The new Royal Court season, announced today, includes a total of ten world premieres – among them works by Mark Ravenhill, Debbie Tucker Green and Anthony Neilson, plus actress Ellie Kendrick’s writing debut.
Kendrick’s first written piece, Hole, opens at the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs on 28 November 2018, running until 12 January 2019, and is directed by Helen Goalen and Abbi Greenland.
Mark Ravenhill makes his return to the Royal Court with The Cane, directed by Vicky Featherstone, which is staged at the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs from 6 December 2018 to 26 January 2019.
Preceding him in the venue is Debbie Tucker Green’s Ear for Eye, running from 25 October to 24 November 2018, while Anthony Neilson returns to the Jerwood Upstairs as both writer and director with The Prudes, from 18 April to 2 June 2018.
Further highlights include: James Macdonald directing 2017 Pinter Commission work One for Sorrow by Cordelia Lynn; Robert Alan Evans’ new play The Woods, directed by Lucy Morrison; a new work by Deborah Stevenson; Pity by Rory Mullarkey; Instructions on Correct Assembly by Thomas Eccleshare; plus director Ola Ince will programme the Royal Court’s third space, The Site in autumn 2018.
The Royal Court will also partner LIFT in presenting Belgian Lies Pauwels’ Happiness Always, with a second project for LIFT 2018 later this month.
Artistic director Vicky Featherstone said:
“Our new season for 2018 combines a thrilling range of playwrights and theatre artists, fearlessly, angrily and often very humorously exploring power and control, identity and gender, and the major failure of the echo-chamber of liberalism.
“We have a mix of experienced writers returning, plays by debut writers and writers new to the Royal Court, major US and international artists pushing form and offering a place for debate and reflection and story.”
A bookshop institution
Also announced today, the Royal Court will host the return of a longstanding theatre institution, the Samuel French Bookshop. The publisher was forced to close its famous outlet in Fitzroy Street, Bloomsbury in April last year. It will open a new site in the Royal Court’s Balcony Bar from Monday 5 March.
Douglas Schatz, managing director of Samuel French in the UK, said: “Samuel French is thrilled to reopen a theatre bookshop in London, especially here at the Royal Court, the home of new playwriting.”
Season dates
Instructions for Correct Assembly – Thomas Eccleshare (dir. Hamish Pirie)
7 April to 19 May 2018
The Prudes – Anthony Neilson (also directing)
18 April to 2 June 2018
One for Sorrow – Cordelia Lynn (dir. James Macdonald)
20 June to 11 August 2018
Pity – Rory Mullarkey (dir. Sam Pritchard)
12 July to 11 August 2018
The Woods – Robert Alan Evans (dir. Lucy Morrison)
5 September to 13 October 2018
Deborah Stevenson commission
21 September to 6 October
Ear for Eye – Debbie Tucker Green (also directing)
25 October to 24 November 2018
Hole – Ellie Kendrick (dir. Helen Goalen and Abbi Greenland0
28 November 2018 to 12 January 2019
The Cane – Mark Ravenhill (dir. Vicky Featherstone)
6 December 2018 to 26 January 2019
