Andrea Riseborough is to join Matthew MacFadyen in the Royal Court’s production of The Pain And The Itch, the first production to be directed by Dominic Cooke in his inaugural season as Artistic Director of the theatre.
RADA graduate Riseborough, 25, last month won the 2006 Ian Charleson Award for her performances in Measure For Measure and Miss Julie with the Peter Hall Company. Her London stage credits include Burn/Chatroom/Citizenship at the National and A Brief History Of Helen Of Troy at the Soho. She is most recognised on television for playing Labour researcher Kirsty MacKenzie in the BBC political sitcom Party Animals, while her other small screen credits include The Secret Life Of Mrs Beeton, Venus, Doc Martin and A Very Social Secretary. On the big screen she is to appear in the new, as yet untitled, Mike Leigh film.
Joining MacFadyen and Riseborough in The Pain And The Itch is Amanda Boxer (The Arab Israeli Cookbook at the Tricycle), Abdi Gouhad (Gaddafi for the ENO), Peter Sullivan (Rock ‘N’ Roll at the Royal Court and the Duke Of York’s, Stoning Mary at the Royal Court) and Sara Stewart (Proof at the Donmar Warehouse, TV’s Sugar Rush).
Bruce Norris’s The Pain And The Itch is a social satire that takes a withering look at phoney liberal values. It centres on a cosy family Thanksgiving dinner for six. Someone – or something – is leaving bite marks in the avocados. Clay and Kelly’s daughter Kayla has an itch and Carol can’t remember who played Gandhi.
The Pain And The Itch premiered at Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre, with which American playwright Norris has an ongoing collaboration. This is the UK premiere of the play.
The play runs in the Royal Court’s Jerwood Theatre Downstairs from 14 June-21 July. Further casting is still to be announced.
CB