Complete Cast Announced for London Three Sisters

Complete casting has been announced for Christopher Hampton's adaptation of Anton Chekhov's Three Sisters. The play, directed by Sean Holmes, begins performances at the Lyric Hammersmith January 15, 2010, with opening set for January 25. The limited engagement, presented by the Lyric Hammersmith and Filter Productions, plays through February 20.

A fresh take on the Chekhov classic, Three Sisters will star Paul Brennen as Kulygin (BBC’s The Tudors; Filter’s Twelfth Night); Jonathan Broadbent as Tuzenbach (Grand Guignol at Theatre Royal Plymouth; Filter’s Twelfth Night); Jim Bywater as Ferapont (Uncle Vanya at The Young Vic); Nigel Cooke as Chebutykin (Out of Joint’s Dreams of Violence); Clare Dunne as Irina (nabokov’s Crunch); Romola Garai as Masha (Emma in BBC’s Emma; Atonement); David Judge as Rodé (Irish Pele at Manchester Contact Theatre); John Lightbody as Vershinin (Headlong’s The English Game); Poppy Miller as Olga (Filter’s Twelfth Night); Ferdy Roberts as Andrei (Filter’s Twelfth Night and Caucasian Chalk Circle); Gemma Saunders as Natasha (Filter’s Twelfth Night and ITV’s Law and Order); Mark Theodore as Solyony (Days Of Significance at RSC); Sandra Voe as Anfisa (The Man Who Had All The Luck at Donmar Warehosue) and Paul Woodson as Fedotik (BBC’s The Day of the Triffids).

In Three Sisters the Prozorov family, frustrated by their small-town life, long to return to Moscow. But as relationships, duty and misguided optimism take hold, the family find their dreams drifting further away. Fusing imaginative staging, evocative physicality and Filter’s trademark use of sound, this new production stripps Chekhov's text bare, delving beneath the surface to explore one family’s search for elusive happiness.

The combination of Filter’s exuberance and Holmes’ precision have proved a winning formula in the past with both Twelfth Night (RSC/UK Tour/Tricycle) and their ground-breaking version of Brecht’s Caucasian Chalk Circle (National Theatre), both of which played to critical acclaim.

Holmes became Artistic Director of the Lyric Hammersmith in January 2009. His first season also included a revival of Trevor Griffiths’ Comedians. Filter, formed in 2001 by actors Ferdy Roberts, Oliver Dimsdale, and musician Tim Phillips, creates shows with a fusion of live and recorded music. In addition to their collaborations with Holmes, credits include Water (Lyric Hammersmith); The Birthday Party and Dumb Waiter (Bristol Old Vic); Girl In The Goldfish Bowl (Crucible Studio) and Playing The Victim (Royal Court).