Channel 4 to air theatrical event The Vote on Election Night 2015

3 November 2014

 

On the night of next year’s general election, Channel 4 and the Donmar Warehouse will unite for a unique theatrical and television event. The Vote is a new play that takes place in a polling station during the last 90 minutes of voting on Election Day 2015. At exactly the same time as the fictional action is set – 8.30pm to 10pm on 7th May 2015 – the play will be broadcast live from the Donmar Warehouse on More4.

The Vote is written by the award-wining playwright James Graham and directed by Artistic Director of the Donmar Josie Rourke who are reuniting for the first time following their celebrated collaboration on Privacy. The play will have a short run at the Donmar before being broadcast live on its final night. The project has been commissioned from Twofour by John Hay, Commissioning Editor for Arts, and David Brindley, Commissioning Editor for Documentaries. The Executive Producer for Twofour is David Clews.

The way that the production is being filmed for television is also innovative. Twofour will, for the first time, bring the fixed rig technology used for their own hit Educating… series (and for other Channel 4 documentaries including 24 Hours in A&E and One Born Every Minute) into the theatre, allowing them to capture the performance in a more sophisticated way.

The play will see a roll call of some of the UK’s most admired actors in a state-of-the-nation response to one of the most important yet peculiar rituals we have. This is not a play about the upcoming election but about elections everywhere: the right to be counted, the characters we meet in these most unglamorous of settings which is where history turns.

It will also be a snapshot of Britain in 2015. There is barely any other real-world precinct left where people of all classes, race, age and faith must physically turn up, as themselves, cheek-by-jowl with their neighbours, in order to fulfil their civic responsibility. In any given constituency this means bankers queue up behind immigrants who stand behind anarchists who wait behind priests.

Cast announcements will follow in the new year.

Channel 4 Commissioning Editor for Arts John Hay commented: “Channel 4’s arts programming is all about collaborating with people who can open up new perspectives on the big social and political questions of the day through their work, so this is a perfect project for us. The Donmar already have an enviable track record on that front, and the use of the rig, along with the creation of a moment when the drama exactly parallels real life, promise a ground-breaking piece of event television. We’re delighted to be working with such a stellar team.”

Kate Pakenham, Donmar Executive Producer said: “It’s so exciting to have Josie and James reunite to create another incisive and urgent play for our times. Equally, we’re thrilled to be working in partnership with Channel 4 to realise our ambitions around this production – a broadcaster whose creativity and innovation reflects perfectly the Donmar’s own values. This partnership will enable us to broaden the reach of the play, bringing the Donmar into living rooms all around the UK live and in real time on the night of the election, in a first for British theatre.”

David Clews, Twofour's Creative Director, said: “It's fantastic to be collaborating with Josie Rourke, James Graham and the Donmar. For a number of years we've been using the fixed rig to make some of C4's most successful documentaries, enabling us to tell stories with real intimacy. To be taking this technology into a completely new, dramatic space is incredibly exciting.”

This live broadcast television event will be preceded by a limited run at the Donmar from 24 April – 7 May 2015. Tickets will be available via a ballot.

James Graham (Writer) returns to the Donmar following his recent play Privacy. James’s other theatre credits include the new Broadway musical Finding Neverland, produced by Harvey Weinstein, the olivier-nominated This House, (National Theatre); The Whisky Taster (Bush Theatre) and Tory Boyz (Soho Theatre).Television credits include the upcoming political drama Coalition (Channel4); Prisoner’s Wives(BBC1) and Caught In A Trap (ITV1).

For Film, his feature X Plus Y (BBC Films/ BFI/ Origin pictures) opened at the Toronto and then the London Film Festivals, due for release March 2015. Films in development include Mrs Queen for the Weinstein Company, and Gypsy Boy for BBC Films.

Josie Rourke (Director) is Artistic Director of the Donmar Warehouse where she is currently directing City of Angels. Also at the Donmar she has directed The Recruiting Officer, The Physicists, Berenice, The Weir (which transferred to Wyndham’s Theatre), Coriolanus (which was broadcast to cinemas around the world in partnership with National Theatre Live) and James Graham’s play Privacy. In 2013 she directed The Machine, a new play by Matt Charman, as part of the Manchester International Festival, which also played at Park Avenue Armory, New York. Rourke trained at the Donmar, under Sam Mendes, through the theatre’s annual Resident Assistant Director Scheme. Prior to the Donmar, she was Artistic Director at the Bush Theatre, London, from 2007 to 2011. Her 2010 production of Men Should Weep by Ena Lamont Stewart ran in the Lyttelton at the National Theatre. In 2011 her production of Much Ado About Nothing, starring David Tennant and Catherine Tate, ran in the West End at Wyndham’s Theatre and received an Olivier Award nomination for Best Revival.