The first part of Matthew Warchus’ fourth season at The Old Vic has been unveiled, with further details about Emma Rice’s Wise Children, and a new adaptation of Luke Harding’s A Very Expensive Poison, revealed.
The autumn to winter season opens with the previously announced world premiere of hip hop musical Sylvia from ZooNation: The Kate Prince Company. The new show tells the story of Sylvia Pankhurst and the Suffragette movement 100 years after the first British vote for women, with a cast including Beverley Knight, John Dalgleish and Carly Bawden. This is followed by the UK premiere of 17c as part of the Dance Umbrella 2018 programme, in a multi-media dance theatre production conceived and directed by New York choreographer Annie-B Parson.
A world premiere of Angela Carter’s novel Wise Children, adapted and directed by Emma Rice, subsequently plays from 8 October. Launching her new theatre company of the same name with the performance, Wise Children is set to be a celebration of show business, family, forgiveness and hope, as the stories of fading theatrical stars intertwine. Suitable for ages 14+, expect show girls and Shakespeare, sex and scandal, music, mischief and mistaken identity – and butterflies by the thousand.
Jack Thorne’s version of A Christmas Carol, directed by Warchus, then returns. Stephen Tompkinson (Spamalot, West End) will portray infamous miser Ebenezer Scrooge, a character portrayed at the venue last year by Rhys Ifans. Performances begin 27 November.
Then, coming soon in 2019, Lucy Prebble (The Effect, ENRON) is set to reimagine Luke Harding’s jaw-dropping exposé of the events behind the tragic death of Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko, in new play A Very Expensive Poison. The show promises to send us careering through the shadowy world of international espionage from the townhouses of Fitzrovia to the brothels of Soho.
You can find out more about, and book tickets for, upcoming shows at The Old Vic here.