Cast Announced for Dennis Kelly's Gorge Mastromas

PRESS RELEASE

CAST ANNOUNCED FOR DENNIS KELLY’S GORGE MASTROMAS

The cast has been announced for Dennis Kelly’s new play The Ritual Slaughter of Gorge Mastromas, which runs from 5 Sep – 19 Oct (press night: 11 Sep) in the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs at the Royal Court. The full cast will be Tom Brooke (playing Gorge) Pippa Haywood, Joshua James, Jonathan McGuiness, Aaron Monaghan, Kate O’Flynn and Alan Williams.

_”Now why Gorge made that decision, is difficult to say…
Was it morality? Kindness? Goodness? An innate sense of right and wrong?”_

If you could lie without flinching, corrupt without caring and succeed at all costs – how far could you go…how much could you make?

From the early promise of the 70s through to the unrelenting capitalism of the 80s and 90s, follow Gorge on the journey from innocence to savage greed and knotted honesty, as he invents three golden rules for success, whatever the cost.

An electrifying dark morality tale.

The production will be directed by Vicky Featherstone, designed by Tom Scutt, with lighting by Philip Gladwell, music by Nick Powell and sound by Gregory Clarke.

The Ritual Slaughter of Gorge Mastromas is Dennis Kelly’s Royal Court Theatre debut. His recent credits include the RSC production of Matilda the Musical, which won Olivier, Evening Standard, Critics Circle Awards and transferred to the West End and Broadway, where he won a Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical. Other credits include The Gods Weep for the RSC at Hampstead Theatre, Orphans, at the Traverse Theatre as part of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival before transferring to the Birmingham Rep and Soho Theatre, My Teacher’s A Troll at National Theatre of Scotland, After the End at the Bush and on tour, Love and Money at Royal Exchange, Manchester and Young Vic and Taking Care of Baby at Hampstead Theatre. On television, he wrote Pulling on BBC 3 and most recently the six part original drama Utopia on Channel 4.

The Ritual Slaughter of Gorge Mastromas is directed by Vicky Featherstone, in the first full production she has directed since taking over as Artistic Director of the Royal Court in April 2013. She will also direct Abi Morgan’s The Mistress Contract in 2014.

Prior to the Royal Court she was the first Artistic Director of the National Theatre of Scotland, where her credits include Enquirer (co-directed with John Tiffany), Appointment with The Wicker Man, 27, The Wheel, Somersaults, Wall of Death: A Way of Life (co-directed with Stephen Skrynka), The Miracle Man, Empty, Long Gone Lonesome, Cockroach, 365, Mary Stuart and co-directed The Wolves In The Walls. As Artistic Director of Paines Plough from 1997 to 2005, her credits include The Small Things, Pyrenees, On Blindness, The Drowned World, Tiny Dynamite, Crazy Gary’s Mobile Disco, Splendour, Riddance, The Cosmonaut’s Last Message to the Woman He Once Loved in the Former Soviet Union and Crave, which ran at the Royal Court.

– ends –
(08/09/13)

Notes to Editors:

Cast:

Tom Brooke Gorge
Pippa Haywood A
Joshua James Pete
Jonathan McGuinness Gel
Aaron Monaghan Hotel Porter
Kate O’Flynn Louisa
Alan Williams M

Creative Team:
Vicky Featherstone Director
Tom Scutt Designer
Philip Gladwell Lighting Designer
Nick Powell Composer
Gregory Clarke Sound Designer

Listings Information:

