New comedies from Andrew Payne and William Boyd will play at the Hampstead Downstairs in early 2016.
Payne’s biting boardroom comedy The Meeting opens the new year at the Swiss Cottage venue, playing from 28 January.
The latest play from the writer of Shut Up and Mugged, The Meeting follows Stratton and Cole who are waiting to seal a deal that could make or break their careers. But when the man they were meant to meet is escorted from the building, they meet instead with his female deputy, who is a very different proposition.
The Meeting, which will be directed by New Tricks actor Denis Lawson, is followed from 3 March by The Argument.
The new play from Boyd, whose Longing ran at Hampstead in 2013, explores how words spoken in the heat of the moment can create embers that burn long after apologies are made.
The Argument is directed by Anna Ledwich, whose Olivier Award nominated production of Four Minutes Twelve Seconds, first seen at the Hampstead Downstairs, opened in the West End’s Trafalgar Studio 2 yesterday. It will be followed at the bijou Theatreland venue by another Hampstead hit, The Wasp.
The West End is full of Hampstead Theatre successes this autumn/winter, as the theatre’s latest hit Mr Foote’s Other Leg, which stars Simon Russell Beale and Joseph Millson, transferred to the Theatre Royal Haymarket last month.