Theatre News

Ben Whishaw to star in new season at the Almeida

The spring season will also see a new play by James Graham and a revival of a Martin Crimp satire

Ben Whishaw
Ben Whishaw
© Dan Wooller for WhatsOnStage

The Almeida has announced its spring season which includes Ian Rickson (Jerusalem, Mojo) directing Ben Whishaw in a new play about an aerospace billionaire.

Whishaw, who returns to the Islington venue following Bakkhai in 2015, will star as Luke in Christopher Shinn's new play Against from 12 August to 30 September. Shinn's previous plays include Now or Later, the Pulitzer Prize finalist Dying City, and Teddy Ferrara.

The season will commence with the first London revival in 24 years of Martin Crimp's The Treatment. Running from 28 April to 10 June with previews from 24 April, Lyndsey Turner (Chimerica) will direct a cast including Aisling Loftus and Matthew Needham in Crimp's contemporary satire.

In June, Rupert Goold will direct a new play by James Graham called Ink (27 June to 5 August, previews from 17 June), which charts the inception of The Sun newspaper at the hands of a young Rupert Murdoch.

Talking about the new season, artistic director Goold said: "At the end of 2016, as our new season materialised and we looked back on a year of mendacious politics, ambition and international polarisation, one recurring theme emerged: truth.

"The Almeida’s new season interrogates the reality behind fiction – the line between truth and art, words and action, money and meaning."

The venue also announced a new digital film project called Figures of Speech. Exploring 'speech, rhetoric, and what visionary leadership sounds like' the program launches today with Vanessa Redgrave reading Václav Havel’s Words on Words.

Performer Dickie Beau will present his new show on the set of the Almeida’s Hamlet for two performances in March. Re-member Me looks back on previous performances of Shakespeare's Dane.

Tickets for The Treatment and Ink go on general sale on 2 February, tickets for Against will be available in May.