Andrew Scott to star in Old Vic's livestreamed play Three Kings
One year on from his award-winning run in Noël Coward’s Present Laughter, Andrew Scott will return to the Old Vic theatre in London to perform a new livestreamed play. Three Kings was written for the Sherlock and Fleabag star by Stephen Beresford as part of the Old Vic’s In Camera series, which launched last month with a production of Lungs, starring Matt Smith and Claire Foy, streamed on Zoom. Like Smith and Foy, Scott will perform to an empty auditorium. He will give five performances of Three Kings from 29 July to 1 August.
The play is billed as exploring “fathers and sons, the gifts and burdens of inheritance, and the unfathomable puzzle of human relationships”. It will be staged by Matthew Warchus, the artistic director of the Old Vic. Warchus said he was “hugely grateful to Stephen for writing this play specially for the Old Vic: In Camera series and to Andrew for agreeing to perform it. Their generous support of the Old Vic at this critical time and their spirit of adventure in joining us in this crucial fundraising experiment is enormously appreciated.”
Although they will all offer the same “view” of the production online, tickets will cost between £10 and £40, with a limited number available at each price band. Tickets for Lungs were capped at 1,000 for each performance, replicating the theatre’s real audience capacity, which meant it quickly sold out.
Related: Moriarty's first moves: Andrew Scott's stage roles – in pictures
The Old Vic, one of London’s oldest theatres, is in a “seriously perilous” financial situation, Warchus told the Guardian earlier this year. The theatre is a charity and receives no government funding, relying solely on ticket sales, sponsorship and donations.
The performance of Three Kings on 1 August will be followed by a Q&A with Scott, hosted by Dermot O’Leary, with tickets sold at £20. Scott has already had a lockdown theatre hit with Sea Wall, a half-hour monologue by Simon Stephens that he filmed in a single take in 2011. It is available to rent online.
