NHB Modern Plays – serie

Jez Butterworth's hugely acclaimed, prize-winning play - a comic, contemporary vision of life in England's green and pleasant land.On St George's Day, the morning of the local country fair, Johnny 'Rooster' Byron, local waster and Lord of Misrule, is a wanted man. The council officials want to serve him an eviction notice, his son wants to be taken to the fair, a vengeful father wants to give him a serious kicking, and a motley crew of mates wants his ample supply of drugs and alcohol.Jerusalem premiered at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in July 2009 in a production directed by Ian Rickson and starring Mark Rylance. It transferred to the Apollo Theatre in the West End in January 2010, and played on Broadway in 2011.Jez Butterworth's play won the Evening Standard Best Play Award and the Critics Circle and Whatsonstage.com awards for Best New Play.

A darkly comic fable of brotherly love and family identity, winner of the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.Suzan-Lori Parks' play Topdog/Underdog tells the story of Lincoln and Booth, two brothers whose names were given to them as a joke, foretelling a lifetime of sibling rivalry and resentment. Haunted by the past, the brothers are forced to confront the shattering reality of their future.Topdog/Underdog was first performed at the Joseph Papp Public Theater, New York, in 2001. Its UK premiere was at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in 2003.

The Bronze Age. The Iron Age. The Age of Oil.The Stone Age didn't end for want of stones.Oil follows the lives of one woman and her daughter in an epic, hurtling collision of empire, history and family.Ella Hickson's explosive play drills deep into the world's relationship with this finite resource. It is 'the single most gloriously audacious piece of playwriting of the last few years' (Evening Standard) and won the Catherine Johnson Award for Best Play in 2013.Oil premiered at the Almeida Theatre, London, in October 2016, in a production directed by Carrie Cracknell and starring Anne-Marie Duff.

Hafsah and Bilal aren't looking for love. Hafsah has her faith, her books, her dreams. Bilal's just trying to get through uni. Studying in London, far from their hometowns of Bradford and Birmingham, they find common ground over a peanut butter and blueberry sandwich.But just as their connection is growing, the world around them becomes harder to ignore. As competing opportunities, obligations and injustices get in the way, will they be able to choose each other?Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan's play Peanut Butter & Blueberries is a tender and bittersweet love story that explores how to love when the weight of the world is on your shoulders. It was first performed at Kiln Theatre, London, in 2024, directed by Sameena Hussain.

'I never know what to say when I have to go over all this. It starts to sound like some story I tell that's about some other person entirely.'From the outside, they're the picture of a nice, normal family. Inside, they're in crisis. At their heart is Diana Goodman, a suburban wife and mother living with bipolar disorder and haunted by her past. How far will she go to keep her family's world intact?With powerful lyrics and an electrifying score of more than thirty original songs, next to normal is an intimate exploration of family and loss. It opened in New York in 2008, and transferred to Broadway in 2009, winning three Tony Awards including Best Original Score, and the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.This new edition features the complete book and lyrics of the musical, and exclusive new material, including testimonials on creating the show by James Lapine, Michael Greif, Alice Ripley, David Stone and Michael Longhurst, an essay on its presentation of mental health, and the lyrics to a dozen deleted or alternative songs.It was first published alongside the acclaimed 2023 London premiere at the Donmar Warehouse, which was nominated for four Olivier Awards including Best New Musical, and transferred to the West End in 2024.

