The Duke of York’s Theatre, one of the West End venues owned by ATG Entertainment, will be renamed the Tom Stoppard Theatre in honour of the late playwright. Delve into the highlights from the relationship between Tom Stoppard and ATG Entertainment, with key stagings that stretch from the 1970s to the present day.
Sir Tom Stoppard (3 July 1937- 29 November 2025) is considered one of Britain’s most outstanding playwrights. His plays have become known not just for their razor-sharp wit and masterful use of language but for his creative exploration of the human condition.
Announced today, the Duke of York’s Theatre will officially be renamed The Tom Stoppard Theatre during the coming weeks, in recognition of the playwright’s remarkable contributions to theatre.
Over the years, the venue has staged several Tom Stoppard plays, including the West End transfer of the critically acclaimed Arcadia, directed by Carrie Cracknell, which opens tonight.
Beyond this, Stoppard’s works have taken to the stage in many ATG venues. From multiple productions of one of his most recognisable plays to some of his lesser-known works, discover highlights from the long relationship between Stoppard and ATG Entertainment.
Production History: Tom Stoppard Plays at ATG Venues
1978: Night and Day at the Phoenix Theatre
Night and Day, written nearly 20 years into Stoppard’s illustrious career, is one of his lesser-known plays but no less important. It first premiered in 1978 at the Phoenix Theatre, starred John Thaw (Inspector Morse) and Dame Diana Rigg (Game of Thrones).
The show ran for two years and in 1978 won the Evening Standard Award for Best Play. Night and Day even made the leap across the Atlantic, enjoying a Broadway run starring Dame Maggie Smith (Downton Abbey).
Stoppard’s focus with this work was to satirise the British media. Drawing on his own journalistic background, Stoppard sets the play in a fictional copper-rich country on the African continent, where several competing journalists as they entrench themselves in the home of a local white mine owner, awaiting an impending internal war.
It’s an idiosyncratic work, in which the audience is presented with Stoppard’s sentiments on exploitation and corruption, journalistic ethics and freedom of the press through the lens of Ruth Carson, the wife of the mine owner.
1994: Travesties at the Savoy Theatre
When Stoppard became fascinated by the fact that three major historical figures were all living in Zürich, Switzerland in 1917, Travesties (1974) was the creative outcome. Centred around Henry Carr (also a historical figure, albeit a smaller one), the play recalls Carr’s encounters with the three men of interest: modernist author James Joyce, communist revolutionary Lenin, and Dada founder Tristan Tzara.
Originally produced by the RSC in 1974, the play returned to the West End in 1993, first at the Barbican and then at the Savoy Theatre. Also produced by the RSC, the revival of Travesties starred screen and stage star Antony Sher as Henry Carr.
The play itself has been acclaimed since it first premiered, winning two Tony Awards, a New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best Play and an Evening Standard Award for Best Comedy. Revivals of the play have also received plenty of accolades, including a WhatsOnStage Award, a Drama League Award and several Olivier and Tony Awards.
2006: Rock ’n’ Roll at The Tom Stoppard Theatre
Led by Tony and Olivier Award winning director Trevor Nunn (Cats, Les Misérables), Rock ’n’ Roll was originally staged at the Royal Court Theatre in 2006 before it transferred to The Tom Stoppard Theatre (formerly the Duke of York’s).
The cast included heavyweight actors Rufus Sewell as Cambridge graduate student Jan and Brian Cox as his mentor and Marxist professor Max.
With a timeline that’s spread out over several decades, the play explores the significance of rock and roll in the emergence of the socialist movement in Eastern-Bloc Czechoslovakia, the country where Stoppard was born.
Jan has returned home to Prague with his suitcase full of Western music that puts a target on his back, while Max struggles with his ideals in the face of the political situation unfolding.
Cox later said in a piece written for the Guardian following the playwright’s passing that, ‘what distinguished Tom as a writer were his clear and purposeful ideas. He knew what his purpose was in everything he wrote.’
2009 & 2026: Arcadia at The Tom Stoppard Theatre
Following a critically acclaimed run at the Old Vic, Arcadia returns to the Tom Stoppard Theatre for the second time. Considered one is one of Tom Stoppard’s essential works, Arcadia first played at the venue in 2009.
Directed by David Leveaux, the revival featured a cast that included Dan Stevens (Downton Abbey, The Heiress), Samantha Bond (Downton Abbey, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels) and Jessie Cave (Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince). In a review of the 2009 production, Michael Billings of The Guardian commented that the play ‘gets richer with each viewing.’
How fortuitous then that Arcadia returns to the soon to be The Tom Stoppard Theatre for another captivating run, this time directed by Carrie Cracknell (The Grapes of Wrath, The Deep Blue Sea).
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