Latest news with #TheFifthStep
Time Out
02-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
Three massive hit London plays will be screened in cinemas later this year
Three major London theatre productions have been announced to make their screen debuts in cinemas later this year, as they enter the repertoire of the National Theatre 's NT Live programme. If the previous sentence means nothing to you, then basically NT Live involves high quality, multi-camera recordings of live theatre performances that are subsequently broadcast into cinemas the world over, often for years to come. Sometimes the first screening will literally be live, more often they will be recorded in front of a live audience but broadcast at a later date. Although most of the filmed shows are staged in the National Theatre, NT Live stretches to a lot of other venues too. Without further ado then, the new shows being screened are Mrs Warren's Profession, The Fifth Step, and Hamlet. The legendary Imelda Staunton will make her latest of many NT Live entries with the current West End run of the Bernard Shaw classic Mrs Warren's Profession, which hits cinemas October 23. Dominic Cooke's revival of the decades-ahead-of-its-time morality drama also stars Staunton's actual daughter Bessie Carter, who plays the estranged daughter of Staunton's eponymous brothel madame. Hitting cinemas on November 27, The Fifth Step is just wrapping up its run at @sohoplace in the West End. Written by endlessly provocative playwright David Ireland, the sell-out hit stars big names Martin Freeman and Jack Lowden as two men who become friends and then bitter enemies via the Alcoholics Anonymous programme. Finally, Hamlet, a play that needs no introduction, not least to NT Live viewers: the 2015 Barbican production starring Benedict Cumberbatch has been a mainstay of the cinema streaming service for a decade now, and will doubtless continue to be so for years to come. Nonetheless, a single version of Shakespeare's masterpiece doesn't reflect how many major productions it gets – so this will be a welcome chance to get a new one in the system. Starring Olivier-winner Hiran Abeysekera, the production will be the first National Theatre show of new artistic director Indhu Rubasingham's tenure to get the cinema treatment. Hamlet will be in cinemas from January 22, 2026. Head here for full NT Live listings, with other previously announced shows coming up including a live broadcast on September 4 of the much anticipated, Rosamund Pike-starring Inter Alia.
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Scotsman
02-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Scotsman
Jack Lowden: Play by Slow Horses star from Edinburgh International Festival to be screened in UK cinemas
The play was originally created by National Theatre of Scotland Sign up to our Arts and Culture newsletter, get the latest news and reviews from our specialist arts writers Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... A play starring Jack Lowden which premiered at last year's Edinburgh International Festival is to be beamed into cinemas around the UK after a sell-out West End run. The Fifth Step, written by David Ireland and created by the National Theatre of Scotland, is one of three plays selected for the new season of National Theatre Live and is the first NTS production to be showcased on the platform. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The play had its world premiere at the Royal Lyceum Theatre in Edinburgh last August as part of the EIF and later played in Dundee and Glasgow. It also stars Martin Freeman alongside Slow Horses star Mr Lowden and is directed by Finn den Hertog, co-artistic director of Scottish theatre company Groupwork and associate artist of NTS. Slow Horses star Jack Lowden | Simon Murphy Mrs Warren's Profession and Hamlet will also be added to the NT Live line-up, as well as the previously announced Inter Alia, starring Rosamund Pike, which will broadcast live from the Lyttelton Stage across the UK on 4 September, with subsequent global screenings from 25 September. Mr den Hertog said: 'It's fantastic that The Fifth Step will be filmed and released through National Theatre Live. I've always been an enormous fan of the hybrid nature of the NT Live work and I feel confident the show will really lend itself to being captured in this way. 'I'm delighted to be able to share the work with a wider audience and I'm particularly proud that a play which started its life with National Theatre of Scotland will not only be seen around the world, but will also be coming home, in a sense, for audiences in cinemas, town halls and arts centres across Scotland.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Jack Lowden in The Fifth Step | Mihaela Bodlovic The Fifth Step is a critically-acclaimed comic two-hander that follows Lowden and Freeman's characters' journey to sobriety by way of the 12 steps. Indhu Rubasingham, director and co-chief executive of the National Theatre, said: 'From the moment I began this role, I knew that expanding our digital reach would be key to my vision to bring the world to the National Theatre and the National Theatre to the world. NT Live is a powerful way to open not just our work, but the work of our incredible peers in the West End and beyond, to audiences globally. 'This season is a fantastic example of that vision in action: reimagined classics and bold new writing, just as you'll see on our stages in London. It's about accessibility, excellence, and expanding the joy of theatre far beyond our walls and city. It's about breaking down barriers and inviting everyone in.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad
Belfast Telegraph
15-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Belfast Telegraph
Dundonald playwright taking the West End by storm
Critics have heaped praise on David Ireland's The Fifth Step and the performance of Slow Horses actor Jack Lowden, who's married to Oscar nominee Saoirse Ronan.
