Last Chance To See The audience Starring Kristin Scott Thomas As The Queen
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| By
Jacob Porteous
Stephen Daldry’s hit production of Peter Morgan’s The Audience will complete its run at the Apollo Theatre on 25 July 2015 as previously announced. The production, starring Kristin Scott Thomas as The Queen, opened in May to critical acclaim. The Audience - a play about the weekly meeting between the Queen and her Prime Ministers - has designs by Bob Crowley, with lighting by Rick Fisher, sound by Paul Arditti and music by Paul Englishby.
Morgan’s updated version of The Audience opened two days before the 2015 General Election. In response to the results of the Election, Morgan rewrote the scene between The Queen and David Cameron, imagining the moment when HMQ invites the Prime Minister to form a new Government. This new scene was performed the day after the Election by Kristin Scott Thomas and Mark Dexter.
The Audience cast comprises Kristin Scott Thomas as The Queen with David Calder as Winston Churchill, Mark Dexter as David Cameron and Tony Blair, Michael Gould as John Major, Gordon Kennedy as Gordon Brown, Sylvestra Le Touzel as Margaret Thatcher, David Robb as Anthony Eden and Nicholas Woodeson as Harold Wilson. David Peart plays the Equerry, Charlotte Moore plays Bobo MacDonald and Private Secretary, Marnie Brighton, Madeleine Jackson Smith and Izzy Meikle-Small alternate the role of Young Elizabeth and Matt Plumb and Harry Feltham play the footmen.
For sixty years Elizabeth II has met each of her twelve Prime Ministers in a weekly audience at Buckingham Palace. Both parties have an unspoken agreement never to repeat what is said, not even to their spouses. The Audience imagines a series of pivotal meetings between the Downing Street incumbents and their Queen. From Churchill to Cameron, each Prime Minister uses these private conversations as a sounding board and a confessional - sometimes intimate, sometimes explosive.
The Audience received its world premiere in February 2013 at the Gielgud Theatre with Helen Mirren leading the cast. Mirren is currently recreating the role on Broadway at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre where the run concludes on 28 June 2015.