Former EastEnders actress Anita Dobson and ex-Queen guitarist Brian May have come together to bring Two Sisters, one of two new plays opening this week as the second instalment of the New Plays Festival, to life.

The head of Eastbourne’s New Vic company Tony Milner, jokes it was only after a lengthy courting period, some pain-ful networking and lots of diligent res-earch that he managed to persuade May to write some music.

“It was years of hard work on my part,” he cackles, “but he is also married to Anita Dobson. I suppose that’s what you might call a stroke of luck.”

Organised by Milner in conjunction with Eastbourne Theatres, Brighton Dome and the Arts Council, the New Plays Festival promotes new writing by new playwrights with roots in the area.

The play to which May (who provides the music) and Dobson have added their stellar touch is a drama about elderly siblings who discover a dark secret about their past together.

Milner says the sisters spend “quite an evening” dissecting history as they finally discover the truth about their past, which may ruin their life-long sisterhood.

He adds May fell in love with the play after numerous evenings playing the sister opposite Anita, reading the script, helping her learn the lines.

But has he given it the bombastic treatment befitting of a one-time stadium rocker?

“No, it’s incidental music that backs the play on occasions,” says Milner. “It’s a play. It’s nothing to do with music, but it’s a big feature of it that he’s got involved.”

Opposite Dobson on the stage will be Italian-born but London-raised Paola Dionisotti, a fixture in British theatre over the past 30 years, who won the Evening Standard Theatre Award for Best Actress in 2000.

Two Sisters premieres at Brighton’s Pavilion Theatre tonight; tomorrow Joe, Ho Ho opens at the same venue.

It is another piece penned by Brighton-based Gail Louw, and features Moira Brooker, who played Judith Hanson in BBC sitcom As Time Goes By.

“It’s about Alzheimer’s and a woman caring for her mother and how she copes with the stress of looking after someone at home rather than in a hospital,” says Milner.

“She has a dual life because while she cares and despairs for her mother, she also has a passionate affair with the man of her dreams.

“It is very amusing but there is tension, with Linda’s life extremities, which gives the play a real edge.”

All the actors are local, two from Brighton and two from Eastbourne, and there are parallels to Brian Clark’s Whose Life Is It Anyway?

“It challenges people to come to learn about a disease with a large and expanding number of sufferers thanks to medical advances, most of whom are not hospitalised, but cared for at home,” says Milner.

He stresses how brave the play is and calls it “an important and rewarding must-see for people who take the theatre seriously”.

Other new plays New Vic has commissioned have gone on to play the West End and some have been adapted for film. Telstar, a Joe Meek biopic written by Nick Moran first produced by New Vic, was one of summer 2009’s big UK movies. Unsurprisingly, Milner is hoping for similar success for the new productions.

* All shows start 8pm, doors 7.15pm. Tickets £10/£8, multi-book for all four plays £30. Call 01273 709709 or visit www.brightondome.org for specific dates for individual shows.