CONCORD THEATRICALS ACQUIRES FROM AVALON SECONDARY LICENSING RIGHTS FOR “OPERATION MINCEMEAT”BY SPITLIP

New York, NY (April 4, 2024) – Concord Theatricals is honored to announce that it has secured from Avalon exclusive worldwide secondary licensing rights to David Cumming, Felix Hagan, Natasha Hodgson and Zoë Roberts’ six-time Olivier Award nominated West End hit, Operation Mincemeat. A release timeline will be announced at a later date. For more information, visit TK.

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David Cumming, Felix Hagan, Natasha Hodgson and Zoë Roberts said “to join Concord’s absolutely mind-boggling roster is the honour of our lives. We wanted to write a musical that shows that – no matter what you have at hand, no matter your set, your cast, your limits – you can create an incredible adventure.”

Producer Jon Thoday for Avalon said: “We are delighted Concord has acquired the non-replica rights for Operation Mincemeat, and look forward to aspiring theatre makers breathing life into this production around the world in due course.”

“We are immensely proud to be representing the global secondary licensing rights to the West End hit Operation Mincemeat,” said Steven Greenhalgh, Concord Theatricals’ VP of Acquisitions & Artistic Development. “From small beginnings David, Felix, Natasha and Zoë spent years crafting this very special musical and Concord Theatricals has enjoyed supporting them every step of the way. In collaboration with Avalon, we look forward to encouraging our theatre makers to embrace all the wit, heart and sangria Operation Mincemeat has to offer. Mission accepted. Huzzah!”

The year is 1943 and we’re losing the war. Luckily, we’re about to gamble all our futures on a stolen corpse. Operation Mincemeat is the fast-paced, hilarious and unbelievable true story of the twisted secret mission that won the Allies World War II. The question is, how did a well-dressed corpse wrong-foot Hitler?

Operation Mincemeat made its world premiere at New Diorama Theatre in 2019, followed by several runs at Southwark Playhouse in 2020, 2021 and 2022 and an extended run at Riverside Studios in 2022. The production landed at The West End’s Fortune Theatre and began previews on March 29, 2023. “The year’s funniest musical” (The Washington Post) was named the Best New Musical at the 2024 WhatOnStage Awards and received 6 Olivier Award nominations including for Best new Musical. With 67 5-star reviews, critics have nearly universally declared that this “irrepressible wartime musical is a West End triumph” (The Guardian).

The West End production is directed by Robert Hastie and choreographed by Jenny Arnold. The cast features SpitLip members David Cumming, Natasha Hodgson and Zoë Roberts, along with Claire-Marie Hall, Jak Malone, Seán Carey, Geri Allen, Christian Andrews and Holly Sumpton. Operation Mincemeat is presented in the West End by Avalon (in association with SpitLip), who have supported since the Southwark Playhouse runs. The show was commissioned by New Diorama Theatre, co-commissioned by The Lowry, and supported by the Rhinebeck Writers Retreat. In May 2023, Sony Music released the Original Cast Recording, which has been streamed over 2 million times worldwide.

BIOGRAPHIES

Concord Theatricals is the world’s most significant theatrical company, comprising the catalogs of R&H Theatricals, Samuel French, Tams-Witmark and The Andrew Lloyd Webber Collection, plus dozens of new signings each year. Our unparalleled roster includes the work of Irving Berlin, Agatha Christie, George & Ira Gershwin, Marvin Hamlisch, Lorraine Hansberry, Kander & Ebb, Tom Kitt, Ken Ludwig, Marlow & Moss, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Anaïs Mitchell, Dominique Morisseau, Cole Porter, Rodgers & Hammerstein, Thornton Wilder, and August Wilson. We are the only firm providing truly comprehensive services to the creators and producers of plays and musicals, including theatrical licensing, music publishing, script publishing, cast recording and first-class production. www.concordtheatricals.com

Avalon is a multi-award-winning talent management, television production and live promotions group with offices in London, Los Angeles and New York.

Avalon has produced live shows including: the hit musical Jerry Springer: The Opera, the first West End show to win all four UK ‘Best New Musical’ awards including four Olivier awards and resulted in Jon Thoday, alongside former New York Times CEO Mark Thompson, becoming the last person to be prosecuted for blasphemy in the UK and a welcome change in the law; Newman and Baddiel: Live at Wembley, the first ever arena comedy show in British history; Frank Skinner’s record breaking show at Battersea Power Station; Al Murray’s Olivier nominated West End run; Russell Howard’s 10 consecutive nights at the Royal Albert Hall, which broke a record previously held by Frank Sinatra; David Baddiel’s Olivier nominated one-man show My Family: Not The Sitcom; and most recently Idiots Assemble: Spitting Image Saves The World, which just completed a much-lauded run in the West End.

Avalon is the UK’s largest true independent television production company, with over 40 shows in production in the last year including: hit entertainment format Taskmaster (Channel 4 in the UK, Network 10 in Australia, TV4 in Sweden, TVNorge/Discovery+ in Norway); Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO); Starstruck (HBO Max/BBC); Not Going Out (BBC), the UK’s longest running sitcom on air; Breeders (FX/Sky); The Chris & Rosie Ramsey Show (BBC); and Fantasy Football League (Sky). Avalon has produced over 4,000 episodes of hit programming for audiences in the UK, US and around the world, winning over 30 Emmy Awards and BAFTAs from nearly 100 nominations. Other landmark Avalon shows include Catastrophe (Amazon/Channel 4), Flatbush Misdemeanors (Showtime), The Russell Howard Hour (Sky), TV Burp (ITV), and the cult classic workplace sitcom Workaholics (Comedy Central).

