Hodge, Atkins, Henshall and More Head New Haymarket Company in London

Eileen Atkins, Toby Stephens, Patricia Hodge, David Haig and Ruthie Henshall will headline a new producing initiative at London's venerable Theatre Royal, Haymarket. The inaugural season of the newly created Theatre Royal Haymarket Company, presented at the initiative of the theater's producers Arnold M. Crook and Nigel Everett, and under the direction of Jonathan Kent, will comprise revivals of Wycherley's restoration comedy The Country Wife and Edward Bond's The Sea, and the world premiere of Marguerite, a new musical by Michel Legrand, Alain Boublil, Claude-Michel Schonberg and Herbert Kretzmer. The first season will run from September 27, 2007, to November 1, 2008.

The Country Wife opens the season with a cast led by Stephens, Haig, Hodge and Fiona Glascott, running from September 27 to January 12, 2008, with an official opening on October 9. Written and first performed in 1675, it tells the story of Horner Stephens, a notorious man-about-town, and his ingenious scheme for the rampant mass seduction of the women of London society. By spreading false rumours of his own impotence, he gains the sympathy of the husbands of the town and, more importantly, free access to their wives. Meanwhile, the newly married Pinchwife Haig desperately attempts to keep his naïve young wife Margery Pinchwife Glascott from the clutches of predatory London bachelors.

Stephens appeared in Lincoln Center's Broadway production of Ring Round the Moon and is currently playing Jerry in Harold Pinter's Betrayal at the Donmar Warehouse. His other theater credits include the title roles inHamlet and Coriolanus for the Royal Shakespeare Company, as well as Japes, The Royal Family and A Streetcar Named Desire, all at the Theatre Royal Haymarket.

Hodge, who plays Lady Fidget, was most recently seen in the West End hit productions of Boeing-Boeing and Noises Off. Her extensive theater credits include The Clean House His Dark Materials, Money, Summerfolk, Heartbreak House, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, Noel and Gertie and Separate Tables.

The Country Wife will be followed by a revival of Edward Bond's 1973 play The Sea, running from January17 to April 19, 2008, with an official opening on January 23. Originally produced at the Royal Court and last seen in London in a production directed by Sam Mendes that starred Judi Dench at the National Theatre in 1990, it now stars Eileen Atkins in a cast that also features David Haig and Marcia Warren.

Set in the high Edwardian world of 1907, the play revolves around a wild storm that shakes a small East Anglian seaside village and sets off a series of events that changes the lives of all of its residents.

Atkins, who plays Mrs Rafi, was most recently seen on the London stage in Frank McGuinness's There Came a Gypsy Riding at the Almeida. Other recent work includes the Broadway production of John Patrick Shanley's Doubt, a revival of Pinter's The Birthday Party at the Duchess Theatre and the National Theatre production of Honour. She starred in Yasmina Reza's The Unexpected Man for the RSC, which subsequently transferred both to the West End and to off-Broadway. Atkins' play Vita and Virginia, first seen at Chichester Festival Theatre, subsequently transferred to the West End and off-Broadway.

The final production in the opening season will be the world premiere of Marguerite, featuring music by Michel Legrand, book by Alain Boublil, Claude-Schonberg and Jonathan Kent and lyrics by Herbert Kretzmer from the original French lyrics by Boublil. Starring Ruthie Henshall in the title role, the musical will run from May 6 to November 1, 2008, with an official opening on May 20.

A love story set in Paris during the Second World War, Marguerite draws inspiration from one of the greatest of romantic novels, Alexandre Dumas' La Dame aux Camellias. Marguerite is the beautiful and notorious mistress of a high-ranking German officer. Armand is a young musician half her age who falls obsessively in love with her. Their dangerous love story is played out against the background of occupied Paris.

Henshall, who has starred in Boublil and Schonberg's Miss Saigon and Les Miserables in the West End, has also appeared in Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Woman in White, played both the Roxie Hart in the original London cast and Velma Kelly in Chicago, starred in the title role of Peggy Sue Got Married and was in the London revivals of She Loves Me and Crazy for You.

Boulil and Schonberg were most recently represented on Broadway by the short-lived The Pirate Queen. Martin Guerre, their third musical after Les Miserables and Miss Saigon, is currently being revived at Newbury's Watermill Theatre. Kretzmer, who is supplying the English lyrics to Boublil's French original work, did similar duty on Les Miserables. Legrand has composed more than 200 film and TV scores and wrote the music for the 2002 Broadway musical Amour.

Kent will direct all three productions, joined by his regular design collaborators, set and costume designer Paul Brown and lighting designer Mark Henderson.