The Human Body by Lucy Kirkwood opens at the Donmar Warehouse on February 16.
The strapline reads: “The window for change – real change I mean – will close. It’s already closing. Very soon it will be shut, and we shan’t be able to get it open again.”
Set in 1948, Shropshire: the winter is freezing, austerity is biting and Iris Elcock, GP, Socialist and Labour party councillor, is working tirelessly to implement Nye Bevan’s National Health Service Act and its revolutionary promise of free health care for all.
At home she is a mother, and wife to an ex-Navy man scarred by the war. But a chance meeting with George Blythe, a local boy who has made it to Hollywood, turns her quiet, certain world upside down.
Two worlds meet in a romantic drama which sees stars of film and TV, Keeley Hawes and Jack Davenport, make their long-awaited returns to the London stage.
The Human Body is a story of political and private passions from multi-award-winning writer Lucy Kirkwood (The Witches, Mosquitoes, Chimerica).
In his final production as Artistic Director of the Donmar Warehouse, Michael Longhurst directs together with Ann Yee, with whom he previously collaborated on Next to Normal and Caroline, or Change.
Donmar Warehouse, 41 Earlham Street, Seven Dials, London WC2H 9LX.
Dates: 16 February – 13 April.
Times: Mon – Sat 7.30pm; Thus & Sat matinees 2.30pm.
Admission: £21 – £65.
Booking: www.donmarwarehouse.com – 020 3282 3808
