The New Theatre will present Gogol's satirical masterpiece, The Government Inspector, opening July 11 and playing through to August 22.

Written in 1836 during the repressive regime of Czar Nicholas I and his all pervasive agencies of inspection, The Government Inspector reveals the moral bankruptcy of a political system that is so impoverished that corruption and bribery become ingrained and accepted. Echoing with disconcerting accuracy the recent revelations of the Wood Royal Commission and ICAC, The Government Inspector uses that most powerful of dramatic tools - satire - to attack the materialism and venality of petty bureaucracy. It was ironic indeed that it was the Chief Censor himself, Nicholas I, who approved the play.

Director, Adrian Norman, received a scholarship through the Peter Summerton Foundation to rework and direct The Government Inspector for the New Theatre and divides his time between England and Australia. In England, he directs his own company, In Cahoots, and is a drama advisor to the Arts Council of England. In Australia, Adrian was last year an Affiliate Director with the Sydney Theatre Company, where he was Assistant Director to Marion Potts on the production of The Herbal Bed. Designer, Nicola McIntosh, designed the production of the critically acclaimed Clark in Sarajevo for Griffin Theatre Company.

The Government Inspector reflects a society based on corruption and bribery where there is no choice but to "play the game". Gogol's achievement is to parody a decaying bureaucracy so thoroughly that the audience will leave questioning what is accepted and what is corrupt in their own lives.