Theatre News

Exclusive: Casting announced for X at the Royal Court

Vicky Featherstone will direct Alistair McDowall’s new play set on Pluto

Jessica Raine, Rudi Dharmalingam and Darrell D'Silva
Jessica Raine, Rudi Dharmalingam and Darrell D'Silva
© Dan Wooller for WhatsOnStage

Casting has been announced for Alistair McDowall's new play X which opens at the Royal Court in April.

Call the Midwife star Jessica Raine (Roots, Ghosts) makes her Royal Court debut alongside Rudi Dharmalingam (Hamlet, Oresteia), Darrell D’Silva (Wendy & Peter Pan, Hedda Gabler), James Harkness (The Absence of War, Great Britain) and Ria Zmitrowicz (Four Minutes Twelve Seconds, Arcadia).

Following the massive success of his last play Pomona, McDowall's latest work is set in a space station on Pluto and will be directed by Royal Court artistic director Vicky Featherstone.

Three 'Big Idea' events accompany the production including a discussion about life at the edge of the solar system with freelance science writer and researcher Dr Mike Goldsmith on 13 April, and playwright Alistair McDowall in conversation with director Vicky Featherstone on 19 April.

The production, which has design by Merle Hensel, lighting by Lee Curran, composition and sound by Nick Powell and video by Tal Rosner, will run in the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs from 30 March – 7 May 2016.