAT'S ON IN THE COMING YEAR

Macbeth: September 12 – October 11. Directed by Lucy Pittman-Wallace

Something Wicked This Way Comes: October 15-18. Directed by Gill Robertson

(Visiting production by Catherine Wheels and the National Theatre of Scotland.)

Mary Rose: October 24 – November 15. Directed by Tony Cownie

Christmas Show: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe: November 28 – January 3, 2009. Directed by Mark Thomson

The Man Who Had All The Luck: January 16 – February 14. Directed by John Dove

The Mystery of Irma Vep: February 20 – March 14. Directed by Ian Grieve

Curse of the Starving Class: March 20 – April 11. Directed by Mark Thomson

Copenhagen: April 17 – May 9. Directed by Tony Cownie