Claire Foy and Matt Smith make their Old Vic debuts in Lungs, Duncan Macmillan’s hilarious play about a couple wrestling with the planet’s biggest dilemmas.
Tickets for Lungs are sure to be in high demand, as the play sees The Crown stars Foy and Smith reunited on the stage. The Old Vic’s Artistic Director, Matthew Warchus, directs.
“I could fly to New York and back every day for seven years and still not leave a carbon footprint as big as if I have a child. Ten thousand tonnes of CO2. That’s the weight of the Eiffel Tower. I’d be giving birth to the Eiffel Tower.”
Foy and Smith play a couple in a crumbling world of melting ice caps, overpopulation and political unrest. When it feels like everything’s falling apart before their very eyes, they ask the impossible question: why on earth would somebody bring a baby into this world?
Demonstrating how the world is being damaged by us, even adversely, Lungs is the latest sure-fire West End hit from playwright Duncan Macmillan. Macmillan’s recent London plays have included adaptations of Ibsen’s Rosmersholm and Orwell’s 1984; People, Places And Things; and Every Brilliant Thing.
Lungs was first produced at Washington DC’s Studio Theatre, before receiving its German-language premiere at the Schaubühne in Berlin, directed by Katie Mitchell. It has subsequently been performed around the world, including in London in 2013, when it starred Kate O’Flynn under the direction of Richard Wilson.
Along with her starring role in The Crown, Foy is well-known to West End audiences for her parts in Macbeth, The Connections Plays, Baby Girl, DNA & The Miracle. She has also starred on screen in Wolf Hall. Matt Smith, meanwhile, has performed in That Face (Royal Court/West End), American Psycho (Almeida) and History Boys (National Theatre), along with starring as the titular character in Doctor Who.
Don’t miss the chance to see two sensational performers united with a cutting tale of contemporary parenthood in Lungs at The Old Vic.