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shARon D. ClARKe (below), who will lead the company of the chamber musical Caroline, or Change, written by playwright tony Kushner and composer Jeanine tesori. Ms Clarke will play the title character, who works as a maid for a family in the southern state of louisiana in 1963. President Kennedy, the Civil Rights movement and social change are the backdrops to the show about a woman who doesn’t like to compromise, in an era when change is happening very fast. Michael longhurst, who directed the production of Peter shaffer’s Amadeus, now on at the national, will direct Caroline . . . at Chichester’s Minerva theatre from May. Daniel evans, Chichester’s new artistic director, will unveil the rest of his first season — including a classic Broadway musical — next week. Lucy St LouiS (right), who portrays Diana Ross in Motown. She is staying with the musical, which is about to celebrate its first anniversary at the Shaftesbury theatre. the show, featuring a series of Motown classics, has become a solid hit, having recouped its £5.5 million costs in 28 weeks. Motown is now booking through until February 2018; 200,000 new seats will go on sale today. the musical seems to have performed better in London than it did in New york, which could be down to the fact that although the book remains simple, the production itself is slicker and (in some instances) better cast. Nor has it been hurt by the success of fellow West End musical Dreamgirls. Motown producer Adam Spiegel declared Motown and Dreamgirls ‘cousins, not siblings’. Each drew on the rise of soul music in the uS, he added, ‘though to my mind they operate in slightly different worlds’. theatregoers obviously agree because both of the shows have become red hot tickets. JeReMY JoRDAn, Andrew KeenanBolger, Ben Cook and Kara lindsay, who lead director Jeff Calhoun’s filmed version of Disney’s Broadway musical, newsies (about newspaper delivery boys who go on strike), by Alan Menken, harvey Fierstein and Jack Feldman. But it’s the stunning work of choreographer Christopher Gattelli that lifts the film, just as his dance sequences gave the stage version electricity. newsies will be screened in cinemas here on February 19.