SUPER September will launch what promises to be a phenomenal autumn season for Malvern Theatres with a host of big names from the world of stage and screen set to appear in a wide variety of offerings.

The theatres’ chief executive, Nic Lloyd, says he is extremely pleased at what is planned.

He said: “We have just sent out our seasonal brochure and I think it’s the largest we have ever produced with details of shows from August right through to the end of January. There’s a huge diversity in terms of what’s on, although I’m particularly excited by the number of plays on offer, many of them prior to London”.

Starting the season on September 2 will be Jenny Seagrove and Peter Bowles in Patrick Hamilton’s thriller, The Governess, which will be followed a week later by John Godber’s bitter-sweet comedy, September in the Rain, starring Claire Sweeney and John Thomson.

And then rounding off the month will be a Peter Shaffer double bill, the renowned West End and Broadway one-act plays, The Private Eye and The Public Eye.

The inimitable Maureen Lipman will be on stage in October when she returns to the theatre for Oliver Cotton’s Daytona as will Gwen Taylor in Butterfly Lion, a tale of enduring friendship from the pen of Michael Morpurgo, the acclaimed writer of War Horse.

Throw in Martin Shaw when he takes the lead in 12 Angry Men at the end of October and then a visit a week later by the star of television’s Death in Paradise, Ben Miller, in The Duck House – which delves in MPs expenses – and you can see why everyone at the theatre is eagerly looking forward to the autumn.

The season also sees Simon Callow and Felicity Kendal together in Chin Chin, Lynda Bellingham and Christopher Timothy in A Passionate Woman, and also a touring version of Ibsen’s Ghosts.

The theatres will also host plenty of one-off concerts such as Stacey Kent and Michael Nyman, Three Phantoms, Barbara Dickson and others, and talks by explorer Chris Bonington and Baxter and Blowers from the BBC Radio’s Test Match Special team.

Meanwhile they have just announced that Sue Holderness, from the ever popular television series, Only Fools and Horses, will be starring in their annual pantomime, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

Next up at the Festival Theatre is Bugle Boy: The Glenn Miller Story, which opens for a week from August 6.