NEWS
Sonia Friedman Productions', Oedipus, wins Best Director, Best Actor and Best Actress at 2025 Critics' Circle Awards
27 March 2025
Sonia Friedman Productions’ (SFP) critically acclaimed Oedipus, a new adaptation created by Robert Icke after Sophocles, was today the most awarded production at this year’s Critics’ Circle Theatre Awards with Robert Icke winning Best Director, Mark Strong winning Best Actor and Lesley Manville winning Best Actress.
The production will be transferring to Broadway’s Studio 54 this November with Mark Strong and Lesley Manville resuming their roles as Oedipus and Jocasta respectively, following a record-breaking sold-out run at Wyndham’s Theatre, a Delfont Mackintosh Theatre.
Oedipus began performances on 4 October 2024 and concluded a highly successful strictly limited season on 4 January 2025. Over the course of its 13-week run, the play became the highest-grossing limited-run show at Wyndham’s Theatre ever, with its final week becoming the highest-grossing week in the venue’s history.
In December last year, the production scheduled an additional matinee specifically for Under 30s priced at £10 a ticket which sold out in under an hour.
Sonia Friedman said “It has been an honour to produce Robert Icke’s Oedipus in the West End — an ancient tragedy reimagined as a bold, modern masterpiece. Robert’s direction had the tension and drive of a thriller. He turned a 2,000-year-old story into something urgent, passionate, intimate, and utterly contemporary. Mark Strong and Lesley Manville delivered performances that left the theatre in stunned silence night after night. The complete sell-out run is proof of how deeply this production resonated. I can’t wait for Broadway audiences to experience its power.”
The cast included Mark Strong (Oedipus) and Lesley Manville (Jocasta), Samuel Brewer (Teiresias), Michael Gould (Creon), Sara Hazemi (Lichas/Understudy Antigone), Gary McDonald (Driver), Bhasker Patel (Corin), Phia Saban (Antigone), Jordan Scowen (Eteocles), June Watson (Merope) and James Wilbraham (Polyneices), with Jim Creighton (Ensemble/Understudy Oedipus & Creon), Derek Elroy (Ensemble/Understudy Corin, Teiresias & Driver), Celia Nelson (Ensemble/ Understudy Jocasta & Merope) and Jake Rory (Ensemble/Understudy Polyneices, Eteocles & Lichas).
The creative team is Hildegard Bechtler (Set Design), Wojciech Dziedzic (Costume Design), Natasha Chivers (Lighting Design), Tom Gibbons (Sound Design), Tal Yarden (Video Design) and Julia Horan CDG (Casting Director).
Behind every great man is a great woman.
Election night. The polls predict a landslide victory. Everything is about to change.
Starring the internationally renowned, multi-award-winning Mark Strong and Lesley Manville, Sophocles’ epic tragedy is transformed into an essential, explosive human thriller.
After his revelatory Oresteia, visionary director Robert Icke (1984, The Doctor) reimagines another Ancient Greek tragedy, bringing the secrets of the past bursting into the present.
Icke’s production was originally produced in Dutch by Internationaal Theater Amsterdam and was presented at the Edinburgh International Festival.
The production will be transferring to Broadway’s Studio 54 this November with Mark Strong and Lesley Manville resuming their roles as Oedipus and Jocasta respectively, following a record-breaking sold-out run at Wyndham’s Theatre, a Delfont Mackintosh Theatre.
Oedipus began performances on 4 October 2024 and concluded a highly successful strictly limited season on 4 January 2025. Over the course of its 13-week run, the play became the highest-grossing limited-run show at Wyndham’s Theatre ever, with its final week becoming the highest-grossing week in the venue’s history.
In December last year, the production scheduled an additional matinee specifically for Under 30s priced at £10 a ticket which sold out in under an hour.
Sonia Friedman said “It has been an honour to produce Robert Icke’s Oedipus in the West End — an ancient tragedy reimagined as a bold, modern masterpiece. Robert’s direction had the tension and drive of a thriller. He turned a 2,000-year-old story into something urgent, passionate, intimate, and utterly contemporary. Mark Strong and Lesley Manville delivered performances that left the theatre in stunned silence night after night. The complete sell-out run is proof of how deeply this production resonated. I can’t wait for Broadway audiences to experience its power.”
The cast included Mark Strong (Oedipus) and Lesley Manville (Jocasta), Samuel Brewer (Teiresias), Michael Gould (Creon), Sara Hazemi (Lichas/Understudy Antigone), Gary McDonald (Driver), Bhasker Patel (Corin), Phia Saban (Antigone), Jordan Scowen (Eteocles), June Watson (Merope) and James Wilbraham (Polyneices), with Jim Creighton (Ensemble/Understudy Oedipus & Creon), Derek Elroy (Ensemble/Understudy Corin, Teiresias & Driver), Celia Nelson (Ensemble/ Understudy Jocasta & Merope) and Jake Rory (Ensemble/Understudy Polyneices, Eteocles & Lichas).
The creative team is Hildegard Bechtler (Set Design), Wojciech Dziedzic (Costume Design), Natasha Chivers (Lighting Design), Tom Gibbons (Sound Design), Tal Yarden (Video Design) and Julia Horan CDG (Casting Director).
Behind every great man is a great woman.
Election night. The polls predict a landslide victory. Everything is about to change.
Starring the internationally renowned, multi-award-winning Mark Strong and Lesley Manville, Sophocles’ epic tragedy is transformed into an essential, explosive human thriller.
After his revelatory Oresteia, visionary director Robert Icke (1984, The Doctor) reimagines another Ancient Greek tragedy, bringing the secrets of the past bursting into the present.
Icke’s production was originally produced in Dutch by Internationaal Theater Amsterdam and was presented at the Edinburgh International Festival.