'I'd get freaked out here, alone in the dark. Wondering what's lurking at the bottom of the bed, ready to grab your feet.'Jenny and Sam – and their baby Phoebe – have recently moved into their new home. But something feels frightening and wrong. Very wrong. Over the baby monitor, at 2:22 every night, Jenny hears footsteps around her daughter's cot. Could the house be haunted?When their friends Lauren and Ben come round for a housewarming dinner, they drink wine, relive their pasts, and argue about the existence of ghosts. They decide to stay up until 2:22, to discover the truth. Over one adrenaline-filled night – as the foxes scream outside – secrets will emerge and ghosts may appear…Spine-chilling, funny and scary, Danny Robins' play 2:22 – A Ghost Story was premiered at the Noël Coward Theatre in London's West End in August 2021, directed by Matthew Dunster, and starring Lily Allen, Julia Chan, Hadley Fraser and Jake Wood. It went on to win Best New Play at the 2022 WhatsOnStage Awards, and was nominated for Best New Play at the Olivier Awards.2:22 – A Ghost Story provides rich opportunities for any drama group wanting to make things go bump in the night – and their audiences scream.

'Something is shifting between you – again.Something terrifyingand comforting.'Dre and Des. Young. Gifted. Black. He stayed. She left.Years later, Des and Dre come crashing back into each other's lives, carrying new secrets and old scars. With the clock counting down until Des has to leave again, memories of their past collide with their present and they're forced to question if destiny has brought them back together for a reason.Benedict Lombe's play Shifters is a fierce, funny and beautifully intoxicating celebration of the enduring power of memory and first love. It was performed at the Bush Theatre, London, in 2024, directed by Artistic Director Lynette Linton, before transferring to the Duke of York's Theatre in London's West End. It went on to win Best Production (Play) at the 2025 Black British Theatre Awards, and was staged in an Off-Broadway production in 2026.

In 1969 Loren McIntyre, a National Geographic photographer, found himself lost among the people of the remote Javari Valley in Brazil. It was an encounter that was to change his life, bringing the limits of human consciousness into startling focus.  Inspired by the book Amazon Beaming by Petru Popescu, The Encounter traces McIntyre’s journey into the depths of the Amazon rainforest, incorporating innovative technology into a solo performance to build a shifting world of sound. The Encounter opened at the Edinburgh International Festival in August 2015 performed by Simon McBurney, and received its London premiere at the Barbican in February 2016 before embarking on a world tour.

'I spend the night in an officer’s barracks, where no woman has ever set foot.' In the darkest recesses of Ukraine, a war is raging.A journalist takes a research trip to the front line. Teenage girls wait for soldiers on benches. A medic mourns her lover killed in action.Natal'ya Vorozhbit's play Bad Roads is a heartbreaking, powerful and bitterly comic account of what it is to be a woman in wartime.It was premiered at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs, in November 2017, in a production directed by Vicky Featherstone. It was developed by the Royal Court International Department, and translated by Sasha Dugdale.Natal’ya Vorozhbit is the leading Ukrainian playwright of her generation and has worked with the Royal Court since 2004. Her work includes The Khomenko Family Chronicles, Maidan Diaries (Royal Court) and The Grain Store (RSC).

‘I know you’re there… Miranda? Miranda!’On a summer’s day in 1900, three Australian schoolgirls on a picnic expedition to the remote Hanging Rock abscond from their group. They are last seen heading towards the beckoning Rock…In Tom Wright’s chilling adaptation of Joan Lindsay’s classic novel, five performers struggle to solve the mystery of the missing girls and their teacher. Euphoria and terror reverberate throughout the community, as the potential for history to repeat itself becomes nightmarishly real.This adaptation of Picnic at Hanging Rock was first co-produced by Malthouse Theatre and Black Swan State Theatre Company, Perth, and first performed at Malthouse Theatre, Melbourne, in 2016. The play received its European premiere at the Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh, in 2017.

America in the mid-1980s. In the midst of the AIDS crisis and a conservative Reagan administration, New Yorkers grapple with life and death, love and sex, heaven and hell.Originally premiered in Britain at the National Theatre, London, where it won the Evening Standard Best Play Award, Tony Kushner's Angels in America went on to win two Tony Awards and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.This volume contains both Part One: Millennium Approaches and Part Two: Perestroika, plus 45 pages of bonus material including a new introduction by the playwright, a full production history, deleted scenes, and notes on staging. It was published alongside a new production in 2017 at the National Theatre, London, directed by Marianne Elliott and starring Andrew Garfield, Denise Gough, Nathan Lane, James McArdle and Russell Tovey.

