From the acclaimed Academy Award®-winning screenplay by Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard, this world premiere has been adapted for the stage by Lee Hall. Featuring a company of over 30 actors and musicians, this new play will be directed by Declan Donnellan and designed by Nick Ormerod.Shakespeare in Love will be produced by Disney Theatrical Productions and Sonia Friedman Productions.
Promising young playwright Will Shakespeare is tormented by writer’s block until he finds his muse in the form of passionate noblewoman, Viola De Lesseps. Their forbidden love draws many others, including Queen Elizabeth, into the drama and inspires Will to write the greatest love story of all time, Romeo and Juliet.
This sweeping romantic comedy will transport you back to Shakespeare’s London, teeming with vibrant colours, characters, music and life. Oh, and there’s a bit with a dog!
Lee Hall, who has worked as a writer across theatre, TV, radio and film, won the 2009 Tony Award® for Best Book for his stage adaptation of Billy Elliot. The musical, which also won the Olivier Award for Best Musical in 2006, was based on his screenplay for the film of the same name which saw him nominated for an Academy Award®. In 2008, Hall won the London Evening Standard Award, Best Play for The Pitman Painters. Hall has been writer in residence at the Royal Shakespeare Company and Live Theatre and his screenplay for War Horse was directed by Steven Spielberg in 2011. Other theatre credits include Cooking With Elvis at Live Theatre in Newcastle, Spoonface Steinberg at the Ambassadors Theatre the West End (adapted also for TV and Radio) and Two’s Company at Live Theatre and Bristol Old Vic.
Declan Donnellan and Nick Ormerod formed Cheek by Jowl in 1981 and have since directed and designed over 30 productions for the company which have been performed in over 300 cities in 40 countries all over the world. With Cheek by Jowl, Donnellan and Ormerod have reimagined many of Shakespeare’s texts including the all male As You Like It, Twelfth Night, The Tempest, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Troilus and Cressida and Othello. Cheek by Jowl is an associate company of the Barbican in London where forthcoming collaborations include ‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore from 9 April 2014and Ubu Roi from 18 June 2014. In 1989 Donnellan was made Associate Director of the National Theatre where productions have included Fuente Ovejuna, Sweeney Todd, The Mandate and both parts of Tony Kushner’s Angels In America. Additional theatre credits include ‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore, The Changeling,Great Expectations and British premiers of Outcry, Homebody/Kabul, Sara and Lady Betty (written by Donnellan). In 2000, Donnellan formed Moscow-based company The Chekhov Festival whose productions have included Boris Godunov and Three Sisters, and recently the pair co-directed feature film Bel Amistarring Robert Pattinson, Kristin Scott Thomas and Uma Thurman. His book, The Actor and The Target, originally published in Russian (2001), has since appeared in French, Spanish, Italian, German, Romanian and Mandarin.