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Vogue
27-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Vogue
Dispatch From London: Jack Lowden Is a Force in Soho Place's Compelling The Fifth Step
When I arrived in England years ago for my studies, I was fairly shocked at my new classmates' drinking. That's not just because most American undergraduates are legally prohibited from purchasing alcohol until their final year (though the underage find plenty of ways to get drunk too); in Britain I observed a rampant societal blessing to get pissed—from the one-pound-pint specials at the pub to ladies-drink-free nights—that goes much further than in the US. The drinking culture was no less notable before a recent long weekend in London, from the canned gin and tonics at the lunchtime food truck and the crowds spilling into the street outside pubs at 4:30 p.m., to the clutched White Claws on the tube at 6:30 p.m. and the men in suits staggering around the West End. That evening I caught the sold-out new play (and one of the hottest tickets in town) The Fifth Step, about the fragile, fractious friendship between a young man beginning an Alcoholics Anonymous program and his elder, seemingly wiser sponsor. The title refers to the part of the 12-step program known as the confession, during which members are encouraged to acknowledge 'to God, to oneself, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.' Yet alcoholism is merely its ostensible topic; the show is broadly about faith and appetites, holy and otherwise, and how those intersect with power, whether in a pub, bedroom, or church. Written by David Ireland and directed by Finn den Hertog, The Fifth Step opened in the West End earlier this month after an acclaimed sold-out run in Edinburgh, with Olivier Award–winner Jack Lowden reprising his role as Luka and now joined by Emmy, BAFTA, and SAG Award winner Martin Freeman as James. It's a tight 90-minute tête-a-tête set in the round at the plush, newish Soho Place theater, the stage a circle of trust that eventually deteriorates into a literal boxing ring with seesawing power dynamics. Propulsive with chuckles initially and later gasps, it also tackles the oft-fretted-about contemporary crisis of masculinity, particularly in Britain. After all, as James points out clearly and plainly (as most things are conveyed in this play), 'The culture we live in, drinking's associated with masculinity. You go to Paris and Brazil, no one gives a fuck if you're drinking a chamomile tea.' (Another example: 'I get the impression, Luka, that every man who's ever been in your life has betrayed you. So you have difficulty trusting men. Older men.')
The Guardian
20-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
The Fifth Step review – Jack Lowden and Martin Freeman go head to head
Jack Lowden wasn't away from the stage for as long as his Slow Horses co-star Gary Oldman but it's still a thrill to find him returning to theatre. Seen at the Edinburgh international festival last summer, The Fifth Step – his first play since 2018 – gives him a character both volatile and vulnerable in a two-hander bristling with playwright David Ireland's signature style of knotty provocation and ribald comedy. Lowden resumes the role of Luka, now playing opposite Martin Freeman as James (a part originated in Scotland by Sean Gilder). Luka is new to Alcoholics Anonymous and asks the older James to be his sponsor; the drama unfolds on the verge of the confessional stage in AA's 12-step programme, with Luka expected to acknowledge the harm his addiction has done to himself and others. The play is perceptive about what it means to put your trust not just in another person but also in a programme or organised religion – and how to reconcile what you gain from the exchange with any flaws or failings of that body. Ireland pulls off a tone that is sceptical yet earnest, echoing the sincerity and hangdog humour of the opening song, I'm Just an Old Chunk of Coal (But I'm Gonna Be a Diamond Someday), by Johnny Cash, who knew a thing or two about addiction. That song is warped in the first of several scene transitions, coolly lit by Lizzie Powell, that add off-kilter energy to an in-the-round, interval-free production, stretched as tight as a drum by director Finn den Hertog. The humour ricochets as it did in den Hertog's Square Go, which tussled with younger masculinity, and there is a brilliantly handled apparition of Willem Dafoe as Jesus in a gym (almost Christ on a bike) that recalls the vision of Gerry Adams in infant form in Ireland's unforgettable Cyprus Avenue. Designer Milla Clarke dresses Luka in hoodie and trainers, James in smart shirt and suede shoes; the younger man is all restless legs and twitching fingers, his sponsor composed and watchful. As ever, Freeman is a master of the perplexed reaction, especially in James's multi-levelled incredulity at the suggestion that, as a married man, he has 'pussy on tap'. When Luka is advised to abstain from his gargantuan appetite for masturbation, Lowden matches Freeman in comic disbelief – his eyes widen in horror at the proposal. The timing is impeccable throughout but as the tables are turned, and James's behaviour is scrutinised, both give unsettling performances in a drama that specifically interrogates the role of a sponsor yet applies to multiple positions of authority and influence, including parenthood and priesthood. What appears at first to be a predictable plot twist, foreshadowed by a choice bit of dialogue from Raging Bull, swerves into something more psychologically interesting. The anonymous meeting-room set gives no place to hide as the pair, together on stage throughout, go toe to toe. If the violence that eventually erupts is undercharged, the notes of absurdity are perfectly measured and it ends not with a bang but whimsy. What power do you give another when you put your faith in them? What standards do you hold them to when you seek advice? When does care turn into control? As the questions proliferate and the pair argue over setting boundaries, Ireland continually blurs them in a play that regularly elicits winces. 'Those that are crying will later be laughing,' paraphrases James from the Bible. The reverse is perhaps true for this troubling take on feeling lost and the thorny question of redemption. At @sohoplace, London, until 26 July