Celebrate the incredible journey of Phoebe Waller-Bridge's outrageously funny, blazingly forthright Fleabag, from fringe theatre hit to international cultural phenomenon, in this special edition – featuring the original playscript, never-before-seen colour photos, and exclusive bonus content by Phoebe, director Vicky Jones and key members of the creative team.In 2013, Fleabag made its debut as a one-woman show in sixty-seater venue the Big Belly, at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe's Underbelly. It was an immediate hit, going on to enjoy two runs at London's Soho Theatre, national and international tours, whilst picking up prizes including Critics' Circle, The Stage, Fringe First and two Off West End Theatre Awards, plus an Olivier Award nomination.The 2016 TV adaptation propelled Fleabag and Phoebe to worldwide fame, earning critical acclaim and further accolades including Writers' Guild, Royal Television Society and BAFTA Television Awards. A second series followed in 2019, winning an amazing six Emmy Awards (including Outstanding Comedy Series and Outstanding Writing for a Comedy Series), along with a sold-out run of the original play in New York.This special edition of the play is released alongside Fleabag's first West End run at Wyndham's Theatre, London. It is introduced by Deborah Frances-White, stand-up comedian, writer and host of The Guilty Feminist podcast.

It's late summer, 1983. Out in the street, the world is waiting to greet Margaret Thatcher as she emerges from hospital after routine surgery. But here in this room her life is up for deadly debate… and history is holding its breath.Two people. One window. A gun. When the time comes to pull the trigger, what side of history will you be on?Based on the incendiary short story by Hilary Mantel, The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher is a darkly funny and dangerously tense psychological thriller. Alexandra Wood's stage adaptation was first performed at Liverpool Everyman in 2026, directed by John Young. 'A small triumph: a lesson in artfully controlled savagery' Sunday Times on Hilary Mantel's original short story

'I'd like you to promise me that you're not going to try and set yourself on fire again.'It's 3 a.m. and Brigid's phone rings. Her brother Niall is by the river with a plastic bag and lighter fluid. Sometimes being there for people you love is very, very difficult.Little Brother is a darkly comic play about sibling love, self-destruction, and what it means to save someone who doesn't want to be saved. Set in modern-day Belfast, it asks what happens when the systems designed to help us fall short, and love is doing more heavy lifting than it should.Winner of the 2024 Verity Bargate Award, Eoin McAndrew's play premiered at Soho Theatre, London, in 2025, directed by Emma Jordan.'A masterfully crafted, heart-wrenching play... a rare gem' Anupama Chandrasekhar, Verity Bargate Award judge'Great theatricality, humour and compassion. It stayed with me long after I had finished reading' Moira Buffini, Verity Bargate Award judge

‘I sit on the loo and think about all the people I can have sex with now. I’m not obsessed with sex. I just can’t stop thinking about it.’The Fleabag bites back. A rip-roaring account of some sort of female living her sort of life.Phoebe Waller-Bridge's debut play is an outrageously funny monologue for a female performer. Fleabag premiered at the 2013 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, performed by Phoebe herself, before transferring to Soho Theatre, London, for the first of several successful runs, followed by UK and international tours, a sold-out run in New York and a West End run in 2019. Fleabag won a Fringe First Award in Edinburgh, the Most Promising New Playwright and Best Female Performance at the Off West End Theatre Awards, The Stage Award for Best Solo Performer and the Critics' Circle Award for Most Promising Playwright. It received a Special Commendation in the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize and was nominated for the Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre.In 2016, Fleabag was turned into a wildly successful and 'utterly riveting' (Guardian) BBC television series, with a second series following in 2019.This edition features the original play, plus an introduction by the author.

