London's starstruck: the celebrities appearing in London theatre shows

There’s never been a better time to go star spotting in the West End, as the leading lights of the small and big screen — including Benedict Cumberbatch, Gemma Arterton and, er, Lindsay Lohan — rush to return to the stage. Here are some of the famous names due to arrive in the capital’s theatres, and a reminder of those already here
Stars: Benedict Cumberbatch, Lindsay Lohan, and Gemma Arterton
Rex / Getty
Nick Curtis @nickcurtis11 November 2014

BOOK AHEAD

TAMSIN GREIG

Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown

Playhouse Theatre, from Sat Dec 20

She’s been in The Archers on radio, Green Wing and Episodes on TV, and in Jumpy, The Little Dog Laughed and Gethsemane on stage, among others. Now Tamsin Greig makes her musical debut in an adaptation of Pedro Almodóvar’s film.

BEVERLEY KNIGHT

Memphis the Musical

Shaftesbury Theatre, from Thu Oct 9

The soul singer essays her second West End role, after a stint in The Bodyguard, in this US show about the birth of the Memphis sound in the 1950s.

BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH

Hamlet

Barbican Theatre, Aug 5-Oct 31 2015

He’s been Sherlock, Smaug and Stephen Hawking, and he’s even been in Star Trek, but now Benedict Cumberbatch takes on the young actor’s Everest, Shakespeare’s philosophising Dane.

CILLIAN MURPHY

Ballyturk

National Theatre, Sept11-Oct 11

The star of Peaky Blinders, Batman Begins and 28 Days Later has been lured back to the stage by his old friend and collaborator, playwright Enda Walsh.

RONAN KEATING

Once

Phoenix Theatre, until Sat Mar 21 2015

The former Boyzone singer and solo star takes over the lead of this musical romance between a busker and a Czech girl, adapted from the award-winning film.

LINDSAY LOHAN

Speed-the-Plow

Playhouse Theatre, Sep 24-Nov 29

Yes, she’s really, really here, and yes, the Mean Girls star and tabloid-bait really is going to act in David Mamet’s satire on Hollywood. Fingers crossed.

GEMMA ARTERTON

Made in Dagenham

Adelphi Theatre, from Thu Oct 9

Gravesend-born Arterton makes her musical debut as the leader of the 1968 seamstresses’ strike at the Ford plant in east London.

JANE HORROCKS

East is East

Trafalgar Studios, Oct 4-Jan 3 2015

Horrocks returns to the stage opposite writer Ayub Khan Din in Sam Yates’s revival of his hit about tensions within a mixed-race Salford family.

CATCH THEM WHILE YOU CAN

HELEN MCCRORY

Medea

National Theatre, until Thu Sep 4

The Peaky Blinders star effects a rending infanticide in this Euripides.

GILLIAN ANDERSON

A Streetcar Named Desire

Young Vic, until Tue Sep 19

The star of The Fall is Blanche DuBois in Tennessee Williams’s classic.

BILL NIGHY and CAREY MULLIGAN

Skylight

Wyndham’s Theatre, booking to Sat Aug 23

Nighy and Mulligan shine in David Hare’s play about a couple reunited.

MARTIN FREEMAN

Richard III

Trafalgar Studios, until Sat Sep 27

The Sherlock actor is cast against type as Shakespeare’s brutal king.

RICHARD ARMITAGE

The Crucible

Old Vic, until Sat Sep 13

The Spooks star is a magnificent John Proctor in Arthur Miller’s play.

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