ALL ABOUT EVE by Joseph L Mankiewicz
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PRESS RELEASE IMAGES CAN BE DOWNLOADED HERE @AllAboutEvePlay | AllAboutEvePlay.com Sonia Friedman Productions and Fox Stage Productions present ALL ABOUT EVE by Joseph L Mankiewicz Adapted and directed for the stage by Ivo van Hove • Final casting announced for strictly limited run of All About Eve at the Noël Coward Theatre • Merric Boyd, Fejiro Emasiobi, Jessie Mei Li, Chanelle Modi, Stuart Nunn, Phillipa Peak and Michael Warburton complete the cast • All About Eve will run for 14 weeks with reduced priced previews beginning on 2nd February 2019. Best availability from late March 2019 • Over 20,000 tickets have been available at £25 or under during the run Sonia Friedman Productions and Fox Stage Productions have today announced the full casting for the world premiere of Ivo van Hove’s highly anticipated stage production of the 1950 Twentieth Century Fox film All About Eve as rehearsals commence. Jessie Mei Li will play the role of Claudia Casswell with Merric Boyd, Fejiro Emasiobi, Chanelle Modi, Stuart Nunn, Phillipa Peak and Michael Warburton joining the Ensemble. Performances run from 2nd February at the West End’s Noël Coward Theatre. Previously announced, Emmy Award-winning Gillian Anderson will return to the stage alongside Lily James to lead the cast. BAFTA Award-winner Monica Dolan will play the role of Karen alongside Ian Drysdale as Max Fabian, Tsion Habte as Phoebe, Julian Ovenden as Bill, Sheila Reid as Birdie, Rhashan Stone as Lloyd and Stanley Townsend as Addison DeWitt. Charles Hagerty, Grace Stone and Philip Voyzey will also appear as Ensemble cast. Ivo van Hove’s direction will be accompanied by set and lighting design from Jan Versweyveld, costume design by An D’Huys and music from double Mercury Prize- winner PJ Harvey, alongside Tom Gibbons’ sound design. Casting is by Julia Horan CDG. “Fasten your seat belts. It’s going to be a bumpy night.” Margo Channing. Legend. True star of the theatre. The spotlight is hers, always has been. But now there’s Eve. Her biggest fan. Young, beautiful Eve. The golden girl, the girl next door. But you know all about Eve…don’t you…? Ivo van Hove directs Gillian Anderson and Lily James in his new adaptation of All About Eve, a razor-sharp, unsettling exposé of the eternal obsession at the heart of show-business. Lifting the curtain on a world of jealousy and ambition, this new production, from one of the world’s most innovative theatre directors, asks why our fascination with celebrity, youth and identity never seems to get old. Biographies Gillian Anderson is an award-winning film, television and theatre actress who won an Emmy, a Golden Globe and two Screen Actors' Guild awards for her role as ‘Special Agent Dana Scully’ in the TV series The X-Files. Her further television credits include critically acclaimed Bleak House (BBC), BAFTA-winning mini- series Great Expectations (BBC), BAFTA-nominated thriller The Fall (BBC), Hannibal (NBC), American Gods (Starz) and the acclaimed mini-series War & Peace (BBC). In 2019 she will play Jean in Netflix’s 8-parter, Sex Education (Netflix). On stage, Gillian performed at the Young Vic Theatre as Blanche Dubois in Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire, which relocated to St Ann’s Warehouse in New York and for which she was nominated for an Olivier Award and won Best Actress at the Evening Standard Awards. Other UK theatre credits include What The Night Is For (Pinter Theatre); The Sweetest Swing In Baseball (Royal Court Theatre) and A Doll’s House (Donmar Warehouse) in 2009 for which she earned her first Olivier nomination. Gillian’s film credits include The House of Mirth (Granada Productions); The Mighty Celt (BBC Films); The Last King of Scotland (Film 4); Johnny English Reborn (Universal); Shadow Dancer (Paramount); Sold (2016); Viceroy’s House (20th Century Fox) and Crooked House (Sony). Gillian’s latest films have been The Spy Who Dumped Me (Lionsgate) and The Sunlit Night which will be released in 2019. Lily James graduated from Guildhall School of Music and Drama in 2010. Her breakout film role was the iconic ‘Cinderella’ in Disney’s award-winning worldwide hit adaptation directed by Kenneth Branagh. Lily was most recently seen in Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! (Universal) alongside Meryl Streep, playing ‘Young Donna’. She also appeared in The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (Studio Canal). Lily’s further film credits include ‘Elizabeth Nel’ in Darkest Hour (Working Title) opposite Gary Oldman, and ‘Debora’ in Baby Driver (Working Title) alongside Jamie Foxx and Jon Hamm. Lily’s most notable TV credits include ‘Lady Rose’ in Golden Globe and BAFTA winning period drama Downton Abbey (ITV), and ‘Natasha Rostova’ in the much-heralded War & Peace (BBC). For stage, Lily played ‘Juliet’ in Kenneth Branagh’s acclaimed Romeo and Juliet (Garrick Theatre). Further theatre credits include Vernon God Little (Young Vic Theatre) directed by Rufus Norris, and ‘Desdemona’ in Daniel Evans’ stage production of Othello (The Crucible, Sheffield). Monica Dolan is a BAFTA award-winning actress whose work spans stage, television and film. Highlights include Rosemary West in Appropriate Adult (ITV) for which she won a BAFTA, Janet in Witness for the Prosecution (Mammoth Screen), and Tracey Pritchard in W1A (BBC). Most recently Monica has been seen as Peggy O’Dowd in Vanity Fair (ITV), and Marion in A Very English Scandal (BBC) opposite Hugh Grant. Further TV credits include Inside No. 9 (BBC), The Casual Vacancy (BBC/HBO), Wolf Hall (BBC), and Call the Midwife (BBC). For stage, Monica appeared in self-penned B*EASTS (Bush Theatre), Plaques & Tangles, The Twits, Birth of a Nation (Royal Court), King Lear, Seagull (Royal Shakespeare Company), Macbeth (Out of Joint), She Stoops to Conquer, A Laughing Matter (Royal National Theatre/Out of Joint) and The Walls (Royal National Theatre). Ian Drysdale’s theatre credits include Network, Blood and Gifts (National Theatre), Henry V (Michael Grandage Company), Richard III, Twelfth Night (Shakespeare’s Globe), The Tempest (Theatre Royal Haymarket), Oedipus (Nottingham Playhouse & Liverpool Playhouse), Hamlet, Twelfth Night, Ivanov (Donmar Warehouse), On The Waterfront (Nottingham Playhouse), Rough Crossing (Headlong), Pilate, Sejanus: His Fall, Thomas More, Hamlet, Macbeth, Brand, Much Ado About Nothing, Antony & Cleopatra (RSC), Treasure Island (Tobacco Factory), Tear From A Glass Eye (The Gate/RNT Studio), Idee Fixe, The Beaux’ Stratagem (Bristol Old Vic), Blue Remembered Hills (Edinburgh Festival), Deathtrap (Northern Lights). Television includes: Deep State, Harlots, Doc Martin, Atlantis (Series 2), Suffragette, Southcliffe, Throwback, Fashion, The Verdict, Pulling, Time Gentleman Please, South Bank Show, The Bill, The English Accent. Film includes: Tulip Fever, Time’s Up, Size Matters. Tsion Habte’s theatre credits include Cuttin’ It (Young Vic). Television includes: Les Miserables, Flack, Liar. Film includes: Anemone, Night Out. Jessie Mei Li trained with the National Youth Theatre and was recently in ITV1’s Strangers. This is her professional stage debut. Julian Ovenden is widely recognised for his role as Charles Blake in season five of Downton Abbey (ITV). Further television work includes The Crown (Netflix); Knightfall (A+E Studios); Major Crimes (Warner Bros. Television); Death in Paradise (BBC) and Person of Interest (CBS/Warner Bros). His extensive theatre credits include The Treatment (Almeida Theatre); My Night With Reg (Apollo Theatre/Donmar Warehouse); Showboat (New York Philharmonic); Finding Neverland (Leicester Theatre) and Marguerite (Theatre Royal Haymarket). Sheila Reid spent 7 years in Laurence Olivier’s first permanent company at the Old Vic Theatre, playing, amongst many parts, Bianca in his Othello and Natasha in The Three Sisters – both subsequently filmed. She is a founder member of the Actors Company and spent two seasons with the RSC; notably as the nurse in Romeo and Juliet, Putana in Tis Pity She’s a Whore and Queen Margaret in Richard III. Theatre credits also include an Olivier Award-nomination for When I Was A Girl I Used To Scream And Shout (Whitehall Theatre), My Mother Said I Never Should (Royal Court), The Importance Of Being Ernest (Haymarket), Pornography (Tricycle), Into The Woods (Donmar), Filomena (Almeida) and more recently Rasheeda Speaking (Trafalgar Studios), Silver Linings (English Touring Theatre), Pericles (Shakespeare’s Globe) and Maurice’s Jubilee (Edinburgh Festival / UK tour). She is currently in rehearsals for Troilus & Cressida at The RSC. Ingmar Bergman cast her in his film The Touch, having directed her in Hedda Gabler at the National Theatre. Other films include Brazil, The Winter Guest, Five Days One Summer and, most recently, the short multi award winning O Be Joyful. She is probably best known on TV as Madge, in the comedy series Benidorm. Other television includes Call The Midwife Christmas special 2014, three series of Doctor Who, Father Brown, Humans III, Psychobitches . She was most recently scene in Murder on The Blackpool Express, and has just wrapped on its sequel, Death On Tyne. Rhashan Stone has appeared on stage in The Strange Death of John Doe and The Intelligent Homosexual’s Guide to Capitalism & Socialism (Hampstead Theatre); Our Town (Almeida Theatre); Love and Information and Clubland (Royal Court Theatre); Southwark Fair, The Red Balloon, Sweeney Todd (all National Theatre). He has regularly performed for the Royal Shakespeare Company, Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre and the West Yorkshire Playhouse. On screen