Elizabeth Jones, York theatre boss, meet Elizabeth Jones...York theatre boss.

THE JONES GIRLS: Elizabeth Jones, left, the new general manager of York's Grand Opera House, meets her namesake who has been executive director of the Theatre Royal since 1991. Picture by David Harrison

Elizabeth Jones, 32, on the left, is the new general manager of the Grand Opera House, and she was taking up the reins at the Cumberland Street theatre today.

Elizabeth Jones, 42, on the right, is the executive director of the Theatre Royal, a post she has held since July 1991.

Still keeping up with the Joneses? Well, to make matters easier, Elizabeth on the left likes to be known as Lizzie.

So, Lizzie it is then. "I think it's great to have two women running the theatres in York, and I'm really looking forward to my time here, to maintaining good relations with the Theatre Royal and to being in a such a pretty city where there's very good standard of theatre," she says.

Lizzie is taking over from Ian Sime, who left the Grand Opera House at the weekend after four years to become the general manager of a flagship Apollo Leisure theatre, the Opera House in Manchester.

Lizzie has been with Apollo since leaving the clothing industry in 1994, working in theatre management posts in Torquay, Oxford and Edinburgh and since June 1996 as the general manager of the Wyvern Theatre in Swindon.

"I've always been hanging on for the York post; it was my preferred move because it's an historic city, the Opera House is a beautiful theatre, it's up North - I'm from North Wales originally - and Ian Sime's reputation as a manager goes before him," she says.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.