Newcastle Theatre Company, for example, is re-presenting between Wednesday and Thursday this week Love Letters, a play that has a man and woman reflecting on their relationships over 50 years, largely through letters, that audiences found to be very engaging when it had a short season in February at its Lambton theatre.

And Metropolitan Players is at last able to present at Newcastle's Civic Theatre the musical Priscilla, Queen of the Desert that was originally booked for a season at that venue in mid-2020, with the show having to be postponed that year and also having to cancel two other seasons this year when the virus worsened.

The company had unexpected good luck when Aspire, the Hunter Catholic schools organisation that trains young people in acting, playwriting and theatre technology, postponed until early 2022 a show, The Masked DJ, it had booked into the Civic Theatre for a week-long season in mid-November, so that Priscilla is at last able to be presented, with seven performances between Wednesday, November 10, and Sunday, November 14.

The remaining performances of Love Letters are this Friday at 8pm and Saturday at 2pm and 8pm.

The show's director, Stewart McGowan, selected two males and three females to alternate in the roles. Friday's 8pm show features Derek Fisher and Tracey Owens, Saturday's 2pm matinee has Peter Oliver and Vanessa MacArthur, and its 8pm evening show has Derek Fisher and Tracey Gordon.

The play was written by renowned American playwright Albert Gurney, known as A.R. Gurney, and when it was performed in New York in 1990, two years after it was first staged and presented in many venues, was a Pulitzer Prize finalist. It has been performed worldwide, with audience members seeing the two characters resembling themselves or people they know.

The story's two people, Andrew Makepeace Ladd III and Melissa Gardner, meet as children in the playground of their primary school and are attracted to each other.

Their initial written interactions include thank you notes, summer camp postcards, and Valentines, with their romantic attachment continuing through middle school and into their boarding school and college years, then through the trials of World War II, with Andrew fighting abroad, then becoming a successful lawyer after he returns and learns that Melissa has married someone else during his absence. But that, of course, is not the end of their relationships.

The changing nature of their relationships comes across in their words and actions, with the actors on stage for 90 minutes, and having just a short interval break.

Newcastle Theatre Company now has someone in the theatre office on Monday to Friday between 3pm and 6pm, so the show's tickets, $25, can be bought by ringing 4952 4958 in those times, or going to the theatre.

Tickets can also be obtained by emailing newrep@bigpond.net.au, or the direct link to bookings //au.patronbase.com/_NewcastleTheatreCompany/Productions.

Priscilla, Queen of the Desert has been one of the most successful musicals put together in Australia, attracting huge audiences worldwide since it premiered in Sydney on October 7, 2006.

Its initial Broadway production in 2011, for example, ran for 15 months, with 23 previews and 526 performances.

And its first London production had a two-year run. The show has had seasons in 135 cities across 29 countries.

Priscilla, Queen of the Desert is based on a popular Australian 1994 film with a similar name, that was also a global smash hit.

And all the songs came from hit parades, among them It's Raining Men, I Love the Nightlife, Girls Just Wanna Have Fun and I Will Survive.

The central characters in the film and stage play are three friends - two drag queens, Tick (Dave Baker) and Adam (Luke Baker), and a transgender married woman, Bernadette (Drew Holmes) - who contract to perform a drag show in Alice Springs, with their activities as they journey on a battered bus, which has the name Priscilla painted on it, becoming a comedy of errors, with other people interfering with what they are doing.

The other characters include a woman called Miss Understanding (Justin Charlton), three divas who are colourful chorus members (Nicolette Black, Rachel Davies, Cassandra Griffin), Tick's ex-wife, Marion (Amber Curby), who commissions the three friends to perform at her Alice Springs club, Benji (a role shared by Lachlan McFarlane and Cooper Youman), who is Tick's young son and wants to meet the father he has never known, Bob (Rob Vidler), a mechanic who tries to repair the bus when it breaks down, and Cynthia (Dana Deng), Bob's wife; plus a 21-member ensemble.

The show is directed by Julie Black, who is renowned for her musicals, aided by a strong technical and musical team.

Priscilla, Queen of the Desert has performances nightly at 7.30pm from Wednesday, November 10, to Sunday, November 14, and 1.30pm matinees on the Saturday and Sunday.

Tickets are: Adult $68; Concession/Student $58. They can be bought from the Civic Theatre Ticket Office, 4929 1977.