Educating Rita

Enter

FRANK: You seem to be under the impression that all books are literature.

RITA: Aren't they?

FRANK: No.

RITA: Well, how d' y' tell?

FRANK: I… erm… well… er… one's always known really.

Educating Rita Act One

Educating Rita - Film

Educating Rita is a play about education and choice. Set in the chaotic splendour of a university lecturer’s study/tutorial room, the play’s two characters share a language but each speak a very different tongue. The play follows twenty-six year old Liverpool hairdresser, Rita, and her experience in returning to education. Tutor, and failed poet, Frank, is initially reluctant to take on the enormity of trying to teach this needy but unconventional and unfocused would-be student, preferring instead to continue easing his way through his teaching duties with the blunting help of the booze he keeps stashed behind the books on his shelves. For Rita, though, Frank is the perfect teacher and faced with her determination, with her insistence that she wants to ‘….know. Everything,’ he is reluctantly persuaded to commit to overseeing Rita’s studies and the series of regular tutorials through which the play unfolds.

I wanted to make a play which engaged, and was relevant to, those who had no great knowledge of literature, those who may even have considered themselves ‘uneducated’, whose language was not the language of the university or the theatre. In short, I wanted to write a play which would attract and be as valid and meaningful for the Ritas in the audience as the Franks and the Trishes.’

Since its first appearance in 1980 Educating Rita has gone on become a modern classic, constantly in production throughout the world and widely studied as a set text.

Awards

London - 1980

Laurence Olivier Award, Best Comedy

Original Production

A woman (Rita) and an elderly man (Frank) with glasses and a beard in a room filled with books. The woman appears surprised or speaking, while the man is holding a phone near his mouth and a book in his lap.

RSC Warehouse (now The Donmar Warehouse),
Covent Garden, London. 1980

Producer - The Royal Shakespeare Company

Director - Mike Ockrent

Design - Poppy Mitchell

Cast

Rita - Julie Walters

Frank - Mark Kingston

Black and white promotional material for a show titled 'Educating Rita' with Mark Kingston and Julie Walters. The image features three pictures: the top left shows the show title and actors' names, the top right depicts a woman in a fringed costume with outstretched arms, and the bottom is a photograph of a woman hugging an older man in a room with bookshelves.

Piccadilly Theatre, London. 1980 - 1982

Producer - Royal Shakespeare Company in association with Ian Albery/Piccadilly Theatre

Director - Mike Ockrent

Cast

Rita - Julie Walters

Frank - Mark Kingston

Later Casts

Rita - Julia Deakin, Shirin Taylor

Frank - Donald Burton

Educating Rita… “is both funny, theatrical and realistic. Working-class life is not artificially revered, but it is depicted honestly, truthfully and with great compassion. Most importantly, perhaps, Educating Rita has a proven capacity to empower and to advocate education of the populace at large. Russell suggests that Rita is merely representative of an entire lost class whose achievements could be equal to those on the other side of the barrier. The play is a remarkable combination of the didactic and the popular. Its existence within the mainstream theatre does not appear to have detracted from its substantial themes, its refusal to indulge in the literary games of high-art drama and its applicability to audiences of all social classes.”

Christopher N Jones
“Populism, the Mainstream Theatre, and the Plays of Willy Russell”

'One way of describing Educating Rita would be to say that it was about the meaning of education... Another would be to say that it was about the meaning of life.'

Sunday Times

Two people having a conversation in a room with wooden walls and framed artwork, one person with crossed arms listening to another with a beard and gesturing.

Liverpool Playhouse. 1981

Director - Willy Russell & Pip Broughton

Cast

Rita - Kate Fitzgerald

Frank - William Gaunt

Although the original production was still running in the West End, and prior to launching its own national tour, the RSC graciously granted Liverpool Playhouse special permission to mount its own production of Educating Rita. With superb performances at its center, Willy Russell and co-director Pip Broughton created a hometown Educating Rita that broke box-office records and saw its original run twice revived during the Playhouse season.

