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Fairview at the Young Vic cast celebrate opening night with Joss Whedon among guests

Jackie Sibblies Drury’s play runs at the London venue this winter

| London |

9 December 2019

Nicola Hughes (Beverly), David Dawson (Mack), Julie Dray (Bets), Rhashan Stone (Dayton), Naana Agyei-Ampadu (Jasmine), Esther Smith (Suze), Matthew Needham (Jimbo) and Donna Banya (Keisha)
© Dan Wooller for WhatsOnStage

The cast and creative team celebrated the opening night of Fairview on 5 December, with guests including Joss Whedon and Olivia Williams.

Jackie Sibblies Drury's Pulitzer Prize-winning play will run at the Young Vic until 18 January. Naana Agyei-Ampadu, Donna Banya, Nicola Hughes and Rhashan Stone lead the cast, accompanied by David Dawson, Julie Dray, Matthew Needham and Esther Smith.

Members of the Fairview company — Members of the *Fairview* company
© Dan Wooller for WhatsOnStage

The play follows the Frasier family as they gather to celebrate their Grandma's birthday. Sibblies Drury's work won the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize for women playwrights and the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, beating Heidi Schreck's What the Constitution Means to Me and Clare Barron's Dance Nation which played at the Almeida Theatre in 2018. Barron's new play, Dirty Crusty, ran at the Yard Theatre this autumn.

Jessica Hung Han Yun (lighting designer), Xana (sound designer), Nadia Latif (director), Tom Scutt (designer), Jackie Sibblies Drury (author) and Malik Nashad Sharpe (choreographer)
© Dan Wooller for WhatsOnStage

With Young Vic Genesis fellow and associate director Nadia Latif directing, the production's design is by Tom Scutt, lighting design by Jessica Hung Han Yun, sound design and composition by Xana, choreography by Malik Nashad Sharpe and casting by Charlotte Sutton, with assistant direction by Rob Awosusi and trainee assistant direction by Yasmin Hafesji.

WhatsOnStage's Sarah Crompton described Fairview as "devastatingly intelligent and fiercely passionate", as well as "a vital contribution to the debate around identity politics".