CASTING ANNOUNCEMENT: ESCAPED ALONE

• LINDA BASSETT, DEBORAH FINDLAY, KIKA MARKHAM and JUNE WATSON cast in Escaped Alone by Caryl Churchill.

The full cast has been announced for the Royal Court Theatre’s production of Caryl Churchill’s new play Escaped Alone. Award-winning actresses Linda Bassett, Deborah Findlay, Kika Markham and June Watson have been cast in the four-hander about old friends and catastrophe.

James Macdonald directs. Escaped Alone runs from Thursday 21 January 2016 – Saturday 12 March 2016 in the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs and opens the Royal Court Theatre’s 60th year.

“I’m walking down the street and there’s a door in the fence open and inside there are three women I’ve seen before.”

Three old friends and a neighbour. A summer of afternoons in the back yard. Tea and catastrophe.

“Stories of those above ground were told and retold till there were myths of the husband who cooked feasts, the wife who swam the ocean, the gay lover who could fly, the child who read minds, the talking dog.”

Design by Miriam Buether, Lighting by Peter Mumford and Sound by Christopher Shutt.

Full listings and biography information below.

The Big Idea:
Cast in conversation
Jerwood Theatre Downstairs
Tuesday 16 February 2016, Post-show
Cast members talk with Royal Court International Director Elyse Dodgson

More to be announced

Listings Information:
Escaped Alone
By Caryl Churchill
Directed by James Macdonald
Jerwood Theatre Downstairs, Royal Court Theatre, Sloane Square, SW1W 8AS
Thursday 21 January – Saturday 12 March 2016
Monday – Saturday 7.30pm
Thursday & Saturday matinees 2.30pm (from 30 January)
Captioned Performance 23 February 7.30pm
Audio Described 27 February 2.30pm (Touch Tour 1pm)
Press Night Thursday 28 January 7pm
Age Guidance 14+
Tickets £12, £16, £25, £35 (Mondays all seats £10 available from 9am online on the day of performance)
*Concessions2 stars £5 off top two prices. 25s and under £12 (available in advance for previews and all matinees)
Access £12 (plus a companion at the same rate)
*ID required. All discounts subject to availability.

Caryl Churchill’s previous work for the Royal Court Theatre includes Ding Dong the Wicked, Love and Information, Seven Jewish Children, Drunk Enough to Say I Love You?, A Number, Far Away, Blue Heart, Serious Money, Top Girls and Cloud Nine. Recent revivals of Churchill’s plays include The Skriker (Royal Exchange) and Light Shining in Buckinghamshire plus new play Here We Go (National).

James Macdonald’s previous work for the Royal Court Theatre includes The Wolf from the Door, Circle Mirror Transformation, Love and Information (and off-Broadway), Cock, Drunk Enough to Say I Love You?, Blasted and the European and US tours of Sarah Kane’s 4.48 Psychosis. He was Associate Director at the Royal Court 1992-2007. Other recent work includes The Father (Theatre Royal Bath, Tricycle and West End), Exiles (National) and Glengarry Glen Ross (West End).

Linda Bassett’s Royal Court credits include Love & Information, In Basildon, Wastwater, Lucky Dog, The Stone, Far Away (Royal Court/Albery), The Recruiting Officer, Our Country’s Good, Serious Money (Royal Court/Wyndhams/Public Theater), Aunt Dan and Lemon (Royal Court/Public Theater), Abel’s Sister and Fen (Royal Court/Public Theater/International Tour). Other theatre credits include Roots, Phaedra (Donmar Warehouse), People (National), A Winter’s Tale, Pericles (RSC), Hortensia & the Museum of Dreams (Finborough), Love Me tonight, Out in the Open (Hampstead), Richard III, Taming of the Shrew (Globe) and John Gabriel Borkman (English Touring Theatre). Her film credits include Effie, West is West (BBC films), The Reader, Calendar Girls, The Hours, The Martins and East is East. Her television credits include Call the Midwife, The Life & Adventures of Nick Nickleby, Spies of Warsaw, Grandma’s House, Larkrise to Candleford, Sense & Sensibility, This Little Life, Our Mutual Friend and Far From the Madding Crowd.
Awards include TMA Best Actress Award for Lucky Dog and a Best Actress Award at Semana Internacional de Cine Valladolid España for East is East.

Deborah Findlay’s credits at the Royal Court include Top Girls and Tom and Viv. Other theatre credits include Coriolanus, Moonlight, Madame De Sade, John Gabriel Borkman, The Cut (Donmar Warehouse), Timon of Athens, Bernarda Alba, The Winter’s Tale, The Mandate, Stanley, Once in a While (National), The Glass Menagerie (Young Vic), Like a Fishbone (Bush), Vincent River (59e59 Theater), The New Menosa (Gate), As You Like It, King Lear (Oxford Stage Company), Merchance of Venice (RSC), House of Bernarda Alba (West End), Macbeth (Nuffield, Southampton), Hedda Gabler (Almeida), The Crucible and Child’s Play (Sheffield Crucible). Her film credits include The Lady in the Van, The Ones Below, Suite Francaise, Vanity Fair and The End of the Affair. Her television credits include High and Dry, Law & Order UK, Poirot, Silent Witness, Torchwood, Cranford, The Family Man, The Midsomer Murders, Anna Karenina, Wives & Daughters and Jane Eyre. Awards include an Olivier Award for Best Supporting Actress and a New York Drama League Award for Outstanding Performance for Stanley and an OBIE Award for Top Girls.

Kika Markham’s credits at the Royal Court include Tribes, Time Present (Royal Court/Duke of York) and Twelfth Night. Other theatre includes The Crucible (Old Vic), The Last Yankee (The Print Room), On the Record (Arcola), You, Women, Power and Politics (Tricycle), The Permanent Way (Out of Joint/National), The Homebody (Young Vic), The Vagina Monologues (Ambassadors), A Wedding Story (Soho/UK Tour), Song at Twilight (Globe), Black Sail, White Sail (Gate), A Bright Room Called Day (Bush), The Taming of the Shrew (Theatre Clywd/Haymarket), Macbeth (Throndike), Anthony and Cleopatra (Haymarket) and The Seagull (Nottingham Playhouse). Her film credits include Franklyn, Paint It Yellow, The Fever, Esther Khan, Killing Me Softly, Wonderland, A Very British Coup, The Innocent, Outland, Anne and Muriel and Operation Outbreak. Her television credits include New Tricks, Mr Selfridge, Secret State, Holby City, Call the Midwife, Einstein and Eddington, Party Animals, Lord Longford, Messiah, The Line of Beauty, Dirty Filthy Love, Born and Bred, Canterbury Tales: The Man of Law’s Tale, Inspector Lynley Mysteries, Waking the Dead, Touching Evil, Woman in White, The Bill, Chronicles of the Young Indiana Jones and Return of Sherlock Holmes.

June Watson’s Royal Court credits include Talking to Terrorists (Royal Court/Out of Joint Tour), Kosher Harry, Sliding with Suzanne (Royal Court/ International Tour), Beside Herself, Saved, Small Change (Royal Court/National), Life Price and Glasshouses. Other theatre credits include The Father, Mrs Lowry and Son (Trafalgar Studios), The Cripple of Inishmaan (Cort Theater/Broadway/Noel Coward), Good People (Hampstead), Before the Party (Almeida), Uncle Vanya (Vaudeville), Calendar Girls (UK Tour), The Children’s Hour (Royal Exchange Manchester), Smaller (Lyric), Mary Stuart (Apollo), Romeo & Juliet (RSC), Scenes from the Big Picture, Our Lady of Sligo, Le Cid, Machinal (National), and Streetcar to Tennesee (Young Vic). Her film credits include Lady in the Van, Ghost Hunter, 102 Dalmatians and Highlander IV: Endgame. Her television credits include Agatha Raisin, Thirteen, Unforgotten, A Song for Jenny, Holby City, Doctors, Law & Order UK, The Bill, The Street, City of Vice, Clapham Junction and Midsomer Murders. Awards include a Clarence Derwent Award for The Cripple of Inishmaan and Before the Party.

The Big Idea is a strand of work launched during Open Court, offering audiences radical thinking and provocative discussion inspired by the work on stage. The Big Idea seeks to foster debate and collaboration, bringing together leading thinkers and artists from all walks of life to engage with the big ideas of our times, through a series of debates and events. AlixPartners support The Big Idea at the Royal Court Theatre.

To download the word document press here