Vertigo partners with Persephone Theatre for Our Man in Havana

By Nikayla Goddard, March 28, 2017 —

What do you get when you cross James Bond with vacuum cleaners and comedy? Our Man in Havana, presented by Vertigo Theatre in a co-production with Saskatoon’s Persephone Theatre.

The play is based on the 1958 spy-thriller novel by Graham Greene. Set in Cuba at the beginning of the Cold War in the 1950s, the play revolves around Jim Wormold, a British vacuum salesman struggling to make a living to maintain his daughter’s extravagant lifestyle. The Brit winds up being inadvertently asked by the Secret Intelligence Service to be “their man in Havana” and he accepts the espionage job of leaking Cuban intel to the British. The play quickly turns from a spy-thriller to a comedy as he fumbles his way through the spy business. As he begins making things and people up, Wormold’s fake reports get more elaborate.

“The poor guy makes up fictitious contacts and is surprised as they come to life around him,” director Mark Bellamy says. “[It’s] a really fun, fast-paced ride — like a roller coaster.”

Our Man in Havana played earlier this year at the Rawlco Radio Hall from Feb. 1–19 in Saskatoon prior to coming to Calgary. This was the first time Our Man in Havana has been shown in Canada, after originating as a popular performance in the United Kingdom. While in Saskatoon, the play was scheduled to run for two weeks but got held back for another week due to the sold-out shows.

Since then, Bellamy has worked with the crew to prep for the Calgary series. The performance opened on March 11 at the Vertigo Theatre.

Despite the large number of roles in the play, only four actors star in the show, three of which play over 50 roles in the performance. The cast of four consists of two actors from Saskatoon and two from Calgary.

Our Man in Havana will run until April 9 at the Vertigo Theatre. Tickets are available online and prices vary.

For more information, visit vertigotheatre.com