Thom Yorke’s Shakespeare-meets-Radiohead stage play Hamlet Hail To The Thief is heading to London later this year.
The show is based on Radiohead’s 2003 album ‘Hail To The Thief’ and came about as a collaboration between Yorke and the Tony and Olivier Award-winning directors Steven Hoggett and Christine Jones.
It is a contemporary adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, and Yorke personally reworked and orchestrated songs from the album for a cast of over 20 musicians and actors, who perform the music live on stage during each show.
It had its world premiere at Aviva Studios in Manchester in April last year before moving to the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford in the summer. Now, it has been confirmed that it is heading to London for the first time.
Hamlet Hail To The Thief will open at the Barbican Theatre on October 31 this year and run until 23 January 2027. Tickets go on sale at 10am on June 26 and you will be able to find yours here.
Yorke has said: “I’m into finally bringing ‘Hamlet Hail to The Thief’ to London, and to the Barbican of all places! It is fascinating and very strange to me how this came to life and how it has worked. When it revealed itself to us over time I was shocked, having never had this kind of experience before. I am happy for it to be seen by a wider audience in such an intense space.”
Jones added: “Bringing this brutal play into the Barbican’s brutalist space seems fated. I feel fiercely fortunate to regroup with these incisive collaborators and push our work further. Both the play and the album continue to speak urgently to the convulsed world we find ourselves in. For me, working on this project is one way to find the ground beneath me.”
The original cast are returning for the Barbican run, with Samuel Blenkin (Alien: Earth, Black Mirror) playing Hamlet, Ami Tredrea as Ophelia, Paul Hilton as Claudius and Claudia Harrison as Gertrude. Alby Baldwin, Brandon Grace, Felipe Pacheco, Romaya Weaver and Marienella Phillips also return.
The synopsis for Hamlet Hail To The Thief reads: “Elsinore has become a surveillance state and hectic runs in the blood of its citizens. Hamlet Hail To The Thief centres on Hamlet and Ophelia’s awakening to the lies and corruption in Denmark, gradually revealed by ghosts and music. Paranoia reigns and no one is spared a tragic unraveling.”
Speaking about how the project came about, Yorke has explained: “I don’t not subscribe to the synchronicity thing. You know, the one about The Wizard of Oz and ‘Dark Side of the Moon’; you watch a movie, turn the sound down, put on another soundtrack and something is revealed. But, obviously, my initial reaction was, this is Hamlet, therefore it’s sacrosanct, it’s untouchable. You can’t. But the idea didn’t go away. It planted a little seed in my head.”
The project also led to a live album being released last year, after Yorke requested to hear some live recordings of Radiohead playing songs from ‘Hail To The Thief’ while putting the show together.
“I was shocked by the kind of energy behind the way we played,” he said of the recordings. “I barely recognised us, and it helped me find a way forward. We decided to get these live recordings mixed and released (it would have been insane to keep them for ourselves). It has all been a very cathartic process. We very much hope you enjoy them.”
Radiohead have not released an album since 2016’s ‘A Moon Shaped Pool’, but they played a well-received comeback tour last year. Guitarist Ed O’Brien, who released a solo album ‘Blue Morpho’ last month, recently told NME that they have “not even talked about” making a new album.
