With an all-star solid together with Lily Allen and Steve Pemberton, Matthew Dunster directs the primary main revival and West End season of Martin McDonagh’s electrifying and savagely humorous Olivier Award-winning play The Pillowman. Performances start on the intimate Duke of York’s Theatre on Saturday 10 June, for a strictly restricted 12-week run by way of to Saturday 2 September 2023.
Tickets will go on basic sale at 12pm on Friday 11 November at www.pillowmanplay.com (
Martin McDonagh, who has simply gained the Best Screenplay Award on the Venice Film Festival for his new, critically-acclaimed film The Banshees of Inisherin, can be the multi Olivier, BAFTA and Academy Award-winning playwright and screen-writer chargeable for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, In Bruges, Seven Psychopaths and Six Shooter.
Martin McDonagh commented:
“I’m thrilled that The Pillowman is lastly making its West End premiere. It’s a play that’s all the time been very near my coronary heart, when it comes to its mixture of darkish comedy with its exploration of the character of story-telling itself and the function of the artist in society. With so many private freedoms beneath assault by governments and religions world wide I believe it’s an ideal time to place this play on.
I’m an enormous admirer of each Steve Pemberton and Lily Allen – their intelligence, their wit, their enjoyable – and having Lily play Katurian, the primary time this function has been performed by a girl in an English-speaking model, is simply so, so thrilling to me. With such a powerful solid, and Matthew on the helm as soon as once more, I can’t wait to be a part of it.”
Lily Allen, who made her West End debut in 2:22 – A Ghost Story on the Noel Coward Theatre in a job for which she was awarded Best Female-Identifying Role in a Play on the Whatsonstage Awards and Olivier nominated, will play Katurian, the primary time the function has been performed by a girl. Up subsequent, Allen will star within the new Sky authentic comedy Dreamland which will premiere in 2023. Lily can be an internationally famend singer and songwriter.
Lily Allen commented:
“One of our most inventive playwrights, Martin McDonagh, is renowned for pushing boundaries and it’s a privilege to join this show. Together with my incredible 2.22 director Matthew Dunster, I am excited to help create a production of The Pillowman that is sorely needed right now in these unprecedented times. I can’t wait to bring it to life each night on stage and for audiences to get to experience it.”
Steve Pemberton is a member of The League of Gentlemen with Reece Shearsmith, Mark Gatiss and Jeremy Dyson. He co-wrote and appeared in Psychoville and Inside No. 9 for which he gained the BAFTA for Best Male Comedy Performance in 2019. His different tv credit embrace: Killing Eve, Good Omens, Worzel Gummidge, Doctor Who, Benidorm, Blackpool, Shameless, Whitechapel, Happy Valley and Mapp and Lucia. His stage work contains enjoying Mr Hardcastle in She Stoops to Conquer on the National Theatre. Steve will play Tupolski.
Steve Pemberton commented:
“As a huge fan of Martin McDonagh’s writing, I’m delighted that The Pillowman is heading to the West End next year. I can’t wait to help bring this blisteringly dark and funny play to life and I’m honoured to be working with such an exciting creative team.”
Further casting is but to be introduced.
In a totalitarian state a Writer is questioned by the authorities a couple of spate of murders that bear similarities to her quick tales. Is this life imitating artwork or one thing extra sinister? This black comedy broadly thought to be one of many best performs of the previous 25 years, examines the function of the artist in society and asks what worth can we pay for freedom of expression.
Martin McDonagh’s Olivier Award-winning Hangmen ran efficiently within the West End and on Broadway. His different performs embrace The Beauty Queen of Leenane, A Skull in Connemara, The Lonesome West, The Lieutenant of Inishmore, The Cripple of Inishmaan, A Behanding in Spokane and A Very Very Very Dark Matter.
Matthew Dunster is a theatre and movie director and author. He has directed or written over sixty exhibits, typically with main nationwide corporations (together with RSC, NT, Royal Court, Young Vic, Royal Exchange, Shakespeare’s Globe, The Bridge), in addition to directing within the West End, on Broadway and internationally. He has been the Associate Director of The Young Vic and Shakespeare’s Globe. Matthew has been nominated for 3 Olivier Awards and his Broadway manufacturing of Hangmen was nominated for 5 Tony’s.
Joining Martin and Matthew on the artistic crew are: Set and Costume Designer Anna Fleischle, the Lighting Designer is Neil Austin, Sound Designer, Ian Dickinson for Autograph and Casting is by Amy Ball.
The Pillowman is produced by Empire Street Productions, the identical firm that introduced the massively profitable Prima Facie starring Jodie Comer to the West End this 12 months, and which went on to interrupt viewers information when it was subsequently launched in cinemas by NT Live. The manufacturing opens on Broadway in 2023. As with Prima Facie, accessibility to The Pillowman is prime to the producer, and there can be a Pay What You Can scheme, with 20 tickets per efficiency for the week, launched the Wednesday beforehand.