This heavily adapted version of Sophocles’s ‘Oedipus Rex’ by erstwhile Almeida wunderkind Robert Icke first premiered in a Dutch language version for Internationaal Theater Amsterdam way back in 2018. Its journey to the London stage has been a fairly fraught one: it was due to arrive here in 2020 with Mark Strong in the title role and the great Helen Mirren as Oedipus’s mother-slash-wife Jocasta. Although there were efforts made to push it back to 2021, the pandemic essentially put paid to Mirren's involvement and it’s presumably now at least reasonably likely that her stage days are behind her.
Four years on, however, and Strong has stayed the course and will be joined by the magnificent Lesley Manville (technically too young to be Strong’s mother, but we’ll allow it). Like all Icke’s adaptations, his ‘Oedipus’ is entirely contemporary in terms of setting and language, aiming to convey the essence of the story and not the period trappings. This is set on the night of politician Oedipus’s great electoral victory – but some very disturbing revelations will come to light about his wife.
Further casting is TBC.
