Want to make a deal with the devil? A new adaptation of The Picture of Dorian Gray is coming to Broadway starring Emmy Award winner Sarah Snook, star of HBO’s smash-hit “Succession." She reprises her Olivier Award-winning performance in the play, in which she takes on all 26 roles and breathes new life into Oscar Wilde’s classic tale.
Adapted and directed by multi award-winning Kip Williams during his tenure as Artistic Director at the acclaimed Sydney Theatre Company, A Picture of Dorian Gray delivers an all new explosive interplay of live performance and video.
Oscar Wilde wrote the gothic horror novel in 1891, though a shorter, novella-length version was published in the July 1890 issue of the American periodical Lippincott's Monthly Magazine. While the novel was subject to much controversy and criticism in its time, it has come to be recognized as a classic of Gothic literature.
Since its initial publication, it has been the subject of many adaptations to film and stage. In 1913, it was adapted for the stage by G. Constant Lounsbery at London's Vaudeville Theatre. An adaptation was seen on Broadway in 1928, written by David Thorne.
The most critically praised film adaptation is 1945's The Picture of Dorian Gray, which earned an Academy Award for best black-and-white cinematography, as well as a Best Supporting Actress nomination for Angela Lansbury, who played Sibyl Vane.
In 2003, Stuart Townsend played Dorian Gray in the film League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. In 2009, the novel was loosely adapted into the film Dorian Gray, starring Ben Barnes as Dorian and Colin Firth as Lord Henry. Reeve Carney portrays Dorian Gray in John Logan's Penny Dreadful, which aired on Showtime from 2014 to 2016.
This new Broadway-bound version is is adapted and directed by Kip Williams and orginated at Sydney Theatre Company in 2020. It extended twice in Sydney and toured to critical and audience acclaim throughout Australia, featuring Australian star Eryn Jean Norvill.
The production then moved to London's West End in early 2024, this time with Succession star Sarah Snook. In London, The Picture of Dorian Gray was adored by critics and audiences alike and earned Snook a Best Actress Olivier Award and a Best Costume Design Olivier Award for Marg Horwell. Check out what the critics had to say.
Wilde’s timeless text is revolutionized by Williams’ celebrated collision of form employing an explosive interplay of video and theater through an intricately choreographed collection of on-stage cameras bringing to life a dizzying 26 characters, each brought to life by Snook.
Williams’ interpretation of beauty, excess, and a deal with the devil brings a striking resonance in our current era, holding a mirror to 21st century society’s narcissistic obsession with youth.
This is not story theater as one might imagine. It is a wondrous merging of technical wizardry, clever stagecraft and incomparable artistry. As you enter the theater, there’s little more than a giant screen suspended on a bare stage. When it begins, we hear Snook’s voice narrating the scene set in an artist’s studio as we meet the artist Basil Hallward and his friend Lord Henry Wotton discussing Basil’s portrait of Dorian Gray, a young man they find “wonderfully handsome.” Snook appears on the giant screen as Dorian, and magically she also becomes the two older men as they all converse about “a new hedonism” that worships the beauty of youth above all else.
Yet it’s not technology itself that leaves “Dorian Gray” feeling so brittle where “Vanya” is a tear fest. It’s that the technology dominates all other values, including Wilde’s, often denying the human contact, and contract, that are at the heart of theater’s effectiveness. Some important scenes, though shot live onstage, must be watched onscreen because the screen itself blocks the upper half of Snook’s body. Her giant face is rendered in such super close-up that you might as well be an otolaryngologist; only her legs are left to do IRL acting.
| West End |
West End |
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| 2025 | Broadway |
Original Broadway Production Broadway |
| Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Direction of a Play | Kip Williams |
| 2025 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Lead Performance in a Playe | Sarah Snook |
| 2025 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Projection and Video Design | David Bergman |
| 2025 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Sound Design of a Play | Clemence Williams |
| 2025 | Drama League Awards | DISTINGUISHED PERFORMANCE | Sarah Snook |
| 2025 | Drama League Awards | OUTSTANDING DIRECTION OF A PLAY | Kip Williams |
| 2025 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Solo Performance | Sarah Snook |
| 2025 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Video/Projections | David Bergman |
| 2025 | Tony Awards | Best Costume Design of a Play | Marg Horwell |
| 2025 | Tony Awards | Best Direction of a Play | Kip Williams |
| 2025 | Tony Awards | Best Lighting Design of a Play | Nick Schlieper |
| 2025 | Tony Awards | Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play | Sarah Snook |
| 2025 | Tony Awards | Best Scenic Design of a Play | Marg Horwell |
| 2025 | Tony Awards | Best Scenic Design of a Play | David Bergman |
| 2025 | Tony Awards | Best Sound Design of a Play | Clemence Williams |
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