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Royal Court Theatre - Jerwood Theatre Downstairs

www.royalcourttheatre.com
info@royalcourttheatre.com
t : 020 7565 5000
London
England

Productions and Projects

2071

2014

'2071 is the year my oldest grandchild will be the age I am now.' Chris Rapley, Climate Scientist
Writer Duncan Macmillan has been talking to Chris Rapley, CBE, the Chair of the London Climate Change Partnership and Professor of Climate Science at University College London.
Working with director Katie Mitchell, a new piece of theatre has been created where the science is centre stage.
5 - 15 November 2014
reviews:
Michael Cavendish in the Telegraph
Sarah Hemming in the Financial Times
Michael Billington in the Guardian

2071

The Heretic

2011

Richard Bean’s new black comedy dares to question whether the science is settled.
The study of climate science is the cool degree at the university where Dr Diane Cassell is a lead academic in Earth Sciences. At odds with the orthodoxy over man-made climate change, she finds herself increasingly vilified and is forced to ask if the issue is political as well as personal. Could the belief in anthropogenic global warming be the most attractive religion of the 21st century?
"I’m a scientist. I don’t ‘believe’ in anything."
The Heretic was directed by Jeremy Herrin, Deputy Artistic Director of the Royal Court. The production ran from 10 February - 19 March 2011.
Photo above: Juliet Stevenson (Dr Diane Cassell); James Fleet (Prof Kevin Maloney); Lydia Wilson (Phoebe); Johnny Flynn (Ben Shotter)
ashdenizen blogs:
What scientists believe in
Wanted: A Portrait of the climate scientist as a real person
What Frankenstein and Titania tell us about climate change
Two very different plays about climate change share some things in common
From no plays about climate change to three in a month

The Heretic

Jerusalem

2009

Editors' note: We list Jerusalem by Jez Butterworth, as it presents a view of life in rural England.
On St George’s Day, the morning of the local county fair, Johnny Byron, played by Mark Rylance, local waster and modern day Pied Piper, is a wanted man. The council officials want to serve him an eviction notice, his children want their dad to take them to the fair, Troy Whitworth wants to give him a serious kicking and a motley crew of mates want his ample supply of drugs and alcohol.
Jez Butterworth’s new play is a comic, contemporary vision of life in our green and pleasant land.
Jerusalem transferred to the Apollo Theatre, Shaftsbury Avenue and ran there 28 January – 24 April 2010. It transferred to the Music Box Theatre, Broadway, New York in 2011.
www.royalcourttheatre.com/whats-on/jerusalem

Jerusalem, Mark Rylance (Johnny Byron)

Grasses of a Thousand Colors

2009

Wallace Shawn's play is set in the near future, when there have been revolutions in processed food production and sexual explicitness.
"Man has two basic needs - the need for food and the need for sex."
It imagines a future when the food chain has collapsed through over-industrialisation, allowing Shawn to depict the two needs in a garish new light and to dramatise the most basic way in which our appetites are indistinguishable from animal ones.

grasses

Ben, a scientist, tells of his many loves. As his self-obsession literally consumes him, we listen to tales of food, sex and man's true best friend.
Grasses of A Thousand Colors takes as its source The White Cat, a 17th century fairytale by Madame d'Aulnoy, and it moves between a prosperous bourgeois world and a savage dream-like one, in which distinctly taboo things happen between humans and cats.
"Cats like to tease mice. In other words, I'm saying, it's not something that happens by accident when they're pursuing some other more respectable purpose. No. They like to do it."

Grasses of a Thousand Colours had its world premiere at the Royal Court, and was part of their Wallace Shawn season. It was directed by Shawn's long-term collaborator Andre Gregory.

Production photo by Alastair Muir.

Rhinoceros

2007

When a rhinoceros charges across the town square one Sunday afternoon, Berenger thinks nothing of it. Soon, however, rhinoceroses are popping up everywhere and Berenger's whole world is under threat. What will it take for him to stand up to the increasing menace of rhinocerisation?
Eugène Ionesco's satire on conformity is given its first major UK revival since its Royal Court premiere in 1960, which was directed by Orson Welles starring Laurence Olivier. This production is from a new translation by Martin Crimp, and is directed by Dominic Cooke.
See also our feature here by Eleanor Margolies on Rhinoceros and the power of puppetry to enact animal and human behaviour.

Royal Court Theatre - Jerwood Theatre Downstairs
www.royalcourttheatre.com
info@royalcourttheatre.com
t: 020 7565 5000

Sloane Square
London
SW1W 8AS
England

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