Waiting for Godot Extends Again at Haymarket

Sean Mathias’ stellar revival of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot has extended its booking period at the Theatre Royal Haymarket by two weeks, until 9 August 2009. The production, which stars Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart, opened earlier this month (6 May 2009, previews from 30 April) and had already extended past its initial closing date of 28 June (See News, 28 Apr 2009).
McKellen and Stewart are Estragon and Vladimir, two tramps who pass the time by a deserted road as they wait for the mysterious Godot. They’re joined in the cast by Simon Callow and Ronald Pickup as Pozzo and Lucky. The production is designed by Stephen Brimson Lewis, with lighting by Paul Pyant. 

Waiting for Godot comes to the West End following an extensive regional tour, and was warmly received by the critics (See Review Round-up, 7 May 2009). It’s produced by the Theatre Royal Haymarket Company, in partnership with Duncan C Weldon, as the first production in a second season of in-house programming, for which Mathias has been appointed as artistic director.

Next in line at the venue is a new adaptation of Truman Capote’s novella Breakfast at Tiffany’s, written by Samuel Adamson, directed by Mathias and starring Anna Friel as Holly Golightly, the part immortalised in the 1961 film classic by Audrey Hepburn (See News, 15 May 2009). It begins previews on 9 September 2009, opening on 29 September.

Elsewhere, Wolfgang Weinberger’s comic one-man show A Guide to Sexual Misery has  announced further dates at the Leicester Square Theatre. The show, billed as a “romp through the minefield of sexual relations”, finishes its current run on 13 June and will return from 1 to 25 July 2009.