Antony Sher will take the title role in Gregory Doran’s production of King Lear for the Royal Shakespeare Company while Blanche McIntyre directs The Two Noble Kinsmen to mark the 30th anniversary of the Swan Theatre, Stratford.
Sher’s last role with the RSC was Willy Loman in Arthur Miller’s tragedy Death of a Salesman in 2015. RSC associate artist David Troughton, who was last at the RSC playing the lead in The Shoemaker’s Holiday in 2014, will play Gloucester.
Natalie Simpson makes her RSC debut as Cordelia. She played Juliet in the Young Vic’s Measure for Measure in 2015. Antony Byrne and Nia Gwynne will play Kent and Goneril.
The cast also includes Romayne Andrews (soldier), Eke Chukwu (soldier), James Clyde (Cornwall), James Cooney (soldier), Bethan Cullinane (lady), Marième Diouf (lady), Papa Essiedu (Edmund), Jenny Fennessy (lady), Kevin N Golding (Curan), Marcus Griffiths (France), Oliver Johnstone (Edgar), Byron Mondahl (Oswald), Theo Ogundipe (Burgundy), Clarence Smith (Albany), Graham Turner (Fool), Ewart James Walters (old man) and Kelly Williams (Regan).
Design is by Niki Turner, lighting by Tim Mitchell, music by Ilona Sekacz, sound by Jonathan Ruddick, movement by Michael Ashcroft and fights by Bret Yount.
King Lear runs in the Royal Shakespeare Theatre from Saturday 20 August until Saturday 15 October. It then transfers to London’s Barbican Theatre from 10 November until 23 December.
The RSC last performed The Two Noble Kinsmen in the Swan Theatre’s first season in 1986. Blanche McIntyre who directed As You Like It at Shakespeare’s Globe in 2015 teams up with designer Anna Fleischle, Olivier Award winner for best set design for Martin McDonagh’s Hangmen at the Royal Court Theatre, on the 1634 tragi-comedy based on Chaucer’s A Knight’s Tale, attributed to William Shakespeare and John Fletcher.
James Corrigan and Jamie Wilkes play best friends turned love rivals Palamon and Arcite in this production in which “chauvinist men are confronted by resilient women and love is a prize in a deadly game”. Frances McNamee plays Emilia, the woman whose affections Palamon and Arcite fight for.
The cast also includes Joe Allen (fighter), Sally Bankes (schoolmistress), Ashley Campbell (boss), Leander Deeny (host/doctor), Chris Jack (Pirithous), Lena Kaur (the lady), Patrick Knowles (Wooer), Leon Lopez (The Trickster), Paul McEwan (jailer), Allison McKenzie (Hippolyta), Emma Noakes (Hecate), Danusia Samal (jailer’s daughter), Gyuri Sarossy (Theseus), Eloise Secker (Diana) and Kellie Shirley (Venus).
Lighting is by Lee Curran, music by Tim Sutton, sound by Gregory Clarke and movement by Alistair David. The fight director is Kate Waters.
The Two Noble Kinsmen runs in the Swan Theatre from Wednesday 17 August until Tuesday 7 February 2017.