The first major London revival for the stage version of Ken Kesey’s countercultural classic in over 20 years comes this spring, as Clint Dyer directs Aaron Pierre and Giles Terera as two inmates of a hellish psychiatric ward. Published in 1962, Kesey’s darkly comic satire on psychiatry and institutionalisation was quickly adapted into a 1963 play that starred Kirk Douglas as Randall P McMurphy, a rebellious prisoner who makes the mistake of faking insanity, believing he’ll have an easier time of it in a mental hospital (Jack Nicholson famously starred in the 1975 film as Douglas was too old for the role by the time it finally got made).
Pierre – best known for his role in Netflix hit Rebel Ridge – will star as McMurphy, with Olivier winner Giles Terera as his fellow inmade Dale Harding. In what is clearly a pointed gesture, Dyer has cast two Black actors as inmates and that he’s said he wants to pick up on the novel’s ‘conversation on colonialism and identity’. In the most prominent non inmate role, Rachael Stirling will play the vile Nurse Ratched.
