Teddy Ferrara - Donmar Warehouse
Preview by Lizzie Guilfoyle
DOMINIC Cooke returns to the stage to direct the UK premiere of Christopher Shinn’s Teddy Ferrara, which runs at the Donmar Warehouse from October 7 (previews from October 1) to December 5, 2015.
It’s Gabe’s senior year and he’s going to make the most of it. He’s the chair of the LGBT Students Group, and he has one eye on a future in politics and one eye on Drew, the editor of the university newspaper. But as Gabe and his friends throw themselves into campus life, unexpected events reveal a darker, lonelier world inhabited by a freshman called Teddy Ferrara.
Shinn’s insightful and revealing play, inspired by real events, explores society’s uncomfortable embrace of the outsider.
The cast includes Nancy Crane (Provost), Oliver Johnstone (Drew), Kadiff Kirwan (Nicky), Ryan McParland (Teddy), Matthew Marsh (President), Anjli Mohindra (Jenny), Luke Newberry (Gabe), Pamela Nomvete (Ellen) and Nathan Wiley (Tim).
Nancy Crane’s recent theatre credits include Next Fall (Southwark Playhouse), Chimerica (Almeida Theatre), Vieux Carre (King’s Head Theatre), Design for Living (Old Vic), Love the Sinner and Angels in America (National Theatre) and Now or Later, The Sweetest Swing in Baseball and The Strip (Royal Court Theatre). She will be making her Donmar debut in Teddy Ferrara.
Her screen work includes Batman: The Dark Knight and The Machinist (film); Doctors and Law and Order UK (TV).
Oliver Johnstone, who will also be making his Donmar debut in Teddy Ferrara, most recently starred as Giovanni Rossi Lomanitz in Oppenheimer at the RSC. Previous to that he appeared in Spring Awakening (Headlong Tour/West Yorkshire Playhouse), Another Country (Chichester Festival Theatre) and A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre).
On screen, he has appeared in Inspector George Gently, The Syndicate, Little Crackers, Lewis and Whitechapel 3 (TV); The Inbetweeners 2 and Skyfall (film).
Kadiff Kirwan returns to the Donmar having previously starred in Josie Rourke’s productions of The Vote and City of Angels. His theatre credits elsewhere include Home (National Theatre), Jesus Christ Superstar (UK and Australian Tour) and Sister Act (UK tour). His television work includes Crims and Call the Midwife.
Ryan McParland, also making his Donmar debut in Teddy Ferrara, has previously appeared on stage in How Many Miles to Babylon and The Civilisation Game (Lyric Theatre, Belfast), Drumbelly (Abbey Theatre, Dublin) and Summertime (The Mac, Belfast) for which he won an Irish Times Theatre Award. His screen credits include Six Degrees and Coming Up – Spoof or Die (TV); Good Vibrations, Tale of Tales and The Survivalist (film).
Matthew Marsh returns to the Donmar Warehouse where he appeared in The Little Foxes alongside Penelope Wilton, directed by Marianne Elliot in 2001. He is currently starring in A Human Being Died That Night at BAM, New York, having previously appeared in this production at the Hampstead Theatre in London.
His other numerous theatre credits include The Last of the Haussmans, Blood and Gifts, The Overwhelming (with Out of Joint) and Copenhagen (also West End) for the National Theatre, Glengarry Glen Ross (Apollo Theatre), The Shawl (Arcola Theatre), Now or Later (Royal Court Theatre), Bingo and A Prayer for my Daughter (Young Vic), The Lightning Play, Conversations After a Burial and The Goat, or Who is Sylvia? (Almeida Theatre), The Exonerated (Riverside Studios).
His screen work includes The Thick of It, Lead Balloon, New Tricks, Luther, Law and Order, Spooks and Hotel Babylon (TV); The Iron Lady, In Clear Sight, The Special Relationship, An American Haunting and the BBC’s Hawking with Benedict Cumberbatch (film).
Anjli Mohindra, also making her Donmar debut in Teddy Ferrara, has recently appeared on stage in Dara and Behind the Beautiful Forevers (National Theatre), The Importance of Being Earnest, Twelfth Night, Scary Play and The Sound of Musicians (Nottingham Playhouse) and East is East (Birmingham Rep). Her screen credits include Cucumber, The Missing, Beaver Falls, The Inbetweeners and Coronation Street (TV): Miss You Already and The Prince of Dreams (film).
Luke Newberry, also making his Donmar debut in Teddy Ferrara, has previously appeared in Antigone (National Theatre), A Little Hotel on the Side (Theatre Royal, Bath), The Secret Garden (Aldwych Theatre) and The Aliens (Trafalgar Studios). His screen work includes Lightfields, From Darkness, Banana and In the Flesh, for which he was nominated for a BAFTA Leading Actor Award (TV); The Legend of Hercules Slapper & Me, Quartet and Anna Karenina (film).
Pamela Nomvete, also making her Donmar debut in Teddy Ferrara, has previously appeared on stage in Belong, Truth and Reconciliation, Now or Later and Marching for Fausa (Royal Court Theatre), Comedy of Errors, Welcome to Thebes, Racing Demon, The David Hare Trilogy and Fuente Ovejuna (National Theatre), Twelfth Night (RSC) and Talking in Tongues (Lyric, Hammersmith). She has also appeared in several South African productions including Raisin in the Sun (Durban Playhouse), and The Good Woman of Sharkville and Nothing but the Truth (Market Theatre).
Her screen credits include Man in the Street, The Special Relationship and Zulu Love Letter (film); Coronation Street, Lewis, Crossroads and EastEnders (TV).
Nathan Wiley is also making his Donmar debut in Teddy Ferrara. His theatre work includes Arrows, The Day Room and The Rabbit Hole (Fairfield Theatre Company), The Glass Menagerie (Bolton Octagon) and The Man Who Invented Himself (Ernest Porter Manhattan Rep). He has also appeared on screen in Red 2 and Jack Ryan (film); JFK and Bert & Dickie (TV).
From 2007 to 2013, Dominic Cooke was Artistic Director of the Royal Court, where his credits include Now or Later and Other People both by Christopher Shinn, The Low Road, In the Republic of Happiness, Ding Dong the Wicked, Choir Boy, In Basildon, Chicken Soup with Barley, for which he was nominated for an Evening Standard Award, and the multi award-winning production of Clybourne Park for which he was nominated for an Olivier Award.
His credits elsewhere include The Comedy of Errors (National Theatre) and Arabian Nights, which he also adapted, Noughts and Crosses and The Crucible, for which he won the 2007 Olivier Award for Best Director (RSC).
Christopher Shinn is making his Donmar debut with Teddy Ferrara. His play Now or Later premiered at the Royal Court and his adaptation of Hedda Gabler at the Roundabout Theatre on Broadway. His other plays include Picked, Dying City, On the Mountain, What Didn’t Happen, Where Do We Live, The Coming World, Other People and Four.
Read more about the Donmar’s Autumn 2015 Season.