Richard Bean’s fast and furious new play is an anarchic satire about the press, the police and the political establishment. Billie Piper plays Paige Britain, ambitious young news editor of The Free Press, a tabloid newspaper locked in a never ending battle for more readers.
30th June – 23rd August. More info HERE, all tickets are on sale tomorrow. You can book first two weeks now!
Synopsis of Playhouse Presents Foxtrot which airs on Thursday 29th May on Sky Arts:
‘Former stripper Badger (played by Billie Piper) and her accomplice Fox are holed up in a hotel with the man they have just kidnapped, but a phone call from their cold, calculating boss Mrs Dalloway reveals they have abducted the twin of their intended target. Their victim has learning difficulties and struggles to communicate with them, but while Badger wants to ditch him and run, Fox’s conscience gets the better of her.’
Billie Piper and Oliver Chris are part of the company of actors helping to develop a new play for the National Theatre, exploring the sharp end of the tangled relationships between the Establishment, the Press and the police.
In short, the play — or rather the piece of satirical fiction — will explore the fallout from the Leveson Inquiry into the culture, practice and ethics of the Press.I understand Richard Bean’s play will also delve deeply into the psyches of some of the key players in, and around, the inquiry.
Piper, Chris and other members of the large ensemble have been workshopping the project with Bean and Nicholas Hytner, who will direct whatever emerges from all the developmental work.
The plan is that Bean’s untitled piece will be staged at the NT’s Lyttelton Theatre in the summer, and if it clicks with critics and audiences, it will be transferred swiftly into the West End.
The NT is hyper-sensitive about the production; all those with a connection to it are asked to sign a non-disclosure document. In fact, it’s being insisted upon.
Billie was last seen at the NT in Lucy Prebble’s play The Effect. She’s about to appear on Sky TV in the much-anticipated horror drama Penny Dreadful, from Neal Street Productions.