PRESS RELEASE – 18 OCTOBER 2019

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Sonia Friedman Productions Gavin Kalin Productions, Rupert Gavin, Patrick Gracey/Scott M. Delman, 1001 Nights Productions, Tulchin Bartner Productions in association with Len Blavatnik, Eilene Davidson Productions, Louise & Brad Edgerton present

UNCLE VANYA By Anton Chekhov

In a new adaptation by Conor McPherson

Directed by Ian Rickson

Rosalind Eleazar, Aimee Lou Wood, Anna Calder-Marshall, Dearbhla Molloy, Peter Wight and Ciarán Hinds will join and Richard Armitage in a major new production of Anton Chekhov’s .

Sonia Friedman Productions today announced further casting for Conor McPherson’s (, Girl from the North Country), new adaptation of Uncle Vanya directed by Ian Rickson (Jerusalem, The Seagull).

Rosalind Eleazar (The Personal History of David Copperfield, Deep Water, The Starry Messenger), Aimee Lou Wood (Sex Education, Downstate), the Emmy Award-winning Anna Calder-Marshall (LOVE, Evening at the Talk House, Male of the Species), the Olivier and Tony-award nominated Dearbhla Molloy (, , Juno and the Paycock), Peter Wight (The Birthday Party, , The Red Lion) and Olivier Award-nominated Ciarán Hinds (Translations, Game of Thrones, Girl from the North Country) will perform alongside the previously announced Toby Jones and Richard Armitage.

The production will run for sixteen weeks at the Theatre from 14th January 2020 with Opening Night on Thursday 23rd January 2020. Tickets are on sale now. In the heat of summer, Sonya (Aimee Lou Wood) and her Uncle Vanya (Toby Jones) while away their days on a crumbling estate deep in the countryside, visited occasionally only by the local doctor Astrov (Richard Armitage).

However, when Sonya’s father Professor Serebryakov (Ciarán Hinds) suddenly returns with his restless, alluring, new wife Yelena (Rosalind Eleazar) declaring his intention to sell the house, the polite facades crumble and long repressed feelings start to emerge with devastating consequences.

Olivier Award-winner Conor McPherson’s stunning new adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s masterpiece, Uncle Vanya, is a portrayal of life at the turn of the 20th century, full of tumultuous frustration, dark humour and hidden passions. Critically acclaimed director Ian Rickson returns to Chekhov for the first time since his landmark production of The Seagull in 2007, reuniting with BAFTA and Olivier Award-winner Toby Jones (The Birthday Party) alongside Richard Armitage, who returns to the UK stage six years after his Olivier Award-nominated performance in The Crucible. Uncle Vanya is the eleventh collaboration between Ian Rickson and Sonia Friedman Productions, with previous productions including Rosmersholm, Jerusalem, The River, and The Children’s Hour.

Uncle Vanya is designed by Rae Smith, with lighting by Bruno Poet, music by Stephen Warbeck, sound by Ian Dickinson and casting by Amy Ball CDG.

Rosalind Eleazer will play the role of Yelena. Born in , Rosalind graduated from LAMDA in 2015, winning the Spotlight Prize for Best Drama School Graduate. She went on to make her stage debut in Plaques & Tangle at the .

Her television credits include the series Deep Water for Kudos, in which she co-stars with Anna Friel and Sinead Matthews, Breeders, two series of Harlots, Howards End, Rellik, NW, National Treasure and Lore.

She makes her feature film debut in The Personal History of David Copperfield, directed by Armando Iannucci, which has just opened the London Film Festival and is due for general release in January 2020.

Most recently Rosalind appeared at Wyndham’s Theatre in The Starry Messenger opposite Matthew Broderick and Elizabeth McGovern.

Aimee Lou Wood is a UK actress, who came to international attention as Aimee in Netflix’s Sex Education, starring opposite , Asa Butterfield, and James Purefoy.

Aimee also recently wrapped on the biopic Louis Wain, directed by Will Sharpe and staring , Claire Foy, Andrea Riseborough, Sharon Rooney, Stacey Martin and Hayley Squires.

Earlier this year, she starred as Effie in the acclaimed Downstate at the National Theatre.

