New Beatles play set for West End

A new musical has been created to celebrate the achievements of one of the UK’s most successful exports – The Beatles.
Rain, the production company behind the ambitious project, has announced that it is to celebrate the 50th anniversary of The Beatles’ first hit single by launching the new West End show.
The show, which will feature plenty of The Beatles most-celebrated hits, is designed to recognise the achievements of the Liverpool-based band, who dominated the radio airwaves in the 1960s.
Love Me Do, which was released in October 1962, only achieved modest success in the UK, reaching number 17 in the chart. But in the US – where the band also enjoyed huge success – the single reached number one in 1964, and marked the beginning of a glorious run of success for the four-piece group.
And now it has been announced that Let It Be will open for a limited period from September 14th onwards at London’s Prince of Wales Theatre. The venue is where the group played a 1963 Royal Variety Performance and the show will begin barely a month before the 50th anniversary of The Beatles’ debut single.
It will feature will feature more than 20 of the biggest hits from the group, including tracks such as Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, Strawberry Fields Forever and Get Back.
Rain Productions ran a show, entitled Rain: A Tribute to the Beatles, on Broadway in New York in the autumn of 2010.
British artist Sir Peter Blake, meanwhile, has just recreated the iconic album sleeve for The Beatles’ Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, with the new design featuring the likes of Amy Winehouse, Damien Hirst and Eric Clapton.
Another of the famous faces to appear on the cover, Noel Gallagher, described Sir Peter’s original design “as important as the music”.