Metta Theatre, in partnership with Royal & Derngate, Queen’s Theatre Hornchurch and the Stephen Joseph Theatre, have announced the premiere of the first episode of new musical film, Cells.

Written, developed and recorded during lockdown by award-winning writer/director P Burton-Morgan and composer Ben Glasstone, Cells stars Olivier Award-winning actor Clive Rowe and rising star Lem Knights.

A university science lab. A kebab shop at 2am. An online gaming forum. Two strangers’ lives become intertwined. Alan Bennett meets The Streets in this tender and uplifting new work, giving voice to the lives of two everyday blokes.

The first episode is now available on Youtube here, with each partner venue hosting subsequent episodes on their websites over the coming days, with the full film available on Youtube on Monday 26 April. It will be free to access with a suggested donation of £3 per episode or £10 for the whole film. Any monies raised will go to the three regional theatres to help support their recovery.

P Burton-Morgan, who in 2020 won the Writers Guild of Great Britain Award for musical theatre book writing for In the Willows said: “It's extraordinary to think about what we achieved in 2 days of rehearsal, 2 days in the recording studio and just 4 days of filming. But what's even more extraordinary is how this piece - which was written as, and one day hopefully soon will be produced as, a stage musical, exists so fully as a film in its own right. It's thrilling to stretch two artforms to meet each other and I hope paves the way for more theatre projects that are not merely 'captured' on film (and of course as an album too) but exist across a diversity of media forms as a myriad of artworks in their own right.”

The cast album is also available now via Spotify and other digital platforms here.

For more information about the film, please click here.