June 2006
Directed by Cathy Gill
Harleston Players were awarded a grant of £24,000 to stage a local play, written by a contemporary of Shakespeare. Robert Greene was born in Norwich and his romantic comedy The Honourable History of Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay is set in this very part of the Waveney valley. When the King's son falls for a dairymaid, the Fair Maid of Fressingfield, he enlists the help of his best friend, (disguised as a Beccles farmer) and the skills of the world's greatest magician, the infamous Friar Bacon, in order to win her. But things do not go according to plan... Packed with romance, broad comedy and miraculous magic, this was the first time this rumbustious play had been performed for several years.