SplitMoon Theatre has just announced the première of a new production of Demons at St Leonard's Church in Shoreditch. Dramatised from Dostoevsky's novel by Peter Stürm, who also directs, the site-responsive show will run from 25 October to 11 November 2017 and coincide with the Centenary of the Russian Revolution.
Demons is Dostoevsky's prophetic vision of the Russian Revolution, and the subsequent bloodshed under the Soviet regimes. Inspired by the 1869 murder of the student Ivanov by his former co-conspirators, it warns of the seductive lure and fatal consequences of ideologies.
Dostoevsky's tragic satire vividly portrays the impact of radical, nihilist and populist ideas on a provincial town and echoes with particular resonance in today's political landscape.
Peter Stürm, Artistic Director of SplitMoon Theatre, says: "Dostoevsky's Demons has been an obsession for many years. Its grotesque situations, and its carnivalesque characters baring their souls, have always fascinated me. What better place than the atmospheric setting of St Leonard's, with its eerie galleries, staircases and tombs, to drive these Demons out and cleanse our times?"
Peter has trained and worked mainly with repertory companies in Germany and Switzerland. Dostoevsky has been a thread running through his career, from acting in Ingold Wildenauer's production of The Brothers Karamazov in Zurich to adapting and performing The Grand Inquisitor and The Dream of a Ridiculous Man. His most recent directing credit in London was SplitMoon's production of Brecht's In The Jungle of Cities at the Arcola with Jeffery Kissoon.
Jeffery Kissoon will play Stepan Verkhovensky and Tikhon. Jeffery is a veteran actor and director who has worked extensively with the
Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre. His stage credits include The Crucible (Bristol Old Vic), the role of Antony opposite
Kim Cattrall in Janet Suzman's production of Antony and Cleopatra(Liverpool Playhouse), and War and Peace (Shared Experience/Hampstead Theatre). In 1985, Kissoon played Karna in
Peter Brook's nine-hour Hindu epic The Mahabharata, which toured the world and was subsequently adapted into a feature film.
Samuel Collings will play Stavrogin. Samuel is currently appearing in Boudica with
Gina McKee at Shakespeare's Globe. His other stage credits include Antony and Cleopatra(
Royal Shakespeare Company/Public Theater, New York/GableStage, Miami) and the stage premiere of the award-winning BBC TV comedy series Waiting For God (UK No.1 Tour).
Jethro Skinner will play Lebyadkin. Jethro's stage credits include Shakespeare's Globe's smash hit Twelfth Night/Richard III with
Mark Rylance and
Stephen Fry at the Globe, in the West End and on Broadway. He won Best Actor at the Kinotavr (the Russian equivalent of the Oscars) for his role in Oksana Bychkova's Plus One.
Valerie Gogan will play Varvara. Valerie's screen credits include Stephen Frears' Dangerous Liaisons and One More Kiss, in which she starred opposite
Gerard Butler. Her recent stage credits include As Good A Time As Any and The Dead Dogs (The Print Room) and Are We There Yet? (Etch Theatre Company).
Timothy Allsop will play Pyotr Verkhovensky. His theatre credits include Murder in the Cathedral, The Wright Brothers and Roger Bannister in The Four Minute Mile (all Oxford Playhouse), King Lear, Richard III, A Midsummer Night's Dream and Hamlet (Guildford Shakespeare Company), and Lord Dundreary in Our American Cousin (Finborough).
Tyler Fayose, who has just completed the Edinburgh run of Irvine Welsh's new musical Creatives at the Pleasance, will play Kirillov.
Laura Sophia Becker will play Marya. Laura works as an actor across Germany, Switzerland and the UK. Tom Larkin (
War Horse national and international tour) plays Shatov. Karina Wiedman (BBC Radio 4 Death of a Cosmonaut) will play Darya. Irina Peltola will play Lisa.
Design by Nicolai Hart-Hansen (SplitMoon's In The Jungle of Cities; In The Bar of A Tokyo Hotel, Charing Cross Theatre; The Pulverised, Arcola; and currently The Knowledge, Charing Cross Theatre).
Sound Design by Mike Furness (SplitMoon's In The Jungle of Cities; other work includes
Royal Shakespeare Company, National Theatre, Trafalgar Studios, Hampstead Theatre, Soho Theatre, Lyric Hammersmith and Theatre Royal Stratford).
Produced by Caroline Staunton, who has produced all SplitMoon productions to date.
Demons is playing on the Russian Revolution Centenary nights: 25 October (old style calendar) and 7 November (new style). The final performance takes place on 11 November, Dostoevsky's birthday.
The performance on 30 October will be a fundraising gala for the benefit of St Leonard's Church.
"But here we have a force, and such a force, unheard-of! Everything will rise! And the earth will groan a great groan: 'A new, just law is coming', and the sea will boil up and the whole showhouse will collapse, and then we'll see how to build up an edifice of stone. For the first time! We will do the building, we, we alone!" (Pyotr, Act 2)
For more information, visit
www.splitmoontheatre.org.
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