The Ritual Slaughter of Gorge Mastromas
by Dennis Kelly
Directed by Vicky Featherstone
Thurs 5 Sep – Sat 19 Oct 2013
Jerwood Theatre Downstairs, Royal Court Theatre, Sloane Square SW1W 8AS
Monday-Saturday 8pm (except Sat 7 Sep)
Saturday Matinees 3.30pm (from 14 Sep)
Thursday Matinees 3.30pm (from 3 Oct)
Press Night Wednesday 11 September 2013, 7pm
Post-Show Talk Tuesday 1 October
Captioned Performance Wednesday 16 October 8pm
Audio Described Performance Saturday 12 October 3.30pm
Age Guidance 14+
Tickets £32, £22, £16, £12
Mondays all seats £10 (avail. on the day of the performance from 9am online)
Concessions £5 off top two prices* (avail. in advance for all perfs until Sat 14 Sep inclusive and all matinees. For all other perfs, available on a standby basis on the day)
25s and under £10 (limited availability)
School and HE Groups of 8+ 50% off top two prices (available Wed-Sat & matinees)
Groups of 6+ £5 off top price (available Wed-Sat)
Access £12 (plus a companion at the same rate)
*ID required. All discounts are subject to availability

CAST BIOGRAPHIES

Tom Brooke played Lee in Jersualem at the Royal Court and in the West End. Other credits include The Kitchen at the National, I am the Wind at the Young Vic and Wild East at the Royal Court. On screen, his credits include The Boat that Rocked, Game of Thrones, and Mrs Biggs.

Pippa Haywood last appeared at the Royal Court in Nick Payne’s Wanderlust. Recent theatre credits include Alice at Sheffield Crucible, Landscape with Weapon at the National Theatre. On television, she has recently appeared in the BBC1 series Prisoners’ Wives and ITV’s Scott & Bailey. Her credits also include Green Wing, Fear Stress and Anger and The Brittas Empire.

Joshua James last appeared at the Royal Court in Polly Stenham’s No Quarter and Caryl Churchill’s Love and Information. Other credits include The Tempest at Shakespeare’s Globe

Jonathan McGuiness’s theatre credits include Metamorphosis for Vesturport and the Lyric Hammersmith, Comedy Of Errors, The Tempest, Twelfth Night at the RSC, Fatherland at the Gate Theatre, Alice at Sheffield Crucible and 1984 at the Manchester Royal Exchange.

Aaron Monaghan’s recent theatre credits include King Lear, 16 Possible Glimpses, Translations, Arrah na Pogue, Christ Deliver Us at the Abbey Theatre. Work with Druid Theatre includes DruidMurphy, DruidSynge, Inis Meain, Empress of India, The Walworth Farce, The Year of the Hiker, The Cripple Of Inishmaan, for which he won an OBIE Award for Outstanding Performance, a Lucille Lortel Award and a Manchester Evening Standard Award for Best Actor, Penelope and The Playboy of the Western World.

Kate O’Flynn last appeared at the Royal Court in Molly Davies’s The Miracle as part of the Young Writers Festival. Most recently, she played the lead in Simon Stephen’s play Port at the National Theatre. Her other credits include Lungs and The Sound of Heavy Rain for Paines Plough/Sheffield Theatres. Other recent theatre includes Marine Parade, The Whisky Taster at the Bush Theatre, The House of Special Purpose at Chichester Festival Theatre, See How They Run and The Children’s Hour, for which she won a TMA Best Supporting Performance 2008 and MEN Best Newcomer 2008 for Children’s Hour. On film, she appeared in Mike Leigh’s Happy Go Lucky.

Alan Williams was part of the Royal Court’s weekly rep ensemble, appearing in The President has Come to See You, Mint and Talk Show. Previously he appeared at the Royal Court in Stoning Mary. Other credits include Krapp’s Last Tape for Hull Truck, A Thousand Stars Explode in the Sky for the Lyric Hammersmith and War Horse for the National Theatre and West End. His television credits include Starlings, Doc Martin and Luther.

The Royal Court Theatre is supported by Coutts

Coutts is the UK private banking arm of the Royal Bank of Scotland. 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 managing the finances of many of today’s top writers, actors and musicians, but also through our arts sponsorship programme and we are delighted to support The Royal Court and its diverse range of ground-breaking performances.

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