'We are here to make sense of it all.'From the everyday to the astonishing, and the ordinary to the miraculous, the Roman poet Ovid's stories of epic impossibilities explore the power of transformation, the resilience of humans, and the wonder of life.The myths of Metamorphoses have inspired generations of writers, including Shakespeare. Over two thousand years later, they are reimagined for our world by three leading British playwrights, and feature anarchy, shape-shifting and a burning chariot of fire.This entertaining and provocative new play, by Sami Ibrahim, Laura Lomas and Sabrina Mahfouz, was written for the candlelit Sam Wanamaker Playhouse at Shakespeare's Globe, London. It was first performed by four actors in 2021, and directed by Globe Associate Artistic Director, Sean Holmes and Associate Artistic Director of Headlong, Holly Race Roughan.

'Love's irrelevant – we're talking about marriage.'This unique take on Jane Austen's beloved novel is an adaptation like no other, drawing on over two hundred years of romantic pop history, and featuring five young women with a story to tell.You might have seen them before, emptying the chamber pots and sweeping ash from the grate; the overlooked and the undervalued making sure those above stairs find their happy ending.Of course, these women have always been running the show – after all, 'You can't have a whirlwind romance without clean bedding' – but now the servants are also playing every part. Let the ruthless match-making begin!Isobel McArthur's acclaimed Pride and Prejudice* (*sort of) was first produced in 2018 by theatre company Blood of the Young at the Tron Theatre, Glasgow, before a UK tour the following year, produced by the two companies and the Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh. It transferred to the Criterion Theatre in London's West End in October 2021, and won Best Entertainment or Comedy Play at the 2022 Olivier Awards, with its author winning the Emerging Talent Award at the 2022 Evening Standard Theatre Awards.It is a truth universally acknowledged, that an amateur company in want of an irreverent all-female adaptation of a literary classic to perform, need look no further.

Hortense yearns for a new life away from rural Jamaica. Gilbert dreams of becoming a lawyer. Queenie longs to escape her Lincolnshire roots. Three intimately connected stories, tracing the tangled history of Jamaica and Britain.Andrea Levy's epic novel, adapted for the stage by Helen Edmundson, journeys from Jamaica to Britain in 1948 – the year that HMT Empire Windrush docked at Tilbury.Small Island was first performed at the National Theatre, London, in 2019, in an acclaimed production directed by Rufus Norris. This revised edition of the play was published alongside the revival of the production in 2022.

'Do you remember how long ago it was? The last time we saw each other…'On the eve of July 4th, in the Hamptons, Elena is preparing to throw a party to celebrate her husband, Henry, as he unveils his latest architectural masterpiece.But their already vulnerable union is shattered by the unexpected arrival of a former student of Henry's, Mathilde, with whom he shared an intimate connection…Inspired by Ibsen, Lila Raicek's My Master Builder is a startling play that lays bare the vulnerabilities we expose when we leave ourselves open to love.It was first performed at Wyndham's Theatre in London's West End in 2025, directed by Michael Grandage and starring Ewan McGregor, Elizabeth Debicki and Kate Fleetwood.

A tried-and-tested stage adaptation of Barry Hines' novel A Kestrel for a Knave, about a troubled young boy who finds and trains a kestrel.Billy, a disaffected young boy, has problems at school and at home: he's neglected by his mother, beaten by his brother and bullied on all sides. He adopts a fledgling kestrel and treats it with all the tenderness he has never known. Slowly, he begins to see for the first time what he could achieve – if only he tried.Lawrence Till's adaptation of Barry Hines' 1968 novel retains its gritty charm and popular staying power. Kes was first performed at West Yorkshire Playhouse in 1999.

