Edinburgh Fringe Hit The Curing Room Transfers to London’s Pleasance

Photo: Rebecca Pitt
Photo: Rebecca Pitt

The Curing Room, David Ian Lee’s powerful and provocative play, which caused a huge stir at the 2014 Edinburgh Fringe Festival with brave and critically acclaimed performances from seven actors stripped bare on stage, will transfer to London this autumn with a three week run at the Pleasance Islington from 21 October – 9 November.

It’s Spring 1944 – seven Soviet soldiers have been captured by the Nazis, stripped naked and abandoned in the locked empty cellar of a monastery in southern Poland. Deprived of all resources and ties to the world they knew, the prisoners must redefine their concepts of order and human nature and confront the ultimate taboos – murder and cannibalism – in order to survive.

The Curing Room is a thriller that shines a light on dark side of human behavior that is as old as humanity itself – was inspired by an allegedly true anecdote recalled in George Steiner’s seminal work The Death of Tragedy. However, what precisely befell these seven men “in the last year of the war” will forever remain conjecture – as will the identities of the men themselves.

Written and developed in New York with a series of workshops and public readings, this world première marked its inaugural production in Edinburgh with the following cast, who will all transfer to London: Will Bowden, Rupert Elmes, Tom Holloway, Matt Houston, John Hoye, Harvey Robinson and Marlon Solomon.

Presented by Stripped Down Productions, The Curing Room is directed by Joao de Sousa, designed by Phil Lindley with sound design by Angus McRae, lighting design by David Howe and fight direction from Bret Yount.

The Curing Room contains full frontal male nudity and themes which may be distressing to certain audience members – over 16s only.

For more information visit The Pleasance website

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