Casting is now complete for Nina Raine's (Consent, Tribes, Tiger Country) two-part adaptation of George Eliot's classic novel Middlemarch, Playbill reported. Directed by Jeremy Herrin, the Royal Shakespeare Company production will play the RSC's Swan Theatre in Stratford-Upon-Avon. Part 1 begins performances October 2 and Part 2 on October 10. The limited engagement will continue through January 16, 2027, with opening performances October 28.
The company will be led by Nia Towle as Dorothea Brooke, with Amanda Root as George Eliot and Mrs. Cadwallader, John Hodgkinson as Mr. Bulstrode and Borthrop Trumbull, Rory Alexander as Will Ladislaw, and Andrew Richardson as Tertius Lydgate. The cast also includes Lizzie Annis, Gunnar Cauthery, Ian Drysdale, Dave Fishley, Peter Forbes, Ebenezer Gyau, Penny Layden, Emma McDonald, and Anita Reynolds.
"George Eliot's Middlemarch is an entertaining story full of great humanity, wisdom, and wit," Herrin said. "Nina Raine has distilled this epic beloved novel into a very beautiful play in two parts, which has attracted a great ensemble and creative team to the Swan. I can't wait to explore its many pertinent themes: family, marriage, love, purpose, religion, morality, and more. Theatre is a great form for a story that luxuriates in how we are all essentially connected."