Gemma Arterton returns to stage to inaugurate Globe’s indoor Playhouse as Duchess of Malfi

Former Bond girl Gemma Arterton will return to the stage in January 2014 – and, more specifically to Shakespeare’s Globe, where she first appeared in 2007 while still a drama student – to take the title role in bloody Jacobean classic The Duchess of Malfi, the inaugural production in the Globe’s new indoor Sam Wanamaker Playhouse.

Arterton made her professional stage debut at the Globe, fresh from RADA, when she won critical acclaim as Rosaline in Love’s Labour’s Lost. Her other stage credits, both in 2010, have included the West End premiere of The Little Dog Laughed and Hilde Wangel in Ibsen’s The Master Builder at the Almeida.

She has become best known for her screen credits, including Tess in Tess of the D’Urbervilles, the title character in Stephen Frears’ film Tamara Drewe and Bond girl in Quantum of Solace, as well as Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, St Trinian’s, The Disappearance of Alice Creed, Hansel and Gretel and Runner Runner.

Commenting on her return to the stage, Arterton said: “To play the Duchess of Malfi in a magical new theatre seemed an irresistible opportunity for me. I am thrilled to be coming back to Shakespeare’s Globe where I made my stage debut, and I really look forward to the adventure of performing in such an intimate and wonderful space.”

This new production of John Webster’s bloody 1612 classic is helmed by Globe artistic director Dominic Dromgoole and runs in the new, candle-lit Sam Wanamaker Playhouse from 9 January to 16 February 2014. The box office is already open, with the second and final tranche of tickets due for release on 18 November once seating is complete in the new theatre.