Richard Coyle & Jodhi May Play Bears at Donmar

Richard Coyle and Jodhi May will star in the world premiere of Polar Bears, the debut play by Mark Haddon, the award-winning author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time (See News, 30 Oct 2009). Directed by Jamie Lloyd, it opens on 6 April 2010 (previews from 1 April) at the Donmar Warehouse, where it continues until 22 May 2010.

Polar Bears explores one man’s struggle to love, support and live with a woman suffering from a psychological condition. John has never met anyone like Kay. When the moon is in the right phase, she is magnetic and amazingly alive. But when the darkness closes in, she is lost to another world, a world in which John does not belong.

Richard Coyle’s stage credits include: at the Donmar, Proof (opposite Gwyneth Paltrow) and After Miss Julie (with Kelly Reilly); and elsewhere, Look Back in Anger, The York Realist, Don Carlos (opposite Derek Jacobi) and, most recently in the West End, the Pinter double bill of The Lover and The Collection, which was also directed by Jamie Lloyd. Coyle’s many screen credits include Coupling, Whistleblowers, Strange, The Best Man, The Libertine, Cracker and Gunpowder, Plot and Treason.

On stage, Jodhi May has been seen in Blackbird, The Talking Cure and Platonov. On screen, her many credits include Flashbacks of a Fool, Defiance, Nightwatching, Emma, The Amazing Mrs Pritchard, Friends and Crocodiles, The Best Man, The Other Boleyn Girl, The Street, The House of Mirth, The Escapist, Tipping the Velvet, Daniel Deronda and The Last of the Mohicans.

Mark Haddon’s 2003 novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time won the Whitbread Prize. His other books include A Spot of Bother and The Real Porky Phillips and he’s also written TV screenplays including Fungus the Bogeyman and Microsoap.

Polar Bears is designed by Soutra Gilmour, with lighting by Jon Clark and sound by Ben and Max Ringham.