SpitLip

Having worked together in various guises over the past ten years, David Cumming, Felix Hagan, Natasha Hodgson and Zoë Roberts founded SpitLip in 2017 with the aim of making big, dumb musicals. Operation Mincemeat is their debut show. Writing and composing the show collaboratively as a foursome, SpitLip are proud to be making work in a new way, fusing together anarchic physical comedy, a furious gag-rate and a banging soundtrack.

In January 2022, SpitLip were featured in The Stage 25, a list of talent tipped to become the future stars of the UK theatre industry.

“An extraordinarily talented quartet… SpitLip could go stratospheric. Operation Mincemeat has proved to be one of the most exciting musical theatre debuts in decades.” – The Stage

David Cumming is Co-Artistic Director of SpitLip and comedy-horror troupe Kill the Beast – and a freelance theatre-maker/musician in his own right. He works as an actor, writer, director and composer, smashing comedy, drama and music together to create award-winning shows that break the mold.

Theatre includes: composer/sound designer on Saint Jude (Swamp Motel immersive), co-writer/co-director/composer on Dog Show (Pleasance Theatre), co-writer/co-director/co-composer on Frankenstein: How to Make A Monster (Battersea Arts Centre, Traverse Edinburgh, World Tour), Director’s Cut and Don’t Wake the Damp (Kill the Beast), co-writer/co-director on Ramping Up! (Battersea Arts Centre), and co-writer on He Had Hairy Hands and The Boy Who Kicked Pigs (Kill the Beast).

Film and TV includes: co-writer/co-creator/co-composer on Frankenstein: How to Make a Monster (BBC Four).Radio and Podcast includes: composer on The Sink (BBC Sounds), co-writer on Who Exploded Vivien Stone? (Fremantle/Kill the Beast), and co-writer/composer on Eglantine Whitechapel: Supernatural Detective (Kill the Beast).

Felix Hagan is Co-Artistic Director of SpitLip, and a freelance composer and performer in a multitude of different acts and guises. Felix specializes in fusing music and lyrics with vast amounts of excitement and joy, drawing inspiration from classic musical theatre, preposterous glam pop, hard rock, hip-hop and every genre under the sun. As a performer he has toured internationally with Felix Hagan & The Family and Frank Turner & The Sleeping Souls, and played everywhere from pub backrooms to vast arenas (once in the same week). As a songwriter and producer, he has composed top ten albums, Christmas number ones and soundtracks for Mercedes, Honda, Hovis and Odeon. His latest solo EP, “This Is Hagan Music,” was released in 2021.

Theatre includes: The Windsors: Endgame (Runaway), Operation Mincemeat (SpitLip), Don’t Wake the Damp and Director’s Cut (Kill the Beast).

Film and TV includes: Spitting Image (Avalon/Britbox), Jack Whitehall Live (Netflix), Cockroaches (ITV), and Backchat with Jack Whitehall (BBC).

Natasha Hodgson is an award-winning writer, actor, comedian and singer. She is Co-Artistic Director of SpitLip and one part of the award-winning dark comedy troupe Kill the Beast. As well as her theatre work, Natasha created and starred in her own critically acclaimed BBC Sounds scripted series, The Sink, which was nominated for Best Podcast/Online Audio at the Audio Drama Awards 2021 and was named one of the Top 20 Podcasts of 2020 by The Guardian.

Theatre includes: co-writer Operation Mincemeat (New Diorama Theatre, Southwark Playhouse & Riverside Studios), Director’s Cut, Don’t Wake the Damp, He Had Hairy Hands and The Boy Who Kicked Pigs (Kill the Beast).

Film and TV includes: writer on Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared (Channel 4), Dogs in Space (Netflix), The Amazing World of Gumball and Bravest Warriors (Cartoon Network).

Radio and Podcast includes: creator/writer The Sink (BBC), The Exploding Library, co-writer on Who Exploded Viven Stone? (Kill the Beast/Fremantle) & Eglantine Whitechapel: Supernatural Detective (Kill the Beast).

Zoë Roberts is Co-Artistic Director of both SpitLip and Kill the Beast comedy collective, and has been making stupid, award-winning stuff for over a decade.

Theatre includes: co-writer Operation Mincemeat (New Diorama Theatre, Southwark Playhouse & Riverside Studios), Saint Jude (Swamp Motel), The Drop (Swamp Motel), the Ivy Isklander series (Swamp Motel), Director’s Cut, Don’t Wake the Damp, He Had Hairy Hands and The Boy Who Kicked Pigs (Kill the Beast).

Film and TV includes: writer on Dogs in Space (Netflix US).

Radio and Podcast includes: co-writer on Who Exploded Viven Stone? (Kill the Beast/Fremantle), Behind the Screams (Little Earthquake) and Eglantine Whitechapel: Supernatural Detective (Kill the Beast).

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