The Royal Court Theatre has today announced its spring and summer 2017 season of work, including productions with Simon McBurney, Jez Butterworth, Sam Mendes, debbie tucker green and Simon Stephens.
The exciting collection features eight world premieres, four UK and international collaborations, the return of an influential Royal Court play, and a new series of podcasts.
Olivier Award-winning playwright debbie tucker green directs her new play A Profoundly Affectionate, Passionate Devotion To Someone (-Noun) to open the season, premiering in the intimate Jerwood Theatre Upstairs from 28 February 2017. The show centres on three couples, and what could have been between them.
A Profoundly Affectionate, Passionate Devotion To Someone (-Noun)
Meanwhile, in the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs, renowned theatre-maker Simon McBurney directs The Kid Stays In The Picture. In a major collaboration with the Sloane Square venue, and in association with the internationally lauded company Complicite, the show follows the rise and fall of producer Robert Evans’ fortunes in the film industry of the 1960s to 1980s, and plays from 7 March.
The Kid Stays In The Picture
Royal Court Associate Playwright Simon Stephens’ Nuclear War, a series of suggestions on desire, death and time, arrives at the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs from 19 April.
Nuclear War
An exciting new play by the multi-award winning Jez Butterworth, The Ferryman, then opens at the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs, from 24 April 2017. Led by Olivier and Academy Award-winning director Sam Mendes, perhaps best known for Bond films Spectre and Skyfall and West End musical Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, The Ferryman transports audiences to rural Derry in 1981, where preparations for the annual harvest are interrupted by the arrival of a visitor.
The Ferryman
From renowned playwright to an anonymous writer, the theatre then hosts Manwatching, the transfer of a Royal Court commission written by an anonymous woman, exploring the heterosexual female desire – through an account read out loud by a man – from 10 May in the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs – before Gary Owen’s new play Killology runs in the same space from 25 May, centring on the morality behind a controversial new gaming experience.
Killology
Alice Birch’s Anatomy Of A Suicide premieres in the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs on 3 June, exploring the ripples between three generations of women, before Jim Cartwright’s seminal drama Road, which first opened at the Royal Court in 1986, will return to be directed by Associate Director John Tiffany (Harry Potter And The Cursed Child). The show follows a wild night with a drunken tour guide, and a journey to the stars and back, and plays from 21 July.
Anatomy Of A Suicide
Finally, in September 2017, Chilean playwright Guillermo Calderón will make his Royal Court debut with B, directed by Royal Court Associate Director Sam Pritchard in the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs and telling the story of friends planting bombs in the middle of the night, while Chris Thorpe’s new play Victory Condition runs in the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs, centring on an attempt to get to grips with the fact that everything happens at once and led by Artistic Director Vicky Featherstone.
B
Victory Condition
The venue is also to release a new series of Playwrights’ Podcasts, with interviews by Simon Stephens and writers including April de Angelis, Rachel De-lahey, Tanika Gupta, David Hare, Robert Holman, Dennis Kelly, Alistair McDowall, Anthony Neilson, Joe Penhall, Lucy Prebble, Anya Reiss, Polly Stenham and Enda Walsh. The release schedule is to be announced.
Of the announcement, Vicky Featherstone said “I am humbled and thrilled to be announcing such a varied and exciting mixture of work from playwrights and theatre-makers at the top of their game, pushing the limits of their potential to challenge, surprise and provoke us.”
“This is the Royal Court at its best – a place for attracting some of the great playwrights and theatre-makers of our times to experiment and take risks to give us, the audience, the most extraordinary experiences possible.”
Tickets for the new season go on sale to the general public from 4 November 2016 via the theatre’s website.