Edward II: Premiere, Tour and Casting Announced
Renaissance tragedy meets Mean Girls meets 80s slasher movie…
DeNada Dance Theatre presents Carlos Pons Guerra’s Edward II
A new dance adaptation of Christopher Marlowe’s historical play
Premiere: Stanley & Audrey Burton Theatre, Leeds 30 & 31 October
then touring
Nicknamed ‘the Pedro Almodovar of dance’ by the BBC, Carlos Pons Guerra is one of the UK’s leading voices in contemporary queer dance. This autumn, he turns his
distinctive theatrical and choreographic eye to Christopher Marlowe’s Edward II,
transporting his narrative to the only place scarier than the medieval court of England
- high school.
Marlowe’s 1592 play tells the true story of the King of England who fell in love with
his male court favourite, Piers Gaveston. Their love led to a civil war and a chase
across England before they met their tragic end.
Pons Guerra’s high school fever dream interpretation tells the story of the King of the
Class, the boy he loves and the war that tears the playground apart. Hormone-
fuelled, spectacularly camp and aggressively poignant, his Edward II explores the
pain and joys of forbidden love - and the struggle and endurance of queer people
across history.
The work is set to an original score that glitches from 90s video arcade to medieval
electronics by Pons Guerra’s regular collaborator, Spanish MAX Award Winner, Luis
Miguel Cobo. Time-warping costume designs and set design are by April Dalton.
Lighting is by Barnaby Booth.
The piece is danced, lesson to lesson, by a cast of five: Will English (Club Guy and
Roni) as Edward II; Mariano Zamora (Studio Wayne McGregor and Ballet Hispanico
of New York) as Piers Gaveston; Tahlia Russell (Lewis Major Projects) as Edward's
wife, Queen Isabella; Ruby Portus (former Sadler's Wells Young Associate) as
Mortimer Junior, Isabella's lover., and Sebastien Kapps as Lightborne (Edward’s assassin).
Edward II was rarely performed in England until the decriminalisation of
homosexuality in the 1960s. Most historians and academics had until then ignored
the play, in part because of how it portrays a queer monarch, and the relationship
between Edward and Gaveston was largely described as a close friendship. Pons
Guerra’s Edward II is only the second dance adaptation following David Bintley’s
version for Stuttgart Ballet in 1995 which then entered the repertoire of Birmingham
Royal Ballet. It is also only the second dance adaptation of any of Marlowe’s works.
Pons Guerra’s Edward II has come out of his PhD at the University of Leeds,
provisionally entitled 'We Found Love in a Hopeless Place' Reparative Reading,
Queer Dance, and Christopher Marlowe's Edward II’. World experts on Marlowe and
the Renaissance from the Universities of Leeds, Sheffield and York have worked as
consultants on the show.
Pons Guerra says: “I have been living with Edward and Marlowe for over four years
now and in that time I've got very close to both of them. Edward, who was the first
recorded gay king of England, has an incredibly tragic story. And Marlowe, 'the bad
boy' of the Renaissance, tells it beautifully. Rather than dwell on the horror of the
story, my adaptation focuses on the deep, intense and timeless love between the two
male protagonists. I’m offering new queer lights with which to view the gay king of
England and invest Marlowe's text with love, camp and hope.”
Friday 30 & Saturday 31 October
Stanley & Audrey Burton Theatre, Leeds
2 St Cecilia St, Leeds LS2 7PA
Box office: 0113 220 8008 / https://northernballet.com/theatre/2026/edward-ii
Tuesday 17 November
Drama Studio, Sheffield
Shearwood Rd, Broomhall, Sheffield S10 2TD
Box office: 0114 222 8888 / https://performancevenues.group.shef.ac.uk/whats-on/
Friday 15 January
Heywood Civic, Rochdale
LCpl Stephen Shaw MC Way, Heywood, Greater Manchester OL10 1LW
Box office: 0300 303 8633 / https://heywoodcivic.co.uk/event/edward-ii/
Thursday 28 January
Barnsley Civic
46 Eldon St, Barnsley S70 2JL
Box office: 01226 327000 / https://barnsleycivic.co.uk/whats-on/
Tuesday 2 & Wednesday 3 March
Lowry, Salford
Pier 8, The Quays, Salford M50 3AZ
Box office: 0161 876 2000 / https://www.thelowry.com/whats-on