Donmar Warehouse Announces Full Casting For SWEAT

The Donmar Warehouse today announces full casting for Lynette Linton's production of Sweat by Lynn Nottage. Casting includes Leanne Best, Patrick Gibson, Osy Ikhile, Wil Johnson, Stuart McQuarrie, Clare Perkins, Martha Plimpton, Sule Rimi and Sebastian Viveros.

In 2011, Lynn Nottage began spending time with the people of Reading, Pennsylvania: officially one of the poorest cities in the USA.

During the following two years, she dug deep into the forgotten heart of middle America, finding a city divided by racial tension and the collapse of industry.

Sweat is the Pulitzer Prize-winning play that Lynn Nottage wrote following her experience.

Her tale of friends pitted against each other by big business and the decline of the American Dream receives its UK premiere at the Donmar, directed by former Donmar Resident Assistant Director Lynette Linton.

Lynn Nottage (Playwright) is a playwright and a screenwriter, and the first woman in history to win two Pulitzer Prizes for Drama. Her plays include Sweat (Pulitzer Prize, Tony Nomination, Obie Award) which moved to Broadway after a sold out run at The Public Theater, Mlima's Tale (Outer Critics Circle Nomination), By the Way, Meet Vera Stark (Lilly Award, Drama Desk Nomination), Ruined (Pulitzer Prize, Obie Award), Intimate Apparel (American Theatre Critics and New York Drama Critics' Circle Awards for Best Play), Fabulation, or the Re-Education of Undine (OBIE Award), Crumbs from the Table of Joy, Las Meninas, Mud, River, Stone, Por'knockers and POOF!. In addition, she is working with composer Ricky Ian Gordon on adapting her play Intimate Apparel into an opera. She has also developed This is Reading, a performance installation at the Franklin Street, Reading Railroad Station in Reading, PA. She was writer/producer on the 1st season of Netflix's series She's Gotta Have It directed by Spike Lee. Nottage is a member of the Dramatists Guild, an Associate Professor at Columbia University School of the Arts, and the recipient of a MacArthur "Genius Grant" Fellowship, Steinberg "Mimi" Distinguished Playwright Award, Doris Duke Artists Award and PEN/Laura Pels Master Playwright Award among others.

Lynette Linton (Director) returns to The Donmar Warehouse after being Resident Assistant Director, assisting on productions including Knives in Hens with director Yaël Farber, The Lady from the Sea with director Kwame Kwei-Armah, The York Realist with Robert Hastie and Belleville with the newly appointed Donmar Warehouse Artistic Director Michael Longhurst. Lynette recently worked with Michael Grandage as Associate Director on The Lieutenant of Inishmore (Noël Coward). As director her productions include This is (Arts Ed), Assata Taught Me for which she received a Stage Debut nomination (Gate Theatre), Indenture (Dark Horse Festival), And Where There Once Were Two (Arcola Theatre), Assata: She Who Struggles (Young Vic), Chicken Palace (Theatre Royal Stratford East), Naked (The Vault Festival) and This Wide Night (Albany Theatre/Stonecrabs). Lynette will soon co-direct Richard II (Shakespeare's Globe) and direct Function (National Youth Theatre). As a writer her credits include Hashtag Lightie (Arcola Theatre), Chicken Palace and Step (Theatre Royal Stratford East). Lynette was Associate Director at The Gate Theatre from 2016 to 2017, she is also a co-founder of Production Company Black Apron Entertainment.

