Interview: Michael Gyngell on transferring when Harry Met Sally to the stage

MICHAEL Gyngell is clearly an optimist.

He believes, or hopes, that when Sarah Jayne Dunn performs a fake orgasm on stage, someone won't shout out "I'll have what she's having", immediately afterwards.

He'll be lucky.

When Dunn fakes having an orgasm, she will be re-producing one of film's great moments when Meg Ryan, in the movie When Harry Met Sally, embarrasses Billy Crystal in a New York Deli. In fact, the scene became so famous that Katz's Deli, where the scene was filmed, has become a pilgrimage site for film fans.

"It would be awful if someone shouted out the line, but I know that's a possibility because the film is so well known and so loved," says Gyngell, who is directing the show.

"We actually rehearsed that scene yesterday and I think it will work quite beautifully. The key is playing the scene as honestly as possible. In a New York deli, you can actually imagine someone saying that line – there's a website I've been looking at called Overheard in New York, and some of the wisecracks on there match anything in the film, so you can really imagine what happens in the film, happening for real. If we stay honest to that, then I think we'll be okay."

Gyngell has an impressive CV, having worked as an assistant director on the Olivier Award winning The Play What I Wrote and a string of other successful shows. You have to question his judgment, however, taking on a story as iconic as When Harry Met Sally.

The 1989 Nora Ephron- scripted movie told the story of the two eponymous heroes. Over a period stretching from 1977 to 1989 the pair meet sporadically forming a friendship and, eventually, a romantic relationship.

The film's central theme is the argument between Harry and Sally – he believes that "Men and women can't be friends because the sex part always gets in the way" and Sally disagrees, claiming that men and women can be strictly friends without the sex.

Gyngell says: "It is one of the least film-like films that has ever been made," explaining why he thinks it can work as well on a stage as it did on a screen.

"They spend a lot of time just talking to each other. With the majority of films, it is all about the pictures, what the characters do is how you define them, but in truth this has always felt to me like a play masquerading as a film. While it works beautifully as a film, it is very much a story about this relationship, which is why it works as a stage play."

Marcy Kahan's adaptation was not a critical success when it opened in London's West End in 2004, but it was popular with audiences.

Gyngell says he didn't see that adaptation, but the script has been tightened for this new production.

"Obviously we can't have a cast of dozens, so the script has been pared down to tell the story as economically as possible," says Gyngell.

"We now have six actors with two playing Harry and Sally, two playing their friends and two playing all the other roles," says Gyngell.

This new production will tour nationally after it has premiered next week in Wakefield, at the city's Theatre Royal. It is something of a coup for the theatre to have been chosen to host the premiere of the national tour, which will return to theatres in Yorkshire later in the year, coming to the New Theatre in Hull, the Grand Opera House in York and the Sheffield Lyceum.

Murray Edwards, executive director, at Theatre Royal Wakefield, says: "We are thrilled to have When Harry Met Sally opening its national tour here. There is already a real buzz about the show in the region; not only is it one of the most famous romantic comedies of all time and we have an all-star cast and fantastic music, but the quality of the company delivering the tour will also mean our audiences get an all round fabulous experience."

Edwards is perhaps being a little generous. The high profile cast stepping into the large gaps left by Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal are Sarah Jayne Dunn, best known for playing Mandy Richardson in Hollyoaks and Rupert Hill, Coronation Street's ex-local lothario Jamie Baldwin.

Gygnell accepts that having soap actors could be looked upon less than charitably in some quarters. "It's not a problem, as far as we are concerned. We needed people with a high profile, who the public knew, but it was also really important that we got the right actors for the parts and we do have the best actors for the parts. They really do fit these roles."

When Harry Met Sally. Theatre Royal Wakefield February 3 to 6.