'So, if you Americans already have cornflakes and Woolworths, what brings you to England?'It's 1973, and a young man from Des Moines, Iowa, has arrived on the ferry at Dover. He intends to conquer the whole of the island, like Caesar attempted before him.But Caesar didn't have to deal with counterpanes, kippers, Cadbury's Curly Wurlies, or Mrs Smegma the landlady's eccentric house rules. As Bill travels the length and breadth of Britain, through villages with names like Titsey and Little Dribbling, something strange starts to happen. Can it be true? Is he really starting to feel at home?Bill Bryson's smash-hit memoir Notes from a Small Island spent three years in The Sunday Times bestseller list, sold over two million copies, and was voted the book which best represents the UK.Tim Whitnall's hilarious stage adaptation was first produced at the Watermill Theatre, Newbury, in 2023. Written for an ensemble cast of seven (but suitable for a cast of dozens), it will appeal to amateur drama groups as a glorious celebration of one of the nation's most beloved books, and a brilliant dissection of the enduring quirks of our small island.

'You'd think it should be the simplest thing. Walking. Just one foot in front of the other. But it never ceases to amaze me how complicated things can be.'Harold Fry never meant to be a hero. An ordinary man in an ordinary life, until a letter from a long-lost friend sends him out the front door… and he keeps on walking.Strangers turn into companions, kindness appears in unexpected places, and the road reveals more than Harold ever imagined. Back home, his wife Maureen begins her own journey, one that might bring them together again.Funny, profound and uplifting, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry is a joyous celebration of the human spirit, adapted by Rachel Joyce from her multi-million-selling novel, with music and lyrics by the chart-topping musician Passenger. Originally commissioned by Chris Harper Productions, it was first performed in a critically acclaimed, sold-out run at Chichester Festival Theatre in 2025. The production transferred to the Theatre Royal Haymarket, London, in 2026, directed by Katy Rudd, starring Mark Addy and Jenna Russell.

One night in a small town in County Cork, where everyone knows everyone, things spiral terrifyingly out of control. What will happen now to Emma? To her family? To the others?This stage adaptation of Louise O'Neill's devastating novel, Asking for It, shines an unflinching light on the experience of a young woman whose life is changed for ever by a horrific act of violence.Adapted by Meadhbh McHugh, in collaboration with its director Annabelle Comyn, the play premiered at the Everyman, Cork, in June 2018, before transferring to the Abbey Theatre, Dublin. It was produced by Landmark Productions and the Everyman, in association with the Abbey Theatre.'A genuinely heartbreaking, sickening and truthful examination of society's penchant for victim-blaming, its treatment of women and the concept of rape culture' Guardian on Louise O'Neill's novel

An irreverent and unsettling play that interrogates paranoia, ambiguity and innocence in our highly sexualised world.Gethin has just finished his film course and reckons he's the next Scorsese. His mum is on at him to do her friend's wedding video - before the couple get divorced!But Gethin is interested in a much more daring project - one that will get him into dangerously deep water, question his idealism and turn his life and that of his family upside down.Stacey Gregg's play Perve was first staged at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, in 2011.

'I wonder what I have to do for people to recognise me as a threat. Do I have to smash a glass over the head of every single man I come into contact with, just so I leave a mark?'Irina takes erotic photos of average-looking men. Always behind the lens, she watches, she moulds, and she stalks. These boys are putty in her hands, just the way she likes it.When the opportunity to show her photographs in a fashionable London gallery coincides with a new boy to obsess over, cracks begin to appear. How far can she push her new prey for the perfect shot, or has she already gone too far?Based on the critically acclaimed debut novel by Eliza Clark, which was a finalist for the Women's Prize Futures Award, Boy Parts is a pitch-black psychological thriller that subverts the erotic gaze and asks what happens when our need for connection gets twisted.This stage adaptation for one actor by Gillian Greer was premiered in 2023 at Soho Theatre, London, in a co-production between Metal Rabbit Productions and Soho Theatre, and directed by Sara Joyce.Praise for Eliza Clark's novel:'Hilariously sardonic… Will make most readers howl with laughter and/or shut their eyes in horror' Guardian'A carnival funhouse ride: terrifying, feverish, hilarious' Julia Armfield'Boundaries are for breaking and if anyone can crash through and reinterpret the fear of our time, Eliza Clark can' Mslexia'Hallucinogenic, electric and sharp' Jessica Andrews'Delightfully and deviously rooted in the now with its delectable internet and culture references and evocative and real-feeling portrait of women' Dazed'Smart, stylish, and very funny' Lara Williams'Explores the darkest corners of artistic practice, sexuality and violence with bold wit and fearlessness. A dazzling, horrifying debut' Irish Times

