Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead is the play that made a name for Tom Stoppard when it debuted back in 1966 at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and more than fifty years on it’s still making headlines. This time around it’ll be hitting the stage at the Old Vic Theatre with Daniel Radcliffe (Swiss Army Man) making his return to the West End following his previous success in Equus, The Cripple Of Innishmaan and Privacy.
The absurdist tragicomedy had its West End premier at the Old Vic Theatre half a century and the latest production will be a 50th anniversary celebration run.
Dates, tickets and show times
Opening at the Old Vic on the 25th February 2017 for a week of previews until the 6th March, the production is scheduled to run throughout the first couple of months of spring until it closes on the 29th April 2016. Performances will be on at 7.30pm in the evenings between Monday and Saturday with2.30pm matinees on Wednesday and Saturday.
Tickets will coat between £12 and £65 for standard admission to the play.
Story
The play centres on the exploits of Messrs Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, two minor characters you’ll recognise from the fringes of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. They spend most of their time baffled by the events going on in the tragedy of the tragedy of the Prince of Denmark, flitting in and out of the main story and getting increasingly flummoxed by it all.
As questions result in yet more questions for the hapless companions, it starts to become unclear who they are, where one ends and the other begins and what the hell they understand about what’s going on with the Hamlet nonesense.
Cast
With such a stripped back concept, there are just two main roles in Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead with Daniel Radcliffe taking up one half of the stage presence as Rosencrantz. He’ll be joined by Joshua McGuire (Mr Turner), who will be playing Guildenstern, following on from his last appearance at the Old Vic in 2015 as Oliver in Future Conditional.
Production
The 2017 Old Vic Theatre production of the play is being directed by David Leveaux, who makes his debut at the Old Vic for the play. His previous work includes Backbeat at the Duke Of York’s Theatre, No Man’s Land at the Almeida Theatre and Closer at the Donmar Theatre. He’s also had a number of Tony Award nominations for his time working on Broadway.
First impressions
Tome Stoppard’s Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead is a great play and the Old Vic production has got a great director and a solid cast. Daniel Radcliffe is working pretty hard to craft a continuing career as an actor post Harry Potter and this will be another step in his evolution, so he’s undoubtedly going to be trying to push himself once again. He’s had a lot of varying roles ranging from the bizarre of Manny in Swiss Army Man to the frights of Arthur Kipps in The Woman In Black and a young Alan Ginsberg in Kill Your Darlings.
