BECKETT TRILOGY TO TRANSFER FROM ROYAL COURT THEATRE TO WEST END AHEAD OF NATIONAL TOUR

A trilogy of Samuel Beckett plays, performed by actress Lisa Dwan, which has sold out at the Royal Court Theatre before opening, will transfer to the Duchess Theatre in London’s West End for a limited two week run from 3-15 Feb. In a unique collaboration with Nica Burns and her company Nimax Theatres, all tickets will be sold at Royal Court prices (£12- £25).

In May 2013, Lisa Dwan’s performance of Beckett’s landmark piece Not I was staged at the Royal Court, 40 years after the theatre held its UK premiere in 1973. The entire run sold out, with extra dates added due to demand and both critics and audiences captivated by Beckett’s unique piece and Lisa’s performance of it.

In January, Lisa Dwan returns to the Royal Court to reprise her critically acclaimed performance of Not I alongside two more classics Footfalls and Rockaby, directed by Beckett’s long-time collaborator, Walter Asmus. The production runs in the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs at the Royal Court from 9-18 January and has already sold out all tickets ahead of opening.

The trilogy will then tour to Cambridge Arts Theatre, Birmingham Repertory Theatre and The Lowry, Salford in autumn 2014, with international dates to be added.

Praise for Lisa Dwan’s performance of Not I at Royal Court, May 2013

“She has turned what is commonly regarded as the hardest role an actor can tackle into a tour de force”
The Times

5 stars “An unforgettable eight-minute-and-45-second experience for the audience. It is an extraordinary experience, completely immersive, which demands much of Dwan and the audience, too.”
The Guardian

4 stars “a verbal hailstorm charged with pent-up agony…[through Lisa’s performance] we glimpse the volcanic chaos of a desperate mind.”
Financial Times

4 stars “Dwan’s is a dazzling technical performance.”
Telegraph

Vicky Featherstone, Artistic Director of the Royal Court Theatre said:

“When Not I opened at the Royal Court in May, it was an unforgettable and special experience for all who saw it. On announcing that Lisa Dwan would return, this time to perform a trilogy of Beckett’s work, it sold out quickly once again. It is heartening to see there is such a demand for this work.”

“In a visionary move and one which reminds us there is passion and integrity in our West End, Nica Burns and Nimax are opening up this extraordinary piece of theatre to a wider audience. That they are doing this and keeping tickets at Royal Court prices for a limited residency, makes me deeply proud and inspired to be in partnership with them. Following this we will tour round the country to three leading regional theatres in the autumn.”

Nica Burns, Chief Executive of Nimax Theatres said:

“I’m delighted to enable all the audiences who could not get tickets at the Royal Court to experience Lisa Dwan’s outstanding performance of these wonderful Beckett short plays. The delightfully intimate and atmospheric Duchess Theatre could not be a more perfect space to see the plays in the West End.”

Not I is an intense monologue, set in a pitch-black space lit by a single beam of light. A disembodied female mouth floats eight feet above the stage and delivers a stream of consciousness, spoken, as Beckett directed, at the speed of thought. Lisa Dwan was tutored in the role by Billie Whitelaw, who originally performed the part at its 1973 UK premiere and was personally coached for the part by Beckett himself.

Rockaby is probably the most famous of Beckett’s last works. It explores loneliness and features a prematurely old woman dressed in an evening gown, sitting on a wooden rocking chair that appears to rock of its own accord. Rockaby was first performed in New York in 1981 starring Billie Whitelaw and then at the National Theatre in 1982.

Footfalls features the distant voice of ‘Mother’ and May who paces back and forth like a metronome, on a bare strip of floor. Footfalls was first performed by Billie Whitelaw, for whom the piece had been written, at the Royal Court as part of the Samuel Beckett Festival in 1976, directed by Beckett himself.

Lisa Dwan has been performing Beckett since 2005. First performing Not I at Battersea Arts Centre directed by Natalie Abrahami before being directed by Billie Whitelaw at the Southbank Centre in 2009, She has also worked extensively in theatre, film and television both internationally and in her native Ireland. Film credits include: Not I, The Engagement, Walt Disney’s Oliver Twist with Richard Dreyfus and Elijah Wood and John Boorman’s Tailor of Panama and Bhopal – A Prayer for Rain. She adapted, produced and performed the critically acclaimed one woman play Beside the Sea at the Southbank Centre and on tour and starred in Goran Bregović’s new music drama, Margot, Diary Of An Unhappy Queen at the Barbican. She most recently performed in Ramin Gray’s production of Illusions by Ivan Viripaev at the Bush Theatre and A Soldiers Tale at the Hay Festival.

Walter Asmus directs. He was Beckett’s long-time friend and collaborator, assisting him on many of his productions at the Schiller Theatre in Berlin and for TV in Stuttgart. His production of Waiting for Godot, which toured extensively internationally, including in 2008 a one-night-only tour of the 32 counties of Ireland, was widely described as the ‘definitive production’.

Not I/Footfalls/Rockaby is a co-production between the Royal Court Theatre and Mighty Mouth Ltd, in association with Cusack Projects Ltd.

Listings Information:

The Royal Court Theatre and Mighty Mouth present
Not I/Footfalls/Rockaby
by Samuel Beckett
performed by Lisa Dwan
directed by Walter Asmus

West End
Theatre: Duchess Theatre, 3-5 Catherine Street, London, WC2B 5LA.
Dates: 3 – 15 Feb
Performances: Monday – Saturday at 8pm Thursday & Saturday matinees at 3pm
Prices: £25/£20/£12
Royal Court Box Office Tickets can also be purchased for the West End run via the Royal Court
020 7565 5000
www.royalcourttheatre.com

Duchess Theatre Box Office 0844 482 9672
www.nimaxtheatre.com

National Tour

Cambridge Arts Theatre
9-13 September
01223 503 333
www.cambridgeartstheatre.com
Ticket sales date TBC

Birmingham Repertory Theatre, The STUDIO
16-20 September
0121 236 4455
www.birmingham-rep.co.uk
Tickets on sale 20 January (members) and 27 January (general public)

The Lowry, Salford
23-27 September
0843 208 6000
www.thelowry.com
Ticket sales date TBC

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Coutts is the wealth division of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group. Coutts has a long history of supporting the arts going back 200 years, having looked after the financial affairs of many famous clients connected with the arts such as Bram Stoker, Charles Dickens and Chopin. In 1816, Thomas Coutts married Harriot Mellon, a popular actress of her day, and together they became partners of a number of London Theatres, including the Drury Lane and the Royal Opera House. Coutts has even featured in a number of artistic works including The Gondoliers by Gilbert and Sullivan, and Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic story Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. In the new millennium, this tradition has continued not only through Coutts managing the finances of many of today’s top writers, actors and musicians, but also through our arts sponsorship programme. We are delighted to support The Royal Court and its diverse range of ground-breaking performances.

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