A dark and visceral coming-of-age vampire love story, based on the acclaimed novel and film.Oskar is a bullied, lonely, teenage boy living with his mother on a housing estate at the edge of town, when a spate of sinister killings rocks the neighbourhood.Eli is the young girl who has just moved in next door. She doesn't go to school and never leaves the flat by day. Sensing in each other a kindred spirit, the two become devoted friends. What Oskar doesn't know is that Eli has been a teenager for a very long time…Jack Thorne's adaptation of Let The Right One In, based on the novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist, premiered in June 2013 at the Dundee Rep Theatre in a production by the National Theatre of Scotland, before transferring to London's Royal Court Theatre in November 2013. It won the South Bank Sky Arts Award for Theatre in 2014.

'A working-class woman inside the walls of Westminster? If that is not espionage, I do not know what is.'Forever on the right side of history, but on the wrong side of life, Labour MP Ellen Wilkinson is caught between revolutionary and parliamentary politics as she fights for a better world.Battling to save Jewish refugees in Nazi Germany; campaigning for Britain to aid the fight against Franco's Fascists in Spain; leading two hundred workers in the Jarrow Crusade against unemployment and poverty... she pursues each cause with a passionate, reckless conviction.And yet – despite a life spent running into the likes of Albert Einstein and Ernest Hemingway, serving in Churchill's cabinet, having affairs with communist spies and government ministers – she still finds herself, somehow, on the outside looking in.Caroline Bird's play Red Ellen is the remarkable true story of an inspiring and brilliant woman. It was first produced by Northern Stage, Nottingham Playhouse and the Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh in 2022.

'And what happens when the pendulum swings too far? We push back.'In the 1970s, one enigmatic old lady wielded extraordinary influence, fighting against what she believed was the UK's moral decline. Armed with only a typewriter, this seemingly harmless grandmother took on the BBC and the 'godless media' in a culture war that divided the nation.Inspired by real events, Caroline Bird's wickedly funny play delves into Whitehouse's most explosive battle – her infamous blasphemy trial against Gay News – and explores her formidable resolve to push back the tide. Was she a pearl-clutching prude or 'the most dangerous woman in Britain'?A fascinating investigation into freedom and censorship, The Last Stand of Mrs. Mary Whitehouse was co-commissioned by Nottingham Playhouse, Eleanor Lloyd Productions and Pakenham Projects. Premiering at Nottingham Playhouse in 2025, it was directed by Sarah Frankcom and starred Maxine Peake and Samuel Barnett.

A dinner party during the Second World War unites celebrated writers Agatha Christie, Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker, Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas – with a mysterious guest.With copious booze flowing, acid-tongued barbs flying, and the threat of global conflict looming, the guests – and the world around them – are close to boiling point. Everyone has a confession. Someone has a secret.Set in the French Alps in 1940, Steven Carl McCasland’s Little Wars is an enthralling, entertaining and ultimately moving portrait of seven exceptional women – and a thrilling fiction based on truth.It was workshopped Off-Off-Broadway, first performed in 2015, and received an acclaimed digital premiere in 2020, featuring Linda Bassett, Sarah Solemani, Juliet Stevenson and Sophie Thompson. It provides glorious opportunities for an all-female cast to play some of the greatest literary figures of the twentieth century.