Theatre News

Toby Jones, Stephen Mangan and Zoe Wanamaker to star in The Birthday Party

The production marks the 60th anniversary of Harold Pinter’s play

Toby Jones, Zoe Wanamaker and Stephen Mangan
Toby Jones, Zoe Wanamaker and Stephen Mangan
© Dan Wooller for WhatsOnStage

A new production of Harold Pinter's The Birthday Party is to open next year at the Harold Pinter Theatre.

Toby Jones, Zoe Wanamaker and Stephen Mangan are to star in the piece, which is set in a sleepy seaside boarding house. Stanley Webber (Jones) is the only lodger at Meg's (Wanamaker) hostel but the peace is disrupted when strangers Goldberg (Mangan) and McCann arrive. It is Pinter's second full-length play.

The piece will be directed by Ian Rickson and further casting is yet to be announced. The production marks the 60th anniversary of the play, which originally opened in Cambridge in 1958, transferring to London later that same year.

The play is often referred to as a comedy of menace and was made into a film in 1968 by William Friedkin.

Tickets are from £15 with over 20,000 seats at £30 and under. Tickets go on sale from midday today.

Rickson said: "I knew Harold from when I ran the Royal Court and he was a great mentor to me. Doing The Birthday Party is thrilling because, like any first major play, it has the intense DNA of the writer’s inner life; their yearnings, their obsessions, their longings. There’s something about The Birthday Party in particular that’s so raw and committed – it has this kind of anarchic, punk spirit and I’m just so excited about directing it."

The Birthday Party runs from 18 January to 14 April, with previews from 9 January 2018.

Buy tickets for The Birthday Party now