Cynthia Erivo will return to London's West End to play 26 roles in a one-woman ‘Dracula'

Time Out

13-05-2025

Cynthia Erivo got her big break on the London stage, though probably not when she expected to. In 2014 the then-unknown Brit was cast in the lead role of the massive West End folly I Can't Sing!, a parody of The X-Factor that turned up years too late for the zeitgeist and duly died a death at the gargantuan London Palladium. But unbenownst to her, she'd already made it: the previous year she'd got great reviews in the tiny Menier Chocolate Factory's production of the musical adaptation of Alice Walker's classic novel The Colour Purple. It never went to the West End. But it did go to Broadway, and after that Erivo's reputation was duly made, Hollywood came calling, and she's not acted on a British stage since.
That will change next year, though, when she makes the mother of all returns in not one role but 26 in a high tech one-woman stage adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula.
If that rings a bell, then it'll be because last year Sarah Snook took the West End by storm in the conceptually similar The Portrait of Dorian Gray. Dracula isn't a rip-off: it's by the same Australian creative team from Sydney Theatre, headed by director-adaptor Kip Williams (who has in fact made a trilogy of Victorian horror adaptations with Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde currently unseen outside Oz).
Paying moody homage to classic horror movies – so a very different look to the very fabulous Dorian Gray – it scored great reviews domestically and should be a proper showcase for Erivo, who'll take on every role from Jonathan Harker to the Count himself.
Quoth Erivo: 'Returning to the stage feels like a homecoming, one that I've been craving for a long time. To do so with a story as rich, complex, and haunting as DRACULA offers a beautiful opportunity to delve into character, into myth, and into the heart of what makes us human.
'From the moment I was asked, I could not get the role out of my mind. Kip's vision is thrilling, terrifying, and deeply resonant, offering a chance to sit with not only the darkness in the world, but also the light we fight to hold onto. It's a rare gift for an actor to inhabit so many voices and perspectives in one piece, and I'm honoured to do it for West End audiences in this extraordinary production. The prospect of doing this show scares me and I know it will be a huge challenge. This show will ask everything of me — and I'm ready to give it.'