Harry Melling, best known as Harry Potter’s Dudley Dursley, will return to the London stage next year to lead the cast of irreverent Broadway comedy Hand To God.
The show will also star Janie Dee, Neil Pearson, Jemima Rooper and Kevin Mains. It begins its run at the West End’s Vaudeville Theatre on 5 February.
Melling, whose burgeoning stage career includes the Bush Theatre’s The Angry Brigade, the Jamie Lloyd-directed The Hothouse and his own one-man show Peddling, will take the dual role of Jason and Tyrone in the New York hit. While Jason is an average citizen of a small Texas town, Tyrone is a scandalous, shocking, truth-speaking puppet who riffs on everything from love to faith, shaking the town’s inhabitants to their core.
The production reunites acclaimed stage performers Dee and Rooper, who previously appeared together opposite Angela Lansbury in Blithe Spirit. Rooper was last seen on stage in Breeders at the St James Theatre, while Dee will soon be back in the West End for a flying visit for the Kings Of Broadway concert at the end of this month.
Hand To God follows in the furry footsteps of previous raucous New York to London puppet hit Avenue Q, which entertained audiences with its X-rated Sesame Street style in 2006.
Described by the New York Times as “Flat-out hilarious”, Hand To God opens at the Vaudeville Theatre following the winter runs of Dawn French’s 30 Million Minutes and Bill Bailey’s Limboland.