Further Casting Announced for ELECTRA at The Old Vic

The Old Vic and Sonia Friedman Productions present Sophocles' ELECTRA, in a version by Frank McGuinness, starring Kristin Scott Thomas.

The creative team includes: Director Ian Rickson, Designer Mark Thompson, Lighting Designer Neil Austin, Music Designer PJ Harvey, Sound Designer Simon Baker, Movement Maxine Doyle, Casting Sam Jones CDG.

Amanda Drew, Jack Lowden, Diana Quick, Golda Rosheuvel, Thalissa Teixeira and Peter Wight join Kristin Scott Thomas in Sophocles' tragedy Electra.

Frank McGuinness' charged adaptation of the classic drama of Electra and Orestes' revenge on their father's murderers opens at The Old Vic in the round on Wednesday 1 October with previews from Monday 22 September. Closing night will be on December 20th.

Kristin Scott Thomas gained international recognition in the 1990s for her roles in Bitter Moon, Four Weddings and A Funeral, for which she won the BAFTA Film Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role, and The English Patient for which she received a Golden Globe nomination as well as an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress. Among her subsequent films are Gosford Park, in which she played Lady Sylvia McCordle, Mission: Impossible, The Horse Whisperer, Keeping Mum, Nowhere Boy, Easy Virtue, and Ne le dis à personne (Tell No One), by French director Guillaume Canet. In addition, Scott Thomas received many accolades for her performance in Il y a longtemps que je t'aime (I've Loved You So Long), including BAFTA and Golden Globe nominations for Best Actress. In early 2007, Scott Thomas played Arkadina in Anton Chekhov's The Seagull at The Royal Court and on Broadway, for which she won a Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actress. In 2009, she starred in Partir (Leaving) as Suzanne, earning a nomination for Best Actress at the Cesar Awards and winning Best Actress at the Evening Standard Film Awards. She also starred in Sarah's Key as Julia Jarmond and in 2011, played the role of Patricia Maxwell in Salmon Fishing in the Yemen before returning to the West End to star as Emma in Harold Pinter's Betrayal directed by Ian Rickson.

Scott Thomas's recent films include Bel Ami with Robert Pattinson, based on the 1885 novel written by Guy de Maupassant, and the film adaption of Douglas Kennedy's novel, The Woman in the Fifth, directed by Pawel Pawlikowski. Last year, Scott Thomas teamed up with director Nicolas Winding Refn for Only God Forgives, and with director Ralph Fiennes for The Invisible Woman. She also performed on stage in Harold Pinter's Old Times directed by Ian Rickson.

Amanda Drew plays Chrysothemis. Amanda is well known on television as Dr. May Wright in EastEnders, and more recently for her role as Cate in Broadchurch, as Jacqui Whitehead in Southcliffe, Life of Crime, Switch, Silent Witness and Men Behaving Badly. On stage Amanda's credits include The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Olivia in Twelfth Night and John Gabriel Borkman at the National; Eastwood Ho!, The Malcontent, The Roman Actor, Jubilee and Love in a Wood for the RSC and Love and Information, Enron, The Stone, Faces in the Crowd and The Ugly One at the Royal Court. Films include Elfie Hopkins & The Gammons, This Year's Love, The Other Man and Mrs Dalloway.

Jack Lowden plays Orestes. Jack has recently received both the Olivier Award for Best Supporting Actor and the Ian Charleson Award for his latest role as Oswald in Richard Eyre's production of Ghosts at The Almeida and Trafalgar Studios. On stage he has also starred as Eric Liddell in Chariots of Fire at the Hampstead Theatre and the Gielgud Theatre and Blackwatch at the Barbican and on tour in America. Jack's television credits include The Tunnel, Mrs. Biggs, Blue Haven and Being Victor, while his film work includes 71 and uwantme2killhim? In 2015 Jack will appear as the poet Thomas Wyatt in the BBC television adaptation of Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall, as well as starring in the World War I BBC drama series The Passing Bells and upcoming film Pan with Hugh Jackman and Amanda Seyfried.

Diana Quick plays Clytemnestra. Best known as Lady Julia Flyte in Brideshead Revisited, Diana has also appeared extensively on stage in productions including Mother Teresa Is Dead, The Old Neighbourhood, The Sea and King Lear for the Royal Court, Hamlet, The Changeling and The Women Pirates for the RSC, A Map of the World, Troilus and Cressida, Tamburlaine, Plunder and Phaedra Brittanica for the National and You Never Can Tell at the Garrick. Diana has appeared regularly on television in Case Histories, Inspector George Gently, Silk, The Queen and The Woman in White among others. Her film credits include Side By Side, Mother's Milk, Love/Loss, Revenger's Tragedy, AKA and The Discovery of Heaven.

Ian Rickson's directing credits includes Mojo (Harold Pinter Theatre), Old Times (Harold Pinter Theatre), Hamlet (Young Vic), Jerusalem (Royal Court, West End and Broadway), Betrayal (Comedy Theatre), The Children's Hour (Comedy Theatre), The Hothouse and The Day I Stood Still (National Theatre), Parlour Song (Almeida), Hedda Gabler (Roundabout Theatre, New York), The House of Yes (Gate Theatre) and Me & My Friend (Chichester Festival Theatre). He was Artistic Director at the Royal Court from 1998 to 2006, during which time he directed Krapp's Last Tape, The Winterling, Alice Trilogy, The Sweetest Swing in Baseball, Fallout, The Night Heron, Boy Gets Girl, Mouth to Mouth (also in the West End), Dublin Carol, The Weir (West End and Broadway), The Lights, Pale Horse and Mojo (Broadway and Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre), Ashes & Sand, Some Voices and Killers. His last production for the Royal Court, The Seagull, transferred to Broadway. His film credits include Fallout, Krapp's Last Tape and The Clear Road Ahead.

Frank McGuinness lives in Dublin and lectures in English at University College, Dublin. His internationally-acclaimed work includes The Hanging Gardens, The Match Box, The Factory Girls, Baglady, the multi-award winning Observe The Sons Of Ulster Marching Towards The Somme, Innocence, Mary And Lizzie, Someone Who'll Watch Over Me (New York Critics Circle Award, Writers Guild Award for Best Play, 1992), Dolly West's Kitchen, Gates Of Gold, Speaking Like Magpies, There Came A Gypsy Riding and When Greta Garbo Came To Donegal. Frank's widely performed adaptations of classics include Lorca's Yerma, Chekhov's Three Sisters and Uncle Vanya, Brecht's The Threepenny Opera and The Caucasian Chalk Circle, Sophocles' Electra and Oedipus, Euripides' Helen, Ostrovsky's The Storm, Strindberg's Miss Julie and Ibsen's Rosmersholm, Hedda Gabler, The Lady From The Sea, A Doll's House, Ghosts, John Gabriel Borkman, Molina's Damned by Despair and most recently James Joyce's The Dead. Frank is currently working on an opera cycle on the Oedipus Trilogy for the Royal Opera House. TV/screenplays include the award-winning The Hen House for BBC2 and the celebrated BBC drama A Short Stay In Switzerland.

Other cast members include Golda Rosheuvel (Porgy and Bess at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre, The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time for the National and Marat/Sade for the RSC), Thalissa Teixeira and Peter Wight (Much Ado About Nothing at The Old Vic, Trelawny of The Wells at the Donmar Warehouse and The Paradise for the BBC).

The Old Vic is delighted to be collaborating with Sonia Friedman Productions again as part of their in the round season following their successful co-ventures with Dancing at Lughnasa and the Broadway transfer of The Norman Conquests.

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