David Suchet to Star in West End's THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST; Performances Begin 24 June

David Suchet will star as Lady Bracknell in Oscar Wilde's much loved and exhilarating masterpiece The Importance of Being Earnest. Directed by Adrian Noble, the new production will open in the West End on 1 July 2015, with previews from 24 June 2015.

Written shortly before Wilde fell foul of society's unbending condemnation, The Importance of Being Earnest fizzes with wit as he delights in debunking social pretensions. Two bachelor friends, upper crust dandy Algernon Moncrieff and the most reliable John Worthing J.P., lead double lives to court the attentions of the desirable Gwendolyn Fairfax and Cecily Cardew. The gallants must then grapple with the uproarious consequences of their ruse, and with the formidable Lady Bracknell.

David Suchet is one of Britain's most respected actors on stage, screen and television. He was awarded the CBE in 2010. David is best known for his role as the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot in Agatha Christie's Poirot and he has recently completed all 74 Poirot TV films which is the whole canon of Agatha Christie's Poirot stories. His other television work includes Great Expectations, Richard II, Hidden, Diverted, the award-winning BBC drama Maxwell (for which he won Best Actor International Emmy Award in 2008), The Life of Freud, Victoria and Albert, Murder in Mind and Anthony Trollope's The Way We Live Now (BAFTA nomination). Suchet's film credits include Effie, The Bank Job, The In-Laws, A Perfect Murder, Executive Decision and Sunday (winner of the best film at Sundance Film Festival). David has also worked extensively in theatre. His recent stage credits include Long Day's Journey Into Night, All My Sons (Best Actor What'sOnStage.com Awards, Evening Standard Theatre Awards nomination and Olivier Award nomination), Complicit (The Old Vic), Once in a Lifetime (National Theatre), The Last Confession (Theatre Royal Haymarket) and the Royal Shakespeare Company productions of Troilus and Cressida, The Tempest and Othello. Other credits include Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Critic's Circle Award), Separation (Olivier Award nomination), Oleanna and Amadeus (Best Actor, Royal Variety Club Award, Tony nomination on Broadway and Olivier Award nomination).

Adrian Noble was the Artistic Director of the RSC from 1990-2003, directing numerous productions including The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe (Stratford, Barbican), A Midsummer Night's Dream (Stratford, Barbican and Broadway), The Seagull (Stratford, Barbican) and The Secret Garden (Stratford, London). Noble's extensive list of other directing credits includes The Captain of Kopenick for the National, The King's Speech in the West End, The Tempest, Amadeus, Inherit The Wind and As You Like It as Artistic Director at The Old Globe Theatre (San Diego), Hamlet for the Stratford Festival of Canada, Cosi Fan Tutti at the Opera De Lyon, Summer and Smoke, A Woman Of No Importance, The Home Place by Brian Friel at the Abby and West End, Brand by Ibsen starring Ralph Fiennes, Pericles at The Roundhouse in Stratford and in the West End and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang at The London Palladium starring Michael Ball. Noble also directed a film version of A Midsummer Night's Dream and his book How To Do Shakespeare was released in 2009. Adrian Noble is currently directing Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf for The Theatre Royal Bath.

Photo by Richard Young/Rex/Rex USA.