Theatre News

Simon Gray's Vale of Health cycle transfers to Hampstead main house

The quartet, directed by Tamara Harvey, recent opened in the Hampstead Downstairs

Hampstead Theatre's current revival of Simon Gray's In the Vale of Health quartet will transfer to the main house in May following its run in the Downstairs studio.

Directed by Tamara Harvey, the cycle comprises Gray's plays Japes, Japes Too, Michael and Missing Dates.

It continues in the Hampstead Downstairs until 17 May 2014 and will run in the main house from 28 May to 14 June.

The four plays are based on the same characters – two brothers who fall in love with the same woman following the death of their parents – but telling different stories with opposite conclusions.

The cycle began when, watching rehearsals for Japes ahead of its West End premiere in 2001, Gray realised the characters might have made different choices and arrived at a different outcome.

Gray, who died in 2008, described the plays as featuring "the same characters in the same situation in the same house, but telling a slightly different story through to an almost opposite conclusion, or to the same conclusion but by an unexpected (at least by me) route."

The ensemble cast comprises Gethin Anthony, Jamie Ballard, Imogen Doel, Tom Mothersdale and Laura Rees.