Aimee graduated from the Royal Academy of Dramatic in 2017.

Dearbhla Molloy will perform the role of Grandmaman. Dearbhla was recently nominated for the Olivier Award for Best Supporting Actress in Jez Butterworth’s The Ferryman (Royal Court/Gieldud/Bernard B. Jacobs, Broadway).

Her other theatre credits include In Celebration, , Hamlet, As You Like It, Much Ado About Nothing (West End), The Cripple of Inishmaan (Drama Desk Award and Irish Theatre Award for Best Supporting Actress), Hinterland, On the Ledge (National Theatre), The Hostage, Shadow of a Gunman, Lovegirl and the Innocent (RSC); Ditch (Old Vic Tunnels), The Seagull (Edinburgh Festival), Doubt (Tricycle), Juno and the Paycock for which she won the London Critics’ Award for Best Supporting Actress (Donmar/Roundabout), Macbeth (Bristol Old Vic), (Liverpool), Trojan Women (Gate, London), And No More Shall We Part (Hampstead), Dancing at Lughnasa ( Tony Award nomination for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play, Drama Desk Award, Theatre World Special Award), A Touch of the Poet, Outside Mullingar (Broadway), The Cripple of Inishmaan (Atlantic Theatre / US Tour), Much Ado About Nothing (Guthrie Minneapolis), Afterplay (Irish Rep, New York), Moment (Studio Theatre, Washington DC), Translations, Aristocrats, The Misanthrope, Ivanov, Living Quarters, Mrs Warren’s Profession, A Life (Irish Theatre Award for Best Supporting Actress) (), Phaedre, Uncle Vanya, The Philanthropist, Come on Over (Gate, ); The Plough and the Stars (Gaiety).

Dearbhla’s television credits includes Women on the Verge, Acceptable Risk, Scandal, Family Tree, Quirke, Casualty, Coronation Street, Midsomer Murders, Foyle’s War, Waking the Dead, New Tricks, 55 Degrees North, Stan, Touch of Frost, Sex and the City, The Fragile Heart

Her film credits include Wild Mountain Thyme, 3096, No Reservations, The Damned United, Tara Road, The Blackwater Lightship, Home for Christmas, Bloom, Frankie Starlight, Run of the Country, Loaded and This is the Sea.

Dearbhla was the recipient of the US Audie Award for Best Female Solo Narration for My Dream of You by Nuala O'Faolain for which she also received a Grammy Award nomination.

Anna Calder-Marshall will play the role of Nana. Anna is an award-winning stage and screen actress, whose theatre credits include Lost Without Words, LOVE, Evening at the Talk House, The Secret Rapture, The Seagull (National Theatre); The Philistines (RSC); Temple, Salt, Root & Rose (Donmar); Measure for Measure, Hamlet, Saint Joan, Peer Gynt (Birmingham Rep); The Lady's Not for Burning, Caesar and Cleopatra (Chichester); The Bargain, Troilus and Cressida (Theatre Royal Bath); Open Court: Death Tax, Uncle Vanya (Royal Court Theatre); The Herd (); The Wild Duck (Lyceum); Antigone (Old Vic); A Kind of Alaska, Tejas Verdes (The Gate, London); The Importance of Being Earnest (Oxford Playhouse); Bird Calls (Sheffield Crucible); Comfort Me With Apples (Hampstead Theatre); Pastoral (Soho & Hightide); Danger: Memory! (Jermyn Street Theatre); The House of Bernada Alba (Hammersmith Lyric)

Anna’s extensive television credits include Harlots, Les Misérables, Casualty, Scott and Bailey, New Tricks, The Bill, Holby Blue, Poirot, Dalziel and Pascoe, Doctor Who, Midsomer Murders, Witness Against Hitler, Casebook of Sherlock Holmes, Lovejoy, Heartbeat, Blood Royal: William the Conqueror, Rules of Engagement, Inspector Morse, Titus Andronicus, Strangers and Brothers, , The Winter's Tale, Hammer House of Horror, Bloomers, Matilda's England, A Woman's Place?, The Duchess of Duke Street, Crown Court, Under Western Skies, Affairs of the Heart, Play for Today, Male of the Species for which she won an Emmy for Outstanding Single Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role, Sanctuary, Love Story, The Wednesday Play.

