Ultimate thriller Sleuth tours to the Theatre Royal Bath

Anthony Shaffer’s masterpiece Sleuth, starring Todd Boyce (Coronation Street) and Neil McDermott (EastEnders, The Royal), visits the Theatre Royal Bath from Monday 12 to Saturday 17 February, directed by the award-winning Rachel Kavanaugh (RSC/Chichester Festival Theatre).

Milo Tindle arrives at the impressive home of a famous mystery writer, Andrew Wyke, only to be unwittingly drawn into a tangled web of intrigue and gamesmanship, where nothing is quite as it seems. Far more than a ‘whodunnit’, this dark psychological ‘thriller about thrillers’ promises to baffle even the most proficient sleuth and makes for an intriguing study of human conflict, jealousy and manipulation.

After terrorising Coronation Street’s residents as the notorious baddie Stephen Reid, Todd Boyce swops the cobbles for the stage when he takes on the role of mystery writer, Andrew Wyke. Todd’s many television appearances also include The Crown, Sherlock, Mr Selfridge, The Game, Hollyoaks, Spooks, The Unexpected and Unfinished Business. His film credits include The Batman, Kingsman 3, Murder on the Orient Express, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Everest, Kick Ass 2, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The Life and Death of Peter Sellers, Spy Game, Great Expectations and The Labyrinth. On stage, his numerous theatre credits include The Exorcist for Bill Kenwright Productions and Birmingham Rep; Last of the Boys at the Southwark Playhouse; Midnight Cowboy at the Edinburgh Assembly Rooms; Burn This, Doctor Faustus and The Normal Heart at the Sydney Theatre Company; Hamlet at the Young Vic and on tour; The Exonerated at the Riverside Studios, and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? for the South Australian Theatre Company.  

Wyke’s visitor Milo Tindle is played by Neil McDermott, who is well known on television for his roles as Ryan Malloy in BBC’s EastEnders since 2009, and Dr Ralph Ellis in three series of The Royal. Neil makes a welcome return to the Theatre Royal after recently starring in the acclaimed pantomime Sleeping Beauty for the 2023 Christmas season. His screen credits also include Doctor Who, Inspector George Gently and Rosemary and Thyme. In the West End, Neil has starred in Pretty Woman, The Wind in the Willows, The Sound of Music, Shrek The Musical and Follies. His stage credits also include La Cage aux Folles at the Menier Chocolate Factory; Aladdin alongside Sir Ian McKellen and Roger Allam at London’s Old Vic Theatre; Henry IV at the Donmar Warehouse, and Laura Wade’s comedy Home, I’m Darling, which played the Theatre Royal in February 2023 as part of a nationwide tour.

Rachel Kavanaugh is an award-winning director of plays and musicals both in the UK and internationally. She was Artistic Director and Joint CEO of Birmingham Repertory Theatre from 2006 to 2011. Her many credits include a box office record-breaking adaptation of A Christmas Carol at the Royal Shakespeare Company; Shadowlands starring Hugh Bonneville at Chichester Festival Theatre and Half a Sixpence, which transferred to the West End winning multiple awards; The Taming of the Shrew starring Sheridan Smith at The Open Air Theatre, Regent’s 

Park; As You Like It and Love’s Labours Lost, both starring Benedict Cumberbatch, and West End productions of The Wind in The Willows and The Great British Bake Off Musical.

After receiving its world premiere at the Theatre Royal Brighton in 1970, Sleuth transferred to the West End a month later, before playing for twelve years in London and New York, and winning a Tony Award for Best Play.

In 1972, Sleuth was adapted by Anthony Shaffer into a hugely successful film starring Laurence Olivier as Andrew Wyke and Michael Caine as Milo Tindle. Caine returned to the thriller in 2007, this time playing Wyke alongside Jude Law as Tindle, directed by Kenneth Branagh with a screenplay by Harold Pinter.

Anthony Shaffer received Edgar Awards from the Mystery Writers of America for both the stage and the screen versions of Sleuth, Best Play in 1971 and Best Screenplay in 1973.  His other major screenplays included the Hitchcock thriller Frenzy, the British cult thriller The Wicker Man and Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile.