Brit Wit! Frayn's Noises Off and Stoppard's Indian Ink Added to New Roundabout Season
Roundabout Theatre Company has added two productions—a Broadway revival of Michael Frayn's gut-busting comedy Noises Off, directed by Jeremy Herrin, and an off-Broadway production of Tom Stoppard's romantic drama Indian Ink, directed by Carey Perloff—to its 2014-15 season. As previously announced, RTC's upcoming season also includes Stoppard’s The Real Thing, starring Ewan McGregor in his Broadway debut and directed by Sam Gold.
Noises Off, a hilarious play-within-a-play, follows an ambitious director named Lloyd Davis and his troupe of mediocre actors as they blunder from a bad dress rehearsal to a spectacularly disastrous performance. The cast and crew are putting together a silly sex comedy titled, Nothing On—a single-set farce in which lovers frollic, doors slam, clothes are tossed away and embarrassing hi-jinks ensue. Noises Off premiered on Broadway in 1983 and was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Play. The revival will open Roundabout's Broadway season at the American Airlines Theatre in January 2015; casting and an opening date have not yet been announced.
Off-Broadway, the New York premiere of Stoppard's Indian Ink will bow at the Laura Pels Theatre in the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre in September 2014. Set on two different continents and in two different eras, Indian Ink follows free-spirited English poet Flora Crewe on her travels through India in the 1930s, where her intricate relationship with an Indian artist unfurls against the backdrop of a country seeking its independence. Fifty years later, in 1980s England, her younger sister Eleanor tries to preserve the legacy of Flora's controversial career. Casting and opening date will be announced in due course.
Roundabout's slate for its current season includes Broadway mountings of Sophie Treadwell's Machinal (directed by Lyndsey Turner), Cabaret, starring Alan Cumming and Michelle Williams (directed by Sam Mendes and Rob Marshall) and Violet, starring Sutton Foster (directed by Leigh Silverman). Off-Broadway productions include Donald Margulies’ Dinner With Friends (directed by Tony winner Pam MacKinnon) and Bekah Brunstetter’s Cutie and Bear (directed by Evan Cabnet).