Edinburgh Festival previews at the Maltings Arts Theatre, St Albans

THREE of the most talked-about shows due to be staged at this year’s Edinburgh Festival come to a St Albans theatre next month.

July @ The Maltings is a one-off chance to experience a collection of performances that are tipped to set the festival alight this summer.

The event starts next Thursday, July 6, with No Direction, a new play by Albert Welling that deals with the contract between actor and audience.

It leads the audience on a journey through some of life’s trickier moments – loyalty, friendship and betrayal.

No Direction stars Ronnie Toms (The Rising, The Sociable Plover) and Albert Welling (Dr Who, Cemetery Junction, Endeavour). It is directed by Bob Golding, star of the Olivier Award-winning play Morecambe.

Later in the month on July 24 and 25, Flipping The Bird and Red Shift Productions put on the classic tale of Dr Jekyll with a new modern twist.

Fringe First award-winning writer Jonathan Holloway re-imagines Stevenson’s gothic melodrama for a modern audience in a preview of the Edinburgh production.

Wandering through Southwark, the respectable Utterson and decadent Enfield stumble upon a door ajar. The grimy threshold leads them into the criminal underworld of London’s dark press and the mysterious researches of Dr Jekyll.

The production fuses live music, black comedy and grotesque cabaret.

Marilyn Monroe as she has never been seen before arrives at The Maltings on July 25 and 26.

Alone in her bedroom in dressing gown and slippers and overdosed on pills, the woman behind the icon unravels her remarkable life and bares all.

In The Unremarkable Death of Marilyn Monroe, she reveals a biting intelligence, a frustrated talent and an imperfect body in a radical interpretation of a Hollywood legend.

Tickets for all performances are £10 with concessions £7.50. To book or for more information go to www.maltingsartstheatre.co.uk