Rosamund Pike as Hedda Gabler
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Rosamund Pike Sets Hedda Dates Pre-West End

As previously tipped, Rosamund Pike will take the title role in Henrik Ibsen’s 1890 classic Hedda Gabler, which start performances on 23 February 2010 at the Theatre Royal Bath prior to a short regional tour and West End transfer.

The new Theatre Royal Bath production, directed by former Royal Shakespeare Company artistic director Adrian Noble and co-starring Tim McInnerny, runs at Bath until 6 March and then visits Brighton (8-13 March), Richmond (15-20 March), Nottingham (22-27 March) and Oxford (29 March-4 April). Dates and venue for the West End transfer have not yet been confirmed.

Hedda Gabler was last seen in the West End in a 2005 revival, directed by former National Theatre artistic director Richard Eyre and starring Eve Best, which went on to win four Laurence Olivier Awards, including Best Actress, Best Director and Best Revival (See News, 26 Feb 2006).

Set in the Norwegian home of newlyweds George and Hedda Tesman near the turn of the 20th century, Hedda Gabler reveals a passionate woman struggling in a bourgeois world that she finds devoid of excitement. Returning from her honeymoon and already bored with her marriage, Hedda becomes herself caught between the brilliant but dissolute Eilert Loevborg and the clutches of the predatory Judge Brack as a shocking path of destruction unfolds.

Pike’s previous West End credits are Hitchcock Blonde, Summer and Smoke (also directed by Noble), Gaslight and, most recently, Madame de Sade, opposite Judi Dench as part of last year’s Donmar West End season at Wyndham’s Theatre. She’s become internationally famous for her films such as Pride and Prejudice, Die Another Day, The Libertine, Fracture and An Education.

Tim McInnerny is best known for playing Lord Percy and Captain Darling in the Blackadder series. His other screen credits include: on television, Spooks, In the Line of Beauty, Hustle and Inspector George Gently; and on film, 101 and 102 Dalmatians, Notting Hill and Rogue Trader. Most recently on stage, he played Iago in Othello at Shakespeare’s Globe in 2007.

Post RSC, Adrian Noble’s credits have included Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Kean, A Woman of No Importance and Summer and Smoke. Hedda Gabler is designed by Anthony Ward.

- by Terri Paddock

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