Her film credits include Last Christmas, Us Among the Stones, Love, Trespass Against Us, 13 Steps Down, Anna Karenina, Saints-Ex, Zulu Dawn, Wuthering Heights

Peter Wight will play the role of Telegin. Peter’s theatre credits include Rosmersholm (Duke of York Theatre), The Birthday Party (), Hamlet (Almeida/Harold Pinter Theatre), The Red Lion, Ivanov, Sleep With Me, Murmuring Judges, The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui, Black Snow, Waiting for Godot (National Theatre), The Seagull (Royal Court/Broadway), Trelawny of The Wells (), Otherwise Engaged, Chekhov's Women (West End), The Spanish Tragedy, Much Ado About Nothing, Barbarians, A Clockwork Orange, Hamlet (RSC), In The Republic of Happiness, In Basildon, Face to the Wall, Not A Game for Boys (Royal Court), The Caretaker (Globe Theatre Warsaw), Edward II, Mouth to Mouth (Royal Exchange Manchester), Dearly Beloved, Grace (Hampstead Theatre), A State of Affairs, , Commedia, Progress (Lyric Hammersmith), Julius Caesar (Riverside Studios), A Passion in Six Days, A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Nest (Sheffield Crucible), King Lear, The Three Sisters (Birmingham Rep), Hard To Get (Traverse Edinburgh).

His television credits include A Confession, This Time with Alan Partridge, Vanity Fair, Brief Encounters, I Want My Wife Back, Our Zoo, The Mimic, The Paradise, Hit and Miss, Public Enemies, Titanic, Money, Monday Monday, Boy Meets Girl, 10 Days to War, Party Animals, Eastenders, Persuasion, Fantabulosa!, Early Doors, Room at the Top, The Security Men, and Uncle Adolf.

Peter’s film credits include The Sense of an Ending, Another Mother’s Son, The Program, Mr Turner, King of Soho, Brakes, Only You, Kon-Tiki, Hard Boiled Sweets, Clone, Atonement, Hot Fuzz, Lassie, Babel, Pride and Prejudice, The Statement, Lucky Break, Shiner and with Mike Leigh, Another Year, Mr Turner, , Naked, Secrets, Lies and Meantime.

The role of Professor Serebryakov will be performed by Ciarán Hinds. Ciarán began his career at the Glasgow Citizens Theatre and was a member of the company for many years. In Ireland he has worked at the Lyric Theatre Belfast, the Druid Theatre in Galway and at the Project. Ciarán is currently appearing at the National Theatre in ’s Translations. Prior to this Ciaran played the role of Nick in Conor McPherson’s Girl from the North Country in the West End and . Extensive theatre credits include Lyndsey Turner’s Hamlet at the Barbican, Mark O’Rowe’s new play Our Few and Evil Days at the Abbey Theatre. Donmar Theatre and New York productions of Conor McPherson’s The Night Alive, on Broadway as Big Daddy in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, in a co-production with the of Juno and The Paycock by Sean O’Casey, directed by Howard Davies. For the Gate Theatre he appeared in Conor McPherson’s The Birds, the Field Day Company’s version of Antigone, The School for Wives and Brian Friel’s The Yalta Game.

He toured internationally with Peter Brook’s Company in The Mahabharata and has played leading roles at the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Royal Court, the Donmar Warehouse and the National Theatre, where he last appeared in Burnt by The Sun and played Larry in ’s , which transferred to Broadway. He also performed on Broadway in Conor McPherson’s The Sea Farer.

Ciarán’s television credits include MotherFatherSon, as John Franklin in The Terror, as Mance Rayder in Game of Thrones and as Bud Hammond in Political Animals, DCI Langton in Linda La Plante’s Above Suspicion and as Julius Caesar in the BBC/HBO co-production of Rome. This follows extensive television credits including leading roles in The Mayor Of Casterbridge, Jane Eyre, Seaforth, Ivanhoe, Sherlock Holmes, Prime Suspect 3 and the award-winning film of Jane Austen’s Persuasion, in which he played Captain Wentworth.

