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The sold out, critically acclaimed and multiple award-winning hit Best of Enemies in the West End.
With Zachary Quinto (The Boys in the Band, Star Trek, Heroes) in his London stage debut playing left-wing icon Gore Vidal, and David Harewood (Homeland, Super Girl, Ten Percent) reprising his role as the right-wing figurehead William F. Buckley Jr.
1968 – a year of protest that divided America. As two men fight to become the next President, all eyes are on the battle between two others: the cunningly conservative William F. Buckley Jr., and the iconoclastic liberal Gore Vidal. Beliefs are challenged and slurs slung as these political idols feud nightly in a new television format, debating the moral landscape of a shattered nation. Little do they know they're about to open up a new frontier in American politics, and transform television news forever…
James Graham’s work for TV (Sherwood, Quiz, Brexit: The Uncivil War) and theatre (Ink, This House, Labour of Love) makes him one of the UK’s most exhilarating and celebrated writers and Best of Enemies reunites him with award-winning director, Jeremy Herrin (People, Places and Things, Wolf Hall Trilogy, This House). This Young Vic and Headlong transfer to the Noël Coward “rushes at the audience like a newshound after a story” (The Observer) and is “the most riveting play in London’ (New York Times).
Show Information
Creatives
Writer James Graham
Inspired by the documentary by Morgan Neville and Robert Gordon
Director Jeremy Herrin
Designer Bunny Christie
Lighting Designer Jack Knowles
Sound Designer Tom Gibbons
Video Designer Max Spielbichler
Composer Benjamin Kwasi Burrell
Movement Director Shelley Maxwell
Casting Charlotte Sutton CDG (UK) and Jim Carnahan CSA (US)
Voice and Dialect Coach Hazel Holder
Associate Director Annie Kershaw
Cast
Deborah Alli
David Boyle
Lincoln Conway
Emilio Doorgasingh
Vivienne Ekwulugo
Clare Foster
Tom Godwin
David Harewood
Jamie Hogarth
John Hodgkinson
Syrus Lowe
Kevin McMonagle
Sam Otto
Zachary Quinto
Saaj Raja
Show warnings
This show contains themes of racism, homophobia and violence. There is occasional use of homophobic and racist slurs as well as misgendering. There are references to murder, antisemitism and frequent strong language.
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