A man with a beard and medium-length hair, dressed in a suit jacket and tie, stands on a stage holding a coffee mug. Behind him are a wooden chair with clothes draped over it and a set of drawers, suggesting a theatrical performance or rehearsal.

A woman with short hair, wearing a striped shirt, sitting behind a wooden chair, appears to be speaking or explaining something, with a background of a window and curtains.

A promotional poster for the play 'Educating Rita' featuring Tom Baker as Frank and Kate Fitzgerald as Rita, with bold red and blue text, pop art illustration of a woman with long hair holding a Hamlet magazine, and details about the production at Theatre Clwyd in November 1982.

RSC UK National Tour. 1982 - 1983

Director - Mike Ockrent

Cast

Rita - Kate Fitzgerald

Frank - Tom Baker

Frank - Ken Farrington (took over from Tom Baker January – March 1983)

Throughout the 1980s and 90’s there was barely a city or large town in Britain where the play was not professionally produced - such was its appeal amongst aspirant actors that some drama schools even began informing applicants that passages from the play’s text would no longer be acceptable as audition pieces!

Remarkably, Educating Rita seems to have survived such popularity, with audiences and critics noting and applauding its continuing relevance through significant revivals during the 2000’s including a return to the West End, a third production at Liverpool Playhouse and a new UK National Tour, celebrating the play’s fortieth year.

A man and a woman standing back-to-back, both with confident expressions against a plain white background.

Menier Chocolate Factory London
Educating Rita & Shirley Valentine
2010 Willy Russell Season

Producer - David Babani for Chocolate Factory Productions

Director - Jeremy Sams

Rita - Laura Dos Santos

Frank - Larry Lamb

Production Transferred to

Trafalgar Studios London

Producer - David Babani for Chocolate Factory Productions & Sonia Friedman Productions, Tanya Link, Bob Bartner & Bob Boyet

Director - Jeremy Sams

Rita - Laura Dos Santos

Frank - Tim Piggot-Smith

An older man and a young woman sitting in a cozy, well-lit room with stained glass windows, sharing a moment while looking at a blue book. The woman is smiling, and the man is pointing at the book as they engage in conversation.

Menier Chocolate Factory/UK tour. 2012

Producer - David Babani for Chocolate Factory Productions
The Menier Chocolate Factor, London

Director - Tamara Harvey

Cast

Rita - Claire Sweeney

Frank - Matthew Kelly

Two actors, a woman and a man, are engaged in a conversation in a library. The woman is holding a book and looks attentive while the man appears to be explaining something. Bookshelves filled with books are in the background.

Liverpool Playhouse. 2015

Director - Gemma Bodinetz

Cast

Rita - Leanne Best

Frank - Con O‘Neil

Outdoor book fair set against a coastal backdrop with ancient stone ruins, a rocky hill, and the ocean in the distance. Two people are present: a man sitting and reading, and a woman standing with her arms crossed, both surrounded by bookshelves and various furniture.

UK Tour. 2019 & 2021

Producer - David Pugh and Theatre by The Lke

Director - Max Roberts

Cast

Rita - Jessica Johnson

Frank - Stephen Tomkinson

Producer David Pugh and Willy first worked together in the mid Eighties when David was responsible for the touring production of Blood Brothers. In the early 2000’s the writer and producer ( along with friend and colleague Tim Firth ) again joined forces to present the song/spoken word stage show The Singing Playwrights. “Then sometime in early 2018 I got a call from David saying he wanted to present a ‘ fortieth anniversary tour ‘ of Educating Rita. My first thought was, ‘ Forty years! Where the hell did they go ? ‘ By now David was rushing on, telling me that Stephen Tompkinson and Jessica Johnson wanted to play the roles of Frank and Rita. And so my next thought was,’ how lucky am I.’ lucky and boundlessly blessed with the good fortune of having my work graced throughout the years by so many extraordinarily talented and gifted actors.”

To list and credit every production of Educating Rita is beyond the scope of this website but those seeking further information relating to other productions may want to consult and explore The Willy Russell Archive, Liverpool John Moores University Special Collections and Archives.

Learn more