BULL And LIPPY To Play The Maria At The Young Vic In 2015

Two internationally acclaimed productions receive their London premieres at the Young Vic in 2015.

Bull, Mike Bartlett's dark workplace comedy will run 8 January - 7 February 2015. Lippy, an exploration of a real-life Irish tragedy and a major hit at the Dublin and Edinburgh Festivals, will run 19 February - 21 March 2015.

Directed by Clare Lizzimore, Bull sees three desperate colleagues fight for their jobs. Cruel one-upmanship and playground tactics abound in this black comedy. Bull is designed by Soutra Gilmour, whose set offers the audience the chance to cheer and boo the opponents from close quarters, as office politics are played out in an office-cum-bullfighting ring. Standing tickets at the ringside are available.

A companion piece to Cock (Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre, 2010), Bartlett's Bull was first seen at the Crucible Theatre, Sheffield in 2013 and won the UK Theatre Award for Best New Play. The production then transferred to 59E59, New York, where it played as part of the Brits Off-Broadway season.

Casting for Bull is still to be announced. Lighting design for the production is by Peter Mumford with sound design by Christopher Shutt.

Mike Bartlett's King Charles III transferred to the Wyndham's Theatre in the West End on 2 September 2014. Other recent plays include Theatre UK Best New Play winner Love, Love, Love (Paines Plough/Royal Court), 13 (National Theatre) and Earthquakes In London (Headlong/National Theatre). He has previously been writer in residence at the Royal Court, National Theatre and Paines Plough, and aged 32 is one of the country's most highly regarded writers.

Clare Lizzimore's recent credits include premieres of Nick Payne's One Day When We Were Young (Paines Plough), Lay Down Your Cross (Hampstead Theatre) and Pieces Of Vincent by David Watson (Arcola Theatre). She has been resident director at Hampstead Theatre and Glasgow's Citizens Theatre, where her production Tom Fool was nominated for a 4 CATS Awards and transferred to the Bush Theatre.

Soutra Gilmour was awarded the 2012 Evening Standard Award for her work on Inadmissible Evidence (Donmar Warehouse) and Antigone (National Theatre) in the same year. She has been nominated for three Olivier Awards, for The Lover & The Collection (Comedy Theatre), PIAF (Donmar Warehouse) and The Pride (Royal Court).

Bull by Mike Bartlett is produced by Young Vic and Supporting Wall and is supported by Arts Council England through Grants for the Arts. It was originally produced by Sheffield Theatres.

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Lippy

19 February - 21 March 2015 The Maria

Lippy imagines the circumstances which led to four women's decision to starve themselves to death. Based on real life events, the piece asks why they chose this fate, exploring the human need to tell stories. Ben Kidd, Genesis Future Directors Award winner 2012 (The Shawl), returns to the Young Vic, co-directing alongside Bush Moukarzel.

Created by theatre company Dead Centre, Lippy is written by Bush Moukarzel with a cameo writing appearance from celebrated playwright Mark O'Halloran. The piece takes as its starting point the discovery of four bodies in a house in Leixlip, Ireland in 2000. An aunt and her three nieces had barricaded themselves into their home and entered into a suicide pact, destroying all traces of their reasoning - save a handful of letters. Stirred by the public curiosity surrounding this unexplained tragedy, Dead Centre take inspiration from a lip-reader who interpreted the few seconds of CCTV footage of the women in a supermarket before they shut themselves away from the world.

Lippy premiered at Dublin Fringe Festival in 2013, and was named Best Production at the Irish Times Theatre Awards in February 2014. The production played to critical acclaim at The Traverse Theatre as part of the 2014 Edinburgh Fringe Festival, winning a Fringe First, a Herald Angel and a Total Theatre Award. It will receive its US premiere at the Abron Arts Center in New York in October 2014.

The cast for Lippy includes Joanna Banks, David Heap, Bush Moukarzel, Liv O'Donoghue, and Adam Welsh.

Joanna Banks has performed as a member of the Royal Ballet at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden and with companies including Ballet Rambert, London Ballet Theatre Company, National Ballet of Canada and the Irish National Ballet. She is a founder member of Dance Ireland and since 1996 has made numerous guest appearances with Irish Modern Dance Theatre across the globe, in countries including France, Germany, Estonia, Sicily, Brazil and the US.

David Heap's numerous theatre credits include Salome (The Gate, Edinburgh Festival & Spoleto Festival), The Silver Tassie (Abbey Theatre, Dublin), Faith Healer (UK tour), The Race for the Ark Tattoo (Colman Centre, Gureen), Titus Andronicus and Macbeth (Siren Theatre, Dublin), Much Ado About Nothing (The Lyric, Belfast) and Metamorphosis (Dublin Fringe Festival). Heap has toured internationally with the English Shakespeare Company. Film credits include Botched,Capital Letters and Miracle at Midnight. Television credits include Fair City, Father Ted and St. Ives.

Liv O'Donoghue is an Irish-Norwegian dance maker and performer based in Dublin. She was an associate artist with Dance Ireland (2011-2013) and is currently a Modul-Dance carte blanche artist. Her own work has been presented widely throughout Europe, including the UK, Sweden, Germany, Latvia, Italy, Austria and Norway. As a performer, she has been a member of the Liz Roche Company since 2009. She has also worked with junk ensemble, Irish Modern Dance Theatre, Kyle Abraham (Abraham in Motion), Wendy Houstoun, Henri Oguike, and Emma Martin Dance, touring widely throughout Europe and the USA.

Further casting to be announced.

Dead Centre are Ben Kidd, Bush Moukarzel and Adam Welsh. Lippy is co-directed by Ben Kidd, whose recent work includes the UK tour of Spring Awakening for Headlong and David Mamet's The Shawl at the Young Vic. Bush Moukarzel is a writer based in Dublin and also works as an actor, touring extensively with Irish company Pan Pan. Adam Welsh has designed sound and music for Lippy. Cameo playwright Mark O'Halloran is one of Ireland's foremost writers for stage and screen (Trade; Adam & Paul; Garage). The production is designed by Grace O'Hara and Andrew Clancy, with lighting by Stephen Dodd.

Lippy is written by Bush Moukarzel and Mark O'Halloran. The production is directed by Ben Kidd and Bush Moukarzel, and presented by Dead Centre. It is supported by Culture Ireland.

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