Leanne Best (Jessie) makes her Donmar Warehouse debut in Sweat. Her theatre credits include The Human Voice (Gate), Educating Rita, The Matchbox, A Streetcar Named Desire, The Hypochondriac, The May Queen, Our Country's Good, Fleet Street Nativity, The Way Home, Unprotected, The Morris, Macbeth, Popcorn (Liverpool Everyman & Playhouse), The Matchbox (Tricycle), Backbeat (Theatre LA), Damned by Despair (National Theatre), My Zinc Bed (Royal Theatre Northampton), Horse Marines (Plymouth Drum), Drowning on Dry Land (Salisbury Playhouse) and Desperately Seeking Susan (Novello). TV credits include Carnival Row, Tin Star, Cold Feet, Babs, Good Karma Hotel, Black Mirror, Home Fires, Undercover, HG Wells - The Purple Pileus, Line of Duty, From Darkness, Home Fires, The Outcast, Ripper Street, Fortitude, New Tricks, The Driver, Shetland, Lucan, Worricker: Salting the Battlefield, Stepping Up, Good Cop, Moving On, Mobile, New Street Law, Heatwave, Wire in the Blood and Casualty. Film credits include Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool, The Infiltrator, Native, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, The Woman in Black 2: Angel of Death, The Be All and End All and Casbah - A Documentary.

Patrick Gibson (Jason) makes his Donmar Warehouse debut in Sweat. His TV and film credits include The OA, The White Princess, Guerrilla, The Passing Bells, Neverland, The Tudors, Tolkien, The Darkest Minds, In A Relationship, Their Finest and What Richard Did.

Osy Ikhile (Chris) makes his Donmar Warehouse debut in Sweat. His theatre credits include Torn (Royal Court), Sweet Love Remembered (Shakespeare's Globe) and Your Number's Up (Roundhouse Theatre). His TV and film credits include The Feed, Black Mirror, The Greatest of All Time, Childhood's End, The Fear, Fresh Meat, Twenty Twelve, Blackout, Tom and Jenny, Misfits, Phone Shop, Daphne, Sand Castle, Beautiful Devils, Tarzan, Mission Impossible 5, Kill Your Friends, Jet Trash, In the Heart of the Sea, Victim and The Anomaly.

Wil Johnson (Brucie) makes his Donmar Warehouse debut in Sweat. His theatre credits include Leave Taking (Bush) Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead (Old Vic), King Lear (Royal Exchange, Manchester), A Wolf In Snakeskin Shoes (Tricycle), Fuente Ovejuna (National Theatre), Redundant (Royal Court), A Mad World My Masters (Shakespeare's Globe), Serious Money (Birmingham Rep), The Queen and I (Out Of Joint), Torn (Arcola) and the lead in Othello (Royal Lyceum). His TV and film credits include Carnival Row, Outlander, Vera, Waking the Dead, Lewis, The Five and Clocking Off, Moving On, Cracker, Waterloo Road, Hollyoaks, Emmerdale, Adulthood, Anuvahood, Midnight Breaks, Dead End and Macbeth.

Stuart McQuarrie (Stan) returns to The Donmar Warehouse following his performances in The God of Hell, The Dark and The Life of Stuff. His other theatre credits include Creditors (Edinburgh Lyceum), My Country (National Tour) and Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (National Theatre). His TV and film credits include Ordeal by Innocence, Outlander, Tennison, Hollow Crown, Dickensian, The Dad's Army Story, Virtuoso, Another Year, Mr Turner, Harlots, Tennison and Angel Has Fallen.

Clare Perkins (Cynthia) makes her Donmar Warehouse debut in Sweat. Her theatre credits include Mrs Dalloway (Arcola), Emilia (Shakespeare's Globe), Genesis Inc (Hampstead), The Immigrant (Hoxton Hall), Daisy Pulls It Off (Park), Primetime (Royal Court), Roundelay (Southwark Playhouse), The Convert (Gate), Removal Men (The Yard), The House That Will Not Stand, Fabulation, How Long is Never (Tricycle), Welcome To Thebes (National Theatre), Mules (Royal Court) Meridian (Contact Theatre) How To Be Immortal (Penny Dreadful), Little Revolution (Almeida), Our Country's Good (Nuffield), Generations Of The Dead (Young Vic), Twelfth Night (London Bubble), The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night time (National Theatre/UK Tour). Her TV and film credits include Damned, Shoot The Messenger, Family Affairs, EastEnders, Bullet Boy, The Riots, Men Behaving Badly, Death In Paradise, Clapham Common, Talk To Me, Big Women, Babyfather, Casualty, The Bill, All in The Game, Pigheart Boy, Been So Long, Ladybird Ladybird, Secrets and Lies, Whole New Heart, Hallelujah Anyway, 7 Lives and Blacklands.

Martha Plimpton (Tracey) makes her Donmar Warehouse debut in Sweat. Her theatre credits include Other Desert Cities (Old Vic), Company (New York Philharmonic), A Delicate Balance (John Golden, NY), Pal Joey (Roundabout, NY), Top Girls (MTC), Cymbeline, The Coast of Utopia (Lincoln Centre), A Midsummer Night's Dream, Pericles (Public, NY, Shakespeare in the Park), The False Servant (Classic Stage Co.), Flesh and Blood (New York Theatre Workshop), Boston Marriage (Public, NY), Hobson's Choice (Atlantic, NY), Hedda Gabler, The Glass Menagerie, Playboy of the Western World, The Libertine (Steppenwolf) and Uncle Vanya, The Heidi Chronicles, The Sisters Rosensweig, Robbers (Seattle Reperatory Theater). Her TV and film credits include The Real O'Neals, Younger, The Good Wife, Raising Hope, How To Make It In America, Grey's Anatomy, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Law & Order: SVU, ER, Hello Again, Company, Pecker, 200 Cigarettes, Eye of God, I'm Not Rappaport, I Shot Andy Warhol, Beautiful Girls, Mrs Parker & The Vicious Circle, Stanley & Iris, Parenthood, Another Woman, Running On Empty, Stars & Bars, Shy People, The Mosquito Coast, The Goonies, The River Rat.

Martha Plimpton is appearing with the permission of UK Equity, incorporating the Variety Artistes' Federation, pursuant to an exchange programme between the American Equity and UK Equity.

Sule Rimi (Evan) returns to The Donmar Warehouse following his role in Measure for Measure. Theatre credits include Love and Information, Desire Under the Elms (Sheffield Theatres), Barber Shop Chronicles (National Theatre/Australia and New Zealand Tour), Mary Stuart, They Drink It In The Congo (Almeida), The Suicide (National Theatre), The Rolling Stone (Royal Exchange, Manchester/West Yorkshire Playhouse/Orange Tree Theatre), Bordergame (National Theatre of Wales), Babes in the Woods (Rainbow Valley Productions), Othello (Fluellen Theatre Company), Muscle (Shock n Awe), Serious Money (Waking Exploits), Robinson Crusoe, Aladdin (Owen Money Theatre Company) and Stanley's Magic Lamp and the Heart of Darkness (Twm O'r Nant). Television credits include Death in Paradise, Black Earth Rising, Birds of a Feather Christmas Special, Strikeback, Casualty, Unforgotten, Stella, Mistresses, Crash, Caerdydd, The Black Lion, Y Pris, Scrum IV, Doctor Who, Fondue, Sex and Dinosaurs, The Story of Tracey Beaker, Outside the Rules. Film credits include Ashens & The Quest for the Game Child, Bad f-ing, The Adventurer: Curse of The Midas Box, Silent Night, Bloody Night; The Homecoming, The Machine, Elfie Hopkins and the Gammons, Night of the Living Dead: Resurrection, Eastern Promises, Daddy's Girl and Starter for Ten.

Sebastian Viveros (Oscar) makes his Donmar Warehouse debut in Sweat. His theatre credits include Bob, Balm in Gilead, After Troy, Golden Boy (Drama Centre London), Night of the Iguana (Geneva English Drama Society), The Caucasian Chalk Circle, Accidental Death of an Anarchist (Ecolint). His TV credits include Our Girl.

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