His extensive film credits include Peter Greenaway’s The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover, December Bridge, Circle of Friends, Titanic Town, Some Mother’s Son, Oscar and Lucinda, The Lost Son, The Weight of Water and Mary Reilly, The Road To Perdition for , The Sum of All Fears, Mickybo and Me, Calendar Girls, Lara Croft: The Cradle of Life, The Statement, Veronica Guerin and The Phantom of the Opera both for Joel Schumacher, Miami Vice for Michael Mann and Munich for Steven Spielberg. Amazing Grace for Michael Apted, Nativity for Catherine Hardwicke, Hallam Foe, A Tiger’s Tail, Excalibur for John Boorman, Margot at the Wedding for Noah Baumbach, There Will Be Blood for Paul Thomas Anderson, Stop Loss for Kimberly Pearce, In Bruges for Martin McDonagh, The Tale of Despereaux, Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, Cash, Race To Witch Mountain, Conor McPherson’s The Eclipse for which he won Best Actor at the Tribeca Film Festival, Life During Wartime, The Debt, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, John Carter of Mars, Salvation Boulevard, The Rite, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, The Woman in Black, Closed Circuit, The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby, The Sea, Frozen, Last Days in the Desert, Agent 47 , Driftless area, Bleed for This, Silence for Martin Scorsese, Woman Walks Ahead, Red Sparrow, Justice League and most recently First Man.

For further information please contact Kate Hassell or Ben Chamberlain at The Corner Shop PR on 020 7831 7657 [email protected] | [email protected]

LISTINGS

UNCLE VANYA by Anton Chekhov In a new adaptation by Conor McPherson Directed by Ian Rickson Designer – Rae Smith Lighting Designer – Bruno Poet Composer – Stephen Warbeck Sound Designer – Ian Dickinson Casting Director – Amy Ball CDG

Uncle Vanya – Toby Jones Astrov – Richard Armitage Yelena – Rosalind Eleazer Sonya – Aimee Lou Wood Nana – Anna Calder-Marshall Grandmaman – Dearbhla Molloy Telegin – Peter Wight Professor Serebryakov – Ciarán Hinds

Harold Pinter Theatre Panton St, London SW1Y 4DN

First Preview: Tuesday 14th Jan 2020, 19:30 Opening Night: Thursday 23rd Jan 2020, 19:30 Final Performance: Saturday 2nd May 2020, 19:30

Monday – Saturday at 7.30pm, Wednesday and Saturday matinees at 2.30pm

Box Office: 0844 871 7622 Calls cost 7p per minute, plus your phone company's access charge. Group Bookings: 020 7206 1174 Standard network charges apply. Access Bookings: 0800 912 6971 Free Call Customer Services: 0844 871 7627 Calls cost 7p per minute, plus your phone company's access charge.

Audio Described Performance: Wednesday 12th Feb 2020, 19:30 Captioned Performance: Wednesday 26th Feb 2020, 19:30

Reduced price tickets for Preview performances Tickets from just £15/ £10 in Previews

NOTES TO EDITORS

TOBY JONES British actor Toby Jones is known for his performances both in the theatre and on screen. Earlier this year he starred in Don’t Forget The Driver, a series he co-wrote with Tim Crouch for BBC Two. Toby has recently been cast in Louis Wain alongside Benedict Cumberbatch and Claire Foy and in The Sands of Venus. He has newly finished filming A Boy Called Christmas and The Last Thing He Wanted, written and directed by Oscar nominated Dee Rees.

This Autumn Toby returned to the Royal Court Theatre in Glass. Kill. Bluebeard. Imp; four plays written by Caryl Churchill and directed by James Macdonald. He also voiced the role of The Reverend Chasuble for the animated adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s The Canterville Ghost and can currently be seen in the Netflix prequel series The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance.

In 2018 Toby appeared in the revival of Harold Pinter’s The Birthday Party. He went on to star on screen in French comedy film Naked Normandy for Philippe le Gay, Lionsgate’s World War One Drama Journey’s End and the blockbuster, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom.

Toby reprised his BAFTA-award winning role in the third and final season of the award-winning comedy series Detectorists. His other works include Infamous (Best British Actor, London Film Critics Circle Awards), Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (Oscar-nominated) and The Girl (BAFTA, Golden Globe and Emmy nominations). Toby also starred in Peter Strickland’s multi award-winning film Berberian Sound Studio. In 2014, Toby starred as the lead in the BBC Two BAFTA winning drama Marvellous, and in Matteo Garrone’s fantasy horror, Tale Of Tales.

Further screen credits include; The Snowman, Kaleidoscope and Michael Haneke’s Palme d’Or nominated film, Happy End. Atomic Blonde, Sherlock, Dad’s Army, The Secret Agent, The Witness For The Prosecution, Morgan, Wayward Pines, Capital, The Man Who Knew Infinity, The Hunger Games series, the Harry Potter series, Captain America: The First Avenger, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Leave to Remain, Andrew Kotting’s By Our Selves, My Week With Marilyn, The Adventures of Tintin, Frost/Nixon, W. and The Painted Veil.

Theatre credits include: Circle Mirror Transformation (Royal Court Theatre), The Painter (Arcola), Every Good Boy Deserves Favour (National Theatre), Parlour Song (), The Dumb Waiter and Other Pieces (Oxford Playhouse), Measure for Measure (with Complicite) (National Theatre), The Play What I Wrote (winner: Olivier Award for Best Supporting Actor) (West End/Broadway).

RICHARD ARMITAGE Richard is a multi-award-winning stage and screen actor best known for his role as Thorin in Peter Jackson's trilogy of The Hobbit and more recently as Daniel Miller in Epix Berlin Station, as well as Claude Becker in Oceans 8. Armitage also voices Trevor Belmont in the Netflix series Castlevania and Logan in Marvel’s Wolverine podcast. Richard recently shot independent The Lodge, directed by Severin Fiala & Veronika Franz which premiered at Sundance, and was just in Toronto where he was promoting independent feature My Zoe, written and directed by Julie Delpy. He has just wrapped shooting the lead in serialized thriller The Stranger for Netflix/Red Productions, based on Harlan Coben’s #1 New York Times best- selling novel of the same name. In theatre, Richard is well known for his critically acclaimed performance as John Proctor in The Crucible at the Old Vic Theatre. He was nominated for an Olivier Award for his performance. Richard’s leading role in the Off-Broadway play, Love, Love, Love directed by Michael Mayer also garnered critical acclaim.

CONOR MCPHERSON Conor McPherson's plays include Rum and Vodka, The Good Thief, This Lime Tree Bower, St Nicholas, The Weir (Olivier Award, directed by Ian Rickson), Dublin Carol, Port Authority, Shining City (Tony Award nomination), The Seafarer (Olivier, Tony and Evening Standard Award nominations), The Veil, The Night Alive (New York Drama Critics' Circle Award), and most recently, the Olivier Award-winning musical, Girl from the North Country, with Bob Dylan.

IAN RICKSON Ian Rickson was the Artistic Director of the Royal Court from 1998 to 2006, where he directed The River (also Broadway) Jerusalem (also West End and Broadway), The Winterling, The Night Heron and (also Chicago), all by Jez Butterworth; Not Not Not Not Not Enough Oxygen and This is a Chair by Caryl Churchill; Dublin Carol and The Weir by Conor McPherson (also Dublin, Chicago, West End and Broadway); The Seagull by Anton Chekhov (also Broadway); Krapp’s Last Tape by Samuel Beckett; Alice Trilogy by Tom Murphy; The Sweetest Swing in Baseball and Boy Gets Girl by Rebecca Gilman; Fallout by Roy Williams; Mouth to Mouth by Kevin Elyot; The Lights by Howard Korder; Pale Horse and Some Voices by ; Ashes and Sand by Judy Upton and Killers by Adam Pernak.

In the West End, Rickson has directed Edward Albee’s The Goat or Who is Sylvia? (); Rosmersholm (Duke of York’s Theatre); The Birthday Party, Old Times, Betrayal and The Children’s Hour (all at the Harold Pinter Theatre); and at the National Theatre, Translations by Brian Friel, Evening at the Talk House by Wallace Shawn, The Red Lion by Patrick Marber, The Hothouse by Harold Pinter and The Day I Stood Still by Kevin Elyot. Productions at the Old Vic include Electra by Sophocles. Productions at the include The Nest, Now We Are Here and Hamlet. Productions at the Almeida Theatre include Against by Christopher Shinn and Parlour Song by Jez Butterworth.

Work on screen includes Fallout (Company Pictures for Channel 4) and Krapp’s Last Tape by Samuel Beckett (BBC4) and on radio In Therapy (BBC Radio 4). Rickson also works with PJ Harvey and Kate Tempest on their music and poetry shows.

SONIA FRIEDMAN PRODUCTIONS (SFP) is an international production company responsible for some of the most successful theatre productions in London and New York.

Since 1990, SFP has developed, initiated and produced over 170 new productions and together the company has won a staggering 55 Olivier Awards, 30 Tonys and 2 BAFTAs.

In 2019, Sonia Friedman OBE was awarded ‘Producer of the Year’ at the Stage Awards for a record breaking fourth time. In 2018, Friedman was also featured in TIME 100, a list of Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World. In 2017 she took the number one spot in 'The Stage 100', becoming the first number one in the history of the compilation not to own or operate West End theatres and the first solo woman for almost 20 years.

Current productions include: the UK premiere of The Book of Mormon, West End and UK & European tour, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child in London, New York and Melbourne, Mean Girls at the August Wilson Theatre, New York, Fiddler on the Roof at the Playhouse Theatre, London, and , on Broadway. Forthcoming productions include: Harry Potter and the Cursed Child in San Francisco, Hamburg and Toronto, Uncle Vanya at the Harold Pinter Theatre, London, the world premiere of ’s Leopoldstadt at Wyndham’s Theatre, London and The Doctor at the Duke of York’s Theatre, London.

Previous theatre productions include: Rosmersholm, The Ferryman, The Inheritance, Summer and Smoke, Dreamgirls, The Jungle, All About Eve, Consent, The Birthday Party, Ink, Hamlet starring , Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, , The Glass Menagerie, Nice Fish, A Christmas Carol, Funny Girl, Farinelli and The King, Hamlet starring Benedict Cumberbatch, 1984, Sunny Afternoon, Bend It Like Beckham, The Nether, The River, Electra, King Charles III, , , Mojo, , Merrily We Roll Along, Old Times, and Richard III, A Chorus of Disapproval, The Sunshine Boys, Hay Fever, Absent Friends, Top Girls, Betrayal, Much Ado About Nothing, , The Children’s Hour, A Flea in Her Ear, La Bête, All My Sons, , Jerusalem, A Little Night Music, , Othello, Arcadia, , The Norman Conquests, , Dancing at Lughnasa, Maria Friedman: Re- Arranged, La Cage aux Folles, No Man’s Land, The Seagull, Under the Blue Sky, That Face, Dealer’s Choice, Hergés Adventures of Tintin, In Celebration, Boeing-Boeing, The Dumb Waiter, Rock ‘n’ Roll, Love Song, Faith Healer, Bent, Eh Joe, Donkeys’ Years, Otherwise Engaged, Celebration, Shoot the Crow, As You Like It, The Home Place, Whose Life Is It Anyway?, By the Bog of Cats, The Woman in White, Guantanamo: ‘Honor Bound to Defend Freedom’, Endgame, , See You Next Tuesday, Hitchcock Blonde, Absolutely! {Perhaps}, Sexual Perversity in Chicago, Ragtime, Macbeth, What the Night Is For, Afterplay, Up for Grabs, A Day in the Death of Joe Egg, , On an Average Day, A Servant to Two Masters, Port Authority, Spoonface Steinberg and Speed-The-Plow.

TV productions include BBC’s Wolf Hall (co-producer), The Dresser (Exec Producer) and King Lear with Anthony Hopkins (Exec Producer).

For full details of SFP’s theatre productions, please visit soniafriedman.com.