London Datebook: Beckham High Kicks, Motherf**cker Crosses the Pond & More June Picks

While Broadway slows down after the Tony Awards in June, London rolls merrily along, both on and off the West End. This month’s highlights include a stage musical premiere adapted from Keira Knightley’s career-making film, the National Theatre debut of the Broadway play with the famously unprintable title, and a hefty spate of the classics. Oh—and some Gershwin music, too!

JUNE 1-7
It’s All Greek to Them: North London’s ever-adventurous Almeida Theatre kicks off a three-play sequence of Greek classics with a new production of Aeschylus’ epic dynastic tragedy Oresteia, in a new version from director Robert Icke starring Lia Williams, who co-starred in Broadway’s first Skylight some 19 years ago. Opening night is June 5 of what promises to be a long but also soul-stirring evening.

ALSO: It’s the first full post-opening week of the Donmar premiere of Steve Waters’ new play Temple, set during the 2011 Occupy demonstrations in London and starring the great Simon Russell Beale. June 7 sees the end of the acclaimed staging at Shakespeare’s Globe of The Merchant of Venice, starring two-time Tony Award winner Jonathan Pryce as Shylock opposite his real-life daughter Phoebe Pryce playing his onstage daughter, Jessica.

JUNE 8-14
‘S Wonderful: We’ll find out if the song rings true on June 10 when the Chichester Festival Theatre south of London premieres director-choreographer Rob Ashford’s latest venture A Damsel in Distress, which combines a literary source in the ever-so-English P.G. Wodehouse with music from the deeply American George and Ira Gershwin. The starry cast is headed by Richard Fleeshman (Ghost), Summer Strallen (Top Hat), and Sally Ann Triplett (The Last Ship): can the West End be far behind?

ALSO: The Royal Court’s intense-sounding Violence and Son, written by Gary Owen and directed by Hamish Pirie, opens June 8. The Barbican’s festival of work from Irish great Samuel Beckett sees a full and final week of performances of the Sydney Theatre Company production of Waiting for Godot, with Hugo Weaving and Richard Roxburgh starring under the direction of Andrew Upton (who also happens to be Cate Blanchett’s husband).

JUNE 15-21
What’s In a Name: The scabrous title of the 2011 Broadway play The Motherf**ker with the Hat may have sent newspaper copy desks into a tizzy, but Stephen Adly Guirgis’ black comedy has kept both its name as well as New York cast member Yul Vazquez for the play’s British premiere opening June 17 at the National’s Lyttelton auditorium. Indhu Rubasingham directs this time around.

ALSO: Final performances June 20 of both Sunspots, David Lewis’s play about star-gazing and sun-bathing at the Hampstead Theatre Downstairs, and Just Jim Dale, the Tony-winning Englishman’s canter through his life and art: last summer’s off-Broadway hit will complete a month-long West End run at the Vaudeville Theatre.

JUNE 22-28
Bend & Snap: The song from the musical adaptation of Legally Blonde wouldn’t be out of place in Bend it Like Beckham, the latest hit film to get the stage treatment. Lauren Samuels plays Jules, the part taken onscreen by Keira Knightley in 2002, with Natalie Dew as the football-mad Jess and Jamie Campbell Bower as their coach Joe. Filmmaker Gurinder Chadha is on hand to direct the show, with a score by Howard Goodall (music) and Charles Hart (lyrics). Opening night is June 25 at the Phoenix Theatre.

ALSO: June 22 marks the opening night of Luna Gale at the Hampstead Theatre, written by American scribe Rebecca Gilman, directed by Michael Attenborough and starring Sharon Small and Corey Johnson. The starry West End revival of American Buffalo, starring Damian Lewis, Tom Sturridge, and John Goodman, and the Menier Chocolate Factory’s revival of Communicating Doors, with Rachel Tucker (Wicked, The Last Ship) distinguishing herself in a non-musical role